The Perfect Pick-Me-Up!

What do you send someone who is sick, recovering from an illness or has just found out they are pregnant? I always struggle with this. I love to give gifts that are both practical and meaningful, so sometimes flowers just don’t cut it.

I have recently discovered a wonderful product called Comfort Crunch www.comfortcrunch.com. A woman in my hometown, Lambie Stout, started creating this product with her young daughter right after she had been diagnosed with breast cancer. I find her story inspiring. It is worth visiting her website just to read the background on this delicious treat.

The Comfort Crunch she created is one of the few things that Lambie found palatable during her extensive chemotherapy treatments. I remember being pregnant and unable to eat much for the first three months. The next time a close friend of mine is in this situation, I am sending them some Comfort Crunch. For years I have tried to find that perfect little gift to send someone who is feeling down, and now I have found it!

The original Comfort Crunch is made with an assortment of peanuts, cashews and dried fruit. She also offers 3 more unique flavors: Pepita-Pick-Me-Up, Toffee Talk and Ginger-In-A-Snap which throws fun items like sunflower seeds, chocolate, ginger and old-fashioned toffee into the mix. Every flavor is low in sodium!

Did I mention that a percentage of the profits from Comfort Crunch go to furthering cancer research projects? Like I said, this product makes the PERFECT gift!

Just what we love to hear!

With my sister's bridal shower coming up, I had been searching for a meaningful gift rather than something off her registry. She had presented me with a scrapbook at my shower years ago, but I simply didn't have the time to manually compile one...that's when I turned to Bellflower Books. It was such a great concept - everything was done electronically and I could watch the letters and pictures be submitted by all of her friends. It was so easy - and I didn't have to check the mailbox, go to a store and buy a scrapbook and all the accessories, it was all done for me! When I received the book in the mail I knew right away everyone would love it! The design was beautiful and the letters and pictures just added to the keepsake. My sister opened it at her shower and was so surprised...it was truly a cherished gift. Thanks Bellflower!

~Jennifer Noel

Meaningful Gift Found on Vacation...

A big thanks to Emma Justice and Corinna Sager from Lifestyle International...two lovely ladies who were semi-strangers before tonight (I briefly met Corinna at the Harbor Springs Zoll Street dog park 2 days ago and my dog, Lulu, fell in love with her!).

These ladies graciously relinquished part of their dinner conversation tonight to help brainstorm ways to position, promote and communicate ideas about Bellflower Books and for that we are very grateful. How's that for proof that meaningful gifts can, indeed, come in small packages???

What a nice reminder to end the day...you never know who you might meet as long as you're willing to strike up a conversation. Thanks, ladies!

Check out their company at www.lifestyleintl.com.

"Lifestyle International is a boutique communications agency for live presentations, marketing events, trade shows, meetings, video/TV productions and digital media, serving a broad spectrum of clients around the globe.

Simply put: We bring projects to Life, with Style.

Live . Video . Digital"

Meaningful Wedding Gifts

When we created http://bellflowerbooks.com we thought our extremely personalized Bellflower Books would be just perfect for weddings. Here are some great ideas for how to use http://bellflowerbooks.com to create meaningful wedding and bridal shower gifts that your loved ones can treasure forever!

Document the Engagement

A close friend of mine created the most priceless wedding themed Bellflower Book that I have ever seen. She put together a book (as a surprise!) documenting her sister's year long engagement. She started with the engagement story and a photograph of that night and finished with a beautiful love letter from her fiance. She used the collaboration function to collect meaningful letters from family, close friends and future in-laws. The finished product was amazing! She managed to capture every special detail from dress shopping, to choosing invitations, showers, the bachelorette party and every other important event. I would have killed to have someone put together a book like this for me!

Creative Bachelorette Party Gift

Honestly, how many pairs of cheesy under ware does a girl really need? The bachelorette party usually consists of the bride's closest friends, so what a great group to work together and create a book full of funny memories, sentimental stories and good wishes. Make sure to include the moms in this one and any other friend or family member not able to make it to the actual party. You can all have fun looking through the book together and sharing funny memories! Make sure to split the cost of the book up between all the girls! This makes for a great personalized gift for around the cost of a greeting card!

Book of Love and Advice - Perfect for a Bridal Shower

Marriage is an adjustment for everyone, so a book full of love and advice from experienced loved ones is just what every bride needs! Have Moms, Grandmas, Aunts, Cousins and close friends all contribute letters of love, advice and encouragement. Even those who have not been married can write about the special qualities the the bride possesses which are sure to bring her happiness in the future!

A Group Cookbook

I remember trying to cook after I first got married. What a nightmare! Luckily my mom had put together a cookbook full of special family recipes. She even included photos of our friends and family eating together. I think that this would be such a wonderful thing to do for any bride and the collaboration function at http://bellflowerbooks.com makes the creation of this special book extremely easy. Invite friends and relatives to contribute their favorite recipe. They can choose to add a photo of themselves, the food or of family and friends eating the food! This way every time the new bride goes to cook dinner she is not only aided by a book full of great recipes, she is reminded of everyone who loves her!

Wedding Memories

This is one of my favorites! The bride or a bridesmaid can send out a Bellflower Books invitation to contribute to all of the wedding guests a few days before the wedding. This invitation can tell the guests to have their cameras ready to snap their favorite moment from the wedding in order to contribute it to your collaborative memory book. How fun would it be to have memories and photographs of your wedding from the guests' perspective! I think this would be especially fun with destination weddings! A good photographer can only capture so much, it tends to be your friends and loved ones, who know you the best, who take the most intimate photographs. This would be a priceless record of the most important day of your life!

Celebrate Teachers!

We hope to do a lot of good with our product. We figure that a nice way to start spreading the word is to donate books to outstanding people who truly deserve to feel loved and appreciated.

A good friend of ours is a teacher at the local elementary school that we both attended. A few months ago she was talking about the upcoming retirement of two of her favorite co-workers. We thought that a Bellflower Book would be the perfect way to honor their educational career. Kerry and I decided to donate books to these teachers and we were fortunate enough to have our friend Molly coordinate the effort.

The books turned out beautifully. We both had teachers for parents so we know how hard teachers work and how much they deserve to be appreciated. It made us extremely happy to be able to use our product to honor such wonderful women. Kerry also coordinated efforts with the parents of the students in her son’s preschool class. They worked together to produce books for the preschool teachers as end of the year gifts. These books were full of poems, letters and memories from the school year and priceless photographs of the students. They made enough copies of the book for each teacher to receive one. Using www.bellflowerbooks.com was a great way for people to communicate their appreciation for these extremely special people!

Let's bring meaningful gifts back!

With so much bad news dominating our media each day, I think it's time to focus on the positive and get back to what really matters...LOVE & RELATIONSHIPS. That's what this blog is all about. Telling people why they are loved and doing it in the form of a Meaningful Gift.

"Huh?" you say. "I don't get it..."

As a bit of background, I'm starting this blog in conjunction with a web-based business that my good friend & I started about two months ago. It's called www.BellflowerBooks.com and it's all about creating a custom book to tell somebody why they are loved and appreciated. I challenge you to think of a more Meaningful Gift than a collection of letters and photos from all your closest friends & family members bound into a beautiful, hardcover keepsake book.

Since we're in the thick of wedding season, I'll give you one example of how to spread our Meaningful Gift Revolution when you need a special bridal shower gift. Imagine the soon-to-be- blushing bride at her bridal shower. She opens a gift and it contains a hard cover book. She is stumped and thinks to herself..."What is this?" She opens it to find that all of her dearest friends (many of whom are present at the shower) have taken the time to share their favorite memories, advice for a happy marriage, and affirmations of why she is so important in this Bellflower Book. And isn't that just what the joyous times in life should be about...spending time with the people you love and knowing that you are loved in return???

I hope to inspire YOU to slow down and think about what is going on in the lives of those who mean the most to you. Is somebody going through something particularly challenging? Is somebody celebrating something wonderful? If so, join our Meaningful Gift Revolution and shower them with love, support and appreciation in a Bellflower Book.