Many mother-daughter book clubs I have been in touch with like to do crafts before they sit down to talk about the book they have read. While some change up their crafts for every meeting and match it to something in the book, others make a bookmark each time. Inspired by something in the book they’re are discussing, these bookmarks also act as scattered scrapbooks, reminding members of the titles they have read over the years.

Bookmarks are easy to make. You can start by looking for a template to download or create your own blank bookmarks using card stock or colored paper. Creativity-Portal.com (www.creativity-portal.com) offers several templates for you to download, print and cut out. Just enter “bookmark template” in the search box on the website. If you prefer to make your own template, Creativity Portal provides instructions for that too.

You’ll want to gather everything you need for making the bookmarks before everyone arrives for the meeting. Items you may want to have on hand include glue, scissors, glitter, no. 2 pencils, colored pencils, blank paper, rulers, and stickers. You could even gather images from magazines that the girls can cut out to make a collage. Or you could paint images on paper with watercolor or acrylics.

Once everyone is gathers around at the meeting, you can encourage them to think of something from the book that they especially liked or remember. Then have them draw a rough draft of what they have in mind on  blank paper. Once the rough draft is done, you can spend about 20 minutes or so actually creating those images on the stock that will be the finished bookmark.

If you want to make the bookmarks last even with heavy use through multiple books over the years, you can seal them between two sheets of laminate paper (found in office supply stores). Another idea is to keep them between the pages of the books that inspired them. Then if you pick them up to read again you’ll get a little surprise and some insight into what made an impression on you the first time you read the book.

As with any activity, make sure to keep it fun. Conversations you start while cutting, pasting, painting or putting on other decorations can spill over to book talk that comes up later.