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How Nuts & Bolts Paper Co was born (pun intended)...

I remember the day I landed in Colorado.

Just me, 2 kids under the age of three - hungry and tired from the flight - and my dad, who came along as a helper. We met my husband at baggage claim, who had arrived ahead of us in our only vehicle, filled to the brim with our belongings.

I remember walking into the condo he had rented us sight unseen; a mixture of disappointment in its mediocrity and an excitement for the adventure ahead.

I remember saying goodbye to my dad at the airport a few days later, sobbing as I drove away; knowing I was now alone in a city full of strangers. We had moved away from everyone and everything… what now?

I remember taking a pregnancy test 6 months later in the tiny, upstairs bathroom, uttering a 4-letter word when it said “positive.” I had made one friend so far in Colorado, I had two young kids, my husband worked full-time and traveled often, and I had no idea how I was going to grow and raise another human being without a support system.

I also worked long hours trying to grow my little stationery company, which at the time only made me a few hundred dollars each month; but I had a dream to turn it into something bigger.

It was somewhere around month 6 of my pregnancy that I began looking for a simple baby book. Documenting was important to me; we had just started a new journey in our life and this child would be our first native Coloradan. I didn’t want to forget this time, as frightening and foreign as it was.

With 3 kids, little help, and a business to run, I knew that whatever documenting I did with baby #3 had to be simple. Unable to find something I liked, I decided to just make my own.

And that’s when Nuts & Bolts Paper Co was truly founded.

I designed what I knew. A baby book that fit my own needs; something short and to the point, but still pretty (I hate cheesy). It covered the necessary details for each month of baby’s first year, with space for a few highlights and a photo.

This baby book was intentionally designed to work with the memories saved on my phone… so I could easily open my photos, select my favorites to print, grab their dates and recall the moments that accompanied them to jot down in my baby book – whether it was one week after it occurred or 3 months. It was going to be a foolproof way to document my baby’s first year of life, and I was determined to actually finish it (third babies always seem to be forgotten about in the world of memory-keeping, after all).

As the product line grew, so did the ideas. Soon, I had memory books and products that would help mamas document each school year or their entire pregnancy journey. Milestone cards were a great way to capture quick photo memories, and quote books were a fun spot to jot down the hilarious things children said each day before their words were long forgotten.

I fell in love with the idea of simple memory keeping; founded on the reality of a lonely young mom in a foreign place, and with little time and energy to devote to much beyond keeping her kids alive and dinner on the table.

This became the heart of Nuts & Bolts Paper Co.

A memory-keeping company for all moms who want (and need) easy documenting for the years they never want to forget – the hard years, the weird years, the fun years, the years that were formative in their family’s history, the years where they felt alone, the years where everything changed for them.

Our customizable memory books help parents of all types (single moms, two-parent families, same-sex families, adoptive families) document pregnancy - elementary years and beyond with simple prompts, not too many pages, and a focus on photos and basic journaling. We want to help them create keepsakes that they and their kids will treasure for years to come, with memories in their own words and their own handwriting.

Despite living in an increasingly digital world, Nuts & Bolts Paper Co still strongly believes in the beauty of a blurry photograph taken through laughter, and the messy handwriting of a sleep-deprived mom.

And you know what the best part is? I actually finished filling in that damn baby book.

xo, Amy
Founder & Designer

p.s. I'm so glad you're here! Feel free to reach out with product questions or wholesale inquiries.