I took a cue from Ali Edwards' On the Road scrapbook to get ready for our trip to Oregon:
I love how super simple it was to put together, and look forward to sharing it again in a few weeks. In the meantime, I'm hoping to figure out how to use photos from my phone in a typepad blog post so that I can share our journey as we're experiencing it. (If you have any tips, please share!)
I like to collect things to see if they'll present a bigger picture at some point (and if they don't, I'm a fan of tossing the whole lot in the recycling bin). With Juliet, most of her seasonal pages include a ticket stub or two -- that girl attends more plays than most adults I know. After creating the Fall page I showed last week, I decided to save up the theatre stubs from plays she saw with her dad or me for a whole year; the site of all those tickets tells the real story of our "play dates."
I'm not a big fan of using a whole scrapbook page to showcase the first time my kid ironed his own shirt, but I do like to include one page just for Christmas. Somehow in the rush of the holidays, I never seem to get that one gorgeous photo I'm longing for, so I content myself with using what I do have and then moving on. The little Christmas tag on this page is actually a mini-book with (brief!) memories of our holiday written inside.
Again, not one of my favorite schemes -- too many patterns in my little bin. This is what I get when I go to Archiver's without any preconceived idea of what I want to do. You'd think that would work well for me, but it just doesn't. What does work for me? Scraplifting. There are a few scrapbookers out there whose work I really like, and then I might randomly see a page that will inspire me...I like having a starting point and then adding my own style to it. (I invent nothing, I rediscover; remember?) When I'm starting a scheme, I'll often sketch out some page ideas that can be used later. I also jot down what my intentions are as far as how I'll do the titles (chipboard letters? stitching? my own writing? rubber stamps?).
To answer Chel's questions from yesterday, I usually work on these albums only 3 or 4 times a year -- usually a weekend after the holidays, a weekend or free day in the summer, and another day after school starts. I plan ahead before I'm going to work on them by getting my photos and memorabilia ready. (And the ingredients for each scheme are kept in a large zipper pouch, so I'm never digging for that part.)
I tend to order photos ahead of time -- some for my family album, some for the kids album. I always end up with a few leftovers, and sometimes I have to reorder a photo in a larger size. The waste is still minimal, and this is the system that works for me.
For the bits & pieces, I have a drawer in the kitchen where I stash everything -- cards the kids made, ticket stubs, notes I've written on scraps of paper, whatever I think I might use in our albums. I go through this drawer a few times a year & divide up the stuff. I used to have a hard time throwing these little mementos away if I didn't use them, but I am getting better at that! (Mostly I got sick of moving the stuff around from place to place within my not-very-large studio area. Letting go feels great.)
I don't spend a lot of time on each page. First, I have parameters -- these are the tools I have to choose from (the paper, colors, embellishments). Second, I have notes I've taken -- truly, scribbles -- with things I want to be sure to include. I keep our calendar nearby in case I need more ideas. Third, I have my photos ready. My goal is to tell the story, not to dwell on it, and then get back to the amazing life I have right now, creating more memories.
In 9 years of organizing my scrapbooks this way, the only downside I've discovered is once you've started a scheme for the year, you have to stay committed to it even if you don't really like it anymore. (In the end, what does it really matter?)
Here's the collection I started with:
Lots of leftovers, obviously. I used a few bits for accents, but mostly I stuck to my tried-and-true solid colors. And his scheme for this year? Red, kraft, black and white.
Thanks to a nudge from Caroline, I realized I hadn't posted any recent pages from my kids' scrapbook albums in quite awhile.
You may remember that (like most things) I have a system for keeping my mementos. In a nutshell, my kids get about 8 pages a year in their albums -- I can fill those 8 pages however I want, but I always stick to a central color & embellishment theme for each year. (I call that a scrapbook scheme.) You can read more about why I chose this method here and how I do it here.
When I last left off, I had shown a scheme for my son's 7th year. (Take a peek here.) Honestly, it was one of my favorite schemes ever. In fact, I enjoyed it so much I used the same system for my daughter when she turned 10 that year. Here's a glimpse at her pages:
On the Fall page, I used only ticket stubs & postcards for the many plays and performances she had attended over those few months. I thought that was more telling than a combination of photos + ephemera. I balanced that with the Spring page, which is almost all photos. I loved the whimsical lettering (letters cut out from patterned paper, then roughly outlined) and the hand-drawn details:
Next week, I'll share their most recent pages (F's scheme at age 8, and J's at age 11). Then I have some sewing projects that I'm excited to share. And a giveaway for my birthday at the end of the month. Have a great weekend!
All these posts about books over the last month nudged me to create my 2009 summary for my Book album:
Diane asked me to share a little bit about spacing. And when I started to think about it, I wondered: is a good sense of spacing something I learned or something I was born with? Some people just know what colors go together...and some are just naturally good at skiing...is this one of those things?
But then I also remembered that I love teaching, and I love sharing what I've already figured out. There must be a way to help you cultivate a sense of spacing!
To start, I think it's more a matter of seeing than doing. If you want to improve how you space your handwriting, you're one step in the right direction; you must have already seen writing that is pleasingly spaced. Your next step is to gather some examples to study: greeting cards, scrapbook pages, even typewritten projects can help you train your eye to see great spacing.
When you're ready to start practicing, try a list. First think about the spacing between lines. I am a big fan of not measuring, but until you get the hang of it, you can measure the lines so that your list is spaced well from top-to-bottom. You can measure lightly with pencil and erase it, or use a light table with a measured grid underneath.
Then think about the spacing between individual words. This is where the examples you've gathered will come in handy. And, of course, my favorite tip: keep practicing.
Sometimes breaking apart what you want to say into little compartments is helpful. It allows you to work with a very small canvas, and if you make a mistake, you haven't ruined your whole project.
Scraplifting is also a great way to get experience with spacing. I made this layout about 3 years ago, based on one I saw with a left-justified quote, and by writing only one word per line, the spacing was easy.
I'm now pondering on spacing of individual letters within words. When I have a plan, I'll let you know!
I have a new toy. I finally purchased a new scanner last week and installed it just this morning. Now I'm a little bit scan-happy. So this week I'll be scanning everything that will sit still long enough, and then sharing a few things with you.
First up, a few scrapbook pages. I'm still finishing my scrapbooks from 2008. (I have an ongoing travel scrapbook, in which I am just finishing the pages from 2008 travels; and our annual family scrapbook, which is about half done.) I'm a linear girl at heart, like to keep my ducks in a row and all that. There are so many ways to scrapbook...and I choose chronological. It works for me.
One of my favorite family albums is 2006, which was in the landscape format. For each month, I did a summary of activities from that month, plus additional pages for each month as needed. Here are the summary pages for April, June, August, and September:
Finally updated my book album. Love that this project takes so little time, yet has a huge satisfaction factor.
Who says that scrapbooks have to be amazing feats of great design? I'm all for keeping my memories the old-fashioned way. Photos, captions, a bit of color, done.
Recent Comments