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How to print 5.5″ by 8.5″ templates in Adobe Reader

How to print 5.5 by 8.5 templates at home by Ahhh Design #diyplanner #discbound #printing

Now that I’m using my smaller planner I’ve had a lot of questions about printing the 5.5″ by 8.5″ planner templates. I always recommend using Adobe Reader – it’s a free application and I’ve ran into less troubleshooting issues with it than other options.

If your settings don’t look exactly like the screenshots below it’s ok – you should still have all the same options. These were taken from Adobe Reader 11 on a Mac running OS X 10.9.5.

Print Settings

After opening the file select Print underneath File in the application menu. This opens the print dialogue box.

Adobe Reader > File > Print:

You’ll see that the default set-up is for 8.5″ by 11″ paper. To change this we need to add 5.5″ by 8.5″ as an option. In the bottom left corner select Page Setup.

Print Dialogue Box > Page Setup:

From here we want to change the Paper Size. When clicking on that item you’ll see a big list of common paper sizes. Scroll down to the bottom and select Manage Custom Sizes.

Page Setup Box > Paper Size > Manage Custom Sizes:
The left side will show a list of all your custom paper sizes you’ve added. Underneath select the + symbol to add a new one. This creates an Untitled file at the bottom of the list.

Click into Untitled and type 5.5 by 8.5. Then fill in the area to the right with the dimensions. When you select your printer from Non-Printable Area: it should fill in the top, left, right and bottom margins for you.

Custom Paper Sizes - How to print 5.5 by 8.5 templates at home by Ahhh Design #diyplanner #discbound #printing

Select OK!

You should be back in the Page Setup window. Here select your printer under Format For:, under Paper Size: select 5.5 by 8.5 and for Orientation: select the little icon standing upright. Like this:

Select OK!

The adjustments in the Print Dialogue Box will depend on your printer and if you want to print the pages individually or all at once. I print all my templates one at a time onto 5.5 by 8.5 paper as I need them – even the months.

Here I’m going to use printing out the 12 months – one at a time – as an example:

On the print screen select your Printer first and make sure the print preview is showing your template the right direction and fitting within your paper. Under Pages to Print > Pages type in 1-12.

The Page Sizing & Handling area will depend on your printer. I scale mine down to 94% so that none of the page is cut off. Yours might be more or less, you really just have to do a test page and adjust it accordingly. Try the Fit option first, hopefully that will work for you.

Printing!

Before we hit Print think about the first month you’re printing. If you start with January do you want it to be on the right side of your planner or on the left so that February is directly across from it in a two month spread? Depending on your preference January should be printed on a sheet by itself or with February on the back.

For this example we’ll have February printed on the back of January so that all months are double sided.

Place ONE sheet of paper in printer.
Hit Print!
Take printed month out of the printer, flip it over and put it back in to print the next month on the other side.
Repeat adding and flipping paper until finished.

It’s important to have only one sheet of paper in the printer at a time or else it will keep printing all the pages on a single side. This way it prints once and then the printer alerts you that you’re out of paper while you flip it over and put it back inside. You could always print the months out one at a time – instead of all 12 – but that adds a bunch of extra clicking around.

Bulk Printing
If you’re doing a huge daily dated set for a year I can see how you’d definitely want to print all at once using the even/odd settings. Laura from I Heart Planners has a great explanation (Steps 3. and 4.) of printing all your pages at once or even printing them 2-up on 8.5″ by 11″ so that when you cut them they’ll be double sided in the right order. Awesome!

Please let me know if something doesn’t work for you or if any part of this is confusing so I can make it better! Good luck and happy planning! xo

Painted Onesies

Photo by Alisa Burke, http://alisaburke.blogspot.com/

I recently discovered Alisa Burke and was very inspired by her funky baby pants. I spent a while looking through her MANY awesome tutorials – she makes really cool art too. In her post, Messy Dress Tutorial, she talks a little about the Fabric Paint Cannon. The next day I was at Michaels, they had ONE left and it was on sale! YES! I’m not big into fancy tools but this is really neat, I’m already thinking of lots of different ways to use it.

Painted Onesie Tutorial

Supplies:

* Blank Onesie
* Fabric Paint Cannon
* Tulip Soft Fabric Paint
* Tulip Slick Fabric Paint, in black for outlining
* Sponge brush
* Cardboard
* Stencils and Stamps

First I laid the onesie out on my piece of cardboard (beer box, haha) and traced around it. I cut that out and placed the onesie on it, careful not to stretch it out to much. I put a little squirt of soft paint into the cannon, added some water and shook it up really well. The more water you add the more subtle your background will be. I love how it gives it a watercolor affect. I quickly framed where I wanted the background to be with cardboard to protect the rest of the fabric. Then I used the cannon and lightly misted the area.

I picked up a pack of animal stencils at Michaels too, so cute. I just placed the stencil where I wanted it and used the sponge brush to dab a light amount of paint inside. Then I used the black paint and outlined the animal – I chose this black because of the nice point it has for application built in. The letters were done with large foam stamps, I used the same soft paint and sponge brush to apply paint to them.

And that’s it, Ta-da! SO easy. I waited 24 hours and washed them inside out to set the paint and make sure it didn’t bleed. The two above were test runs. I have a new little buddy who had a birthday and wanted to make him something special, I think it turned out pretty cute. Yay for babies!

Add ‘Pin it’ to WordPress Theme

Pinterest has a ‘Pin It’ button available for websites in the ‘Goodies‘ section now. It’s much like the Twitter and Facebook buttons you see EVERYwhere. I added a bit so you can use it in your WordPress theme.

With the following code this button can go on your index, single or archive pages – anywhere the WordPress loop appears. It will automatically pull the first image from the post to be pinned and link to the post’s permalink. The title of the post along with the website url will appear in the description field but can be edited before it’s posted.

Place this code in your template where you want the ‘Pin It’ button to appear – it should be inside The Loop.

<a href="http://pinterest.com/pin/create/button/?url=<?php the_permalink() ?>&media=<?php echo pinterest_image() ?>&description=<?php the_title(); ?> on <?php bloginfo('url'); ?>" class="pin-it-button" count-layout="horizontal">Pin It</a>

Place this script in your footer.php file, just before the closing tag.

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://assets.pinterest.com/js/pinit.js"></script>

Put the following code in your functions.php file.

function pinterest_image() {
  global $post, $posts;
  $first_img = '';
  ob_start();
  ob_end_clean();
  $output = preg_match_all('/<img.+src=[\'"]([^\'"]+)[\'"].*>/i', $post->post_content, $matches);
  $first_img = $matches [1] [0];
  if(empty($first_img)){ //Defines a default image
    $first_img = "/images/default.jpg";
  }
  return $first_img;
}

You can change /images/default.jpg to whatever you’d like. This image will be pinned if there’s not an image in the post.

Be really careful in your functions.php file, it’s a little touchier than what you might be used to. The first thing I ever broke in one was putting a space after the closing ?> – it’ll break your whole site! Always back up your files before you start changing things.

Easy as that, happy pinning!

P.S. Before you ask a question about your WordPress theme please do a quick google or codex search – If you still can’t figure it out ask away and I’ll try my best to help when I can!

.
UPDATE!
Due to Pinterest’s huge popularity now, there are tons of plugins available that will do this for you. I just did a quick search and this one looks good. WP Beginner also shows a different method that doesn’t involve the function file.

4×6 Monthly Booklet Tutorial

A couple of weeks ago I posted 4×6 monthly & weekly diy planner templates and then the 4×6 Index Card Folder Tutorial. Below is a tutorial to create the little booklet made from 4×6 Index Cards that fits in the little folder!

Supplies

[Download not found]
4×6 Index Cards
Printer that prints 4×6
Sewing Machine or needle/thread
Exacto Knife
Optional: Rounded corner hole punch

Directions

First, make sure your printer is set-up to print on 4×6 Index Cards – do a test run on a scrap sheet with the first page of the [Download not found]. When it’s ready put 7 Index Cards in the printer and open the print dialog box. It might not look like my example but there should be a spot to select Odd Pages Only.

This will print pages 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11 and 13. When finished take your stack of cards, flip them over and put them back in the printer – making sure they’re the right direction. Then go into the print dialog and select Even Pages Only and print. This will print pages 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12 and 14 on the other side of the Index Cards.

The first time I printed the booklet I used scrap paper and light/grayscale ink to test – especially since every printer is different. Also, if you want to print the calendar out and NOT make a booklet don’t use the above PDF – the left side doesn’t match up with the right side. :)

Once they’re all printed, fold each sheet in half. Use a bone folder, scissors or fat marker to smooth out the crease and get it nice and flat. Stack them all together and double check that they are in the right order. When looking at your opened stack the bottom page should be January then February, March, April, May, June and July. The first decorative page of the PDF will be the outside of the booklet.

When they’re stacked together, a glance from the top down will show you how uneven the edge of the booklet is. This is because of the width of the spine and varies depending on the thickness of your paper. I like to push the pages together and trim the edge of the booklet so it’s even.

I then went through every corner of the booklet and rounded it off, the inside corners too. This is optional!

Now it’s ready to bind together! A quick search on google will show you a million different ways to do this – since I’m lazy and love my sewing machine I just opened the stack up and stitched right down the middle to attach them all together.

I wanted to add some little tabs for fun, they’re mostly decorative and honestly don’t help with much functionally. I made a little mark on each page getting lower with each one. I then cut off a small slice below each mark down to the bottom. Redo the rounded punch on the bottom corner of each page and that’s it!

4×6 Index Card Folder Tutorial

A simple 4×6 index card folder tutorial to hold your monthly, weekly and meeting diy planner templates!

This folder is very similar to the DIY Cardboard Binder, just a little smaller with binder clips and velcro instead of binder rings and elastic.

Supplies

Two sheets of heavy decorative scrapbook paper
Sewing machine or glue
Two binder clips
Small piece of velcro

Plans

Directions

Because the length of the folder needs to be 17 inches, I sewed some cut up 12×12 scrapbook sheets together to get there. If you have a sheet of 17″ paper or cardboard skip the first 4 steps and just cut two pieces of 4×17 rectangles.

Take the 12×12 scrap book paper and cut it into 2 strips of 4 by 12.
Cut two more pieces to 4 x 6.
Take one 4×12 and one 4×6 and lay it out so that it’s 4×17 – giving you an inch overlap for gluing or sewing. This will be the inside of your folder.
Repeat for the outside.
Attach the front and back with glue or by sewing around the edges. Sewing gives the paper a more flexible and sturdy feel, it’s also fun to use the stitches as part of the design.
At this point, you should have a double sided 4×17 rectangle. Mark lightly where the folds will go – see the dimensions diagram above. Finish decorating by drawing, stitching, painting, adding stickers or sprinkling with fairy dust! Keep in mind that we still have to make the folds, so your decoration should hold up to this.
Next, add the three folds – hold a ruler against the fold mark on your desk and push the flap up against it, this will give you a nice straight fold. My paper split on one side during folding so I went over the fold with a wide zig zag stitch to reinforce the edges.
The last step is to add velcro. Stitch one piece onto the inside right flap, then close the folder and line up the other side on the outside flap.

And you’re done! Use the binder clips to hold two stacks of 4×6 index cards (or the booklet pictured, tutorial and download here!) on each side.

DIY Cardboard Binder

If you want to make a fast and easy binder this is it. You probably have all the parts to put it together just sitting around your house right now!

Supplies

Gluestick and hot glue gun
Flat Cardboard (not corrugated). Could be a cereal box, packaging or shoe box… get creative!
Cheap 2-ring 3×5 notecard binder, or any old small planner or binder
Pieces, parts, stickers, envelopes and scraps for collaging
File folders or thicker paper for dividers, heavy scrapbooking paper works great
♥ DIY Planner Templates to fill the inside!

First, pull out the 2-ring binder clip from your 3×5 notebook. Directions for this and attaching the clip here. Decide what size paper you’d like, poke holes in it and hook it on the binder ring. Measure all the way around this – remember to measure for any tabs you’d like to include plus a little extra on the edges. This will be the width and height of Part A and Part C in the diagram above. The width of Part B should be as high as your binder clip plus a little extra. Part D can be whatever width you’d like really. It can be shorter and fold inside or outside, it can be wide as Part A and Part C or even a funky shape.

Once you figure out your sizes add the widths together and cut out one strip of cardboard. The cardboard I used was thinner than I would like so I cut out two pieces the same size and glued them together. Now make your folds, decorate and add the binder clip!

The pocket on Part A is optional. I cut out a piece of the same cardboard and attached it with hot glue on 3 sides. The closure is a piece of off-white elastic from Joann’s. Stretch it around the closed notebook to get the right length. Then cut two slits in the spine to feed it through. On the outside sew the ends together and you’re done.

Happy binding!

The Bee Planner

I’ve been doing a lot of research on binder-making techniques the last couple of weeks. In the ‘Binder Series‘ I’ll show you my take on ’em and what I learned along the way.

First up is a quick tutorial on the first binder I ever made, The Bee Planner!

The Bee Planner

A few years ago I made my first binder, a gift for my brother ‘n law. I completely hacked it together but here’s what I can remember.

Materials

→ Cheap 2-ring 3×5 notecard binder from office supply store
→ Vinyl, from the uphostery section at JoAnns
→ Bumble bee fabric**
→ Photocopies of CD Artwork**
→ Tissue Paper
→ Cardboard or bookboard
→ Short bolt with flat head, nut and 2 grommets. Might be a good idea to bring your metal binder clip with you to the hardware/craft store to make sure all the sizes match up.
♥ DIY Planner Templates to fill the inside!

** These can be whatever, always remember to make it your own!

First, rip out the 2-ring metal binder piece from your cheapo 3×5 notecard binder. Once it’s off the plastic use pliers to pull out the little brads that were holding it in place so you’re left with two holes on each side. If the metal bends while pulling out the brads just straighten it out with the pliers.

Music is ‘Folly’ by Sam Squarewave

Put the paper you’d like in the metal binder clip and measure from the very left point to the very right. Your bottom board will need to be this big or wider. If you plan on having page dividers with tabs include those in the width as well. Measure the height of the binder rings, your spine will need to be this wide + the thickness of the bottom board + a little extra to be safe.

The front and spine are made of paper (photocopies, collages, drawings) or fabric. The back should be bookboard or cardboard to give it a little weight. All three pieces are covered with clear vinyl on both sides.

Once everything is ready to sew pin it together and stitch around the edges. Also do a stitch up and down through the seems between the front, spine and back. Give yourself plenty of extra vinyl around the edges so sewing is simple… then trim the excess off after.

Vinyl sewing tips!
A sewing machine with a good strong needle will sew through a layer of paper/fabric and two pieces of vinyl easily. The problem is that the vinyl sticks to everything… the foot and the feed. This is where the tissue paper comes in. Put a sheet on the bottom and on the top before sewing:
tissue → vinyl → paper → vinyl → tissue
Once the sewing is done the tissue paper will rip off easily.

Attaching the binder rings

Once the front, spine and back are complete place the metal binder rings on the far left of the back board. Mark inside the holes on each side of the hardware. Use a sharp tool or hammer and nail to create a hole through the entire back piece the size of your grommet. It’s best to make it a little bit smaller and squeeze the grommet in, better than having a hole too big! Put it in so that the pretty side is on the outside of the binder.

Once the grommets are in place use the screws to secure the rings to the board with the flat head of the screw on the outside. Voila!

Like I mentioned in the beginning, I really hacked this binder together. Plus I’m writing this from memory so if something doesn’t work out quite right I warned you! There are a few pictures of this planner on flickr, view ‘all sizes’ to see bigger versions for more detail.

Thanks for reading, hope its helpful!

tutorial » Archive

Print Settings

Here I’m going to use printing out the 12 months – one at a time – as an example:

Printing!

Painted Onesie Tutorial

Supplies:

Place this code in your template where you want the ‘Pin It’ button to appear – it should be inside The Loop.

Place this script in your footer.php file, just before the closing tag.

Put the following code in your functions.php file.

Easy as that, happy pinning!

UPDATE!

Supplies

Directions

Supplies

Plans

Directions

And you’re done! Use the binder clips to hold two stacks of 4×6 index cards (or the booklet pictured, tutorial and download here!) on each side.

Supplies

Happy binding!

The Bee Planner

Materials

Vinyl sewing tips!

Attaching the binder rings

Amanda Hawkins