Sentimental Diva

Spring is the Best Time to Create a Scrapbook

Spring means everyone will be in for another grand and fun house cleaning!

What isn’t well-realized is that spring is also the time for scrapbooking. Why? Notice when you clean, you stumble upon some sentimental but forgotten things you haven’t seen for a long time. Of course, at that moment, you promise never to lose it again. You place it inside a box and you vow to do something with it as soon as possible.

But things don’t go according to plan, do they? Soon you find yourself forgetting about these sentimental items that you really want to preserve forever. Moreover, you realize that the longer you keep them unprotected, the more they become damaged. Don’t let one spring cleaning pass you by again before you start treasuring these valuable things.

What are the things that you can put in a scrapbook?

1. Photos of you and your friends
2. Candid shots from family gatherings
3. kids’ artwork
3. buttons that you misplaced
4. rocks and shells that you picked up during your vacation
and the list goes on.

With a scrapbook, you preserve the memories, you can use your scrapbook as a conversational piece on your living room, and you can even wrap it up and send it as a gift to a relative who lives far away. Memories are the best gifts. If you can’t preserve them, they’re gone forever. If you can keep them with you, do it. You only live once.

Scrapbooking Page Ideas: Scraps and Your First Layout

Whether you are going for the sentimental scrap book that is “anything goes”, or the structured, almost-professional look, you have to decide which scraps will be worth putting in. Let’s say you bought all your scrapbooking tools (glue gun, cutter, colored paper for origami), set up a space and downloaded scrapbooking techniques. You’re ready to get started, but cannot decide which among your scraps or finds you should put in.

Layout – The first thing to consider is how big your page is and will the scraps be too bulky or too humongous to place there? It’s a good idea to have little pockets built in each page, for very small things that could get lost or damaged by gluing and too frequent pressing.

The Story – An ideal scrapbook tells a story … I saw one scrapbook with pages that contained only hand prints and photos of a child. Up until the child reached 18 years of age. This is a really sentimental way of keeping those precious “growing up memories”.

Your First Layout

There are two ways of finding some great layouts for your scrapbooks.

1. Online Scrapbooking Ideas – The internet exposes us to the lives of millions of people. Usually these people will have blogs, myspace pages and customizable web pages. The really creative ones will adorn their web pages with photos and knick-knacks. The idea is to observe how the pages were built and get ideas. Internet surfing can be very productive, as long as you keep your eyes open and your creative juices flowing.

Alternatively, you can look for sites that SELL scrapbooking pages, print out those that you purchased and use them as ages for your scrapbook. These aren’t expensive if you just buy a few for your scrapbook’s dividers, but if you plan on putting all of these quality and high resolution pages in your scrapbook, it could get very pricey for you.

2. Magazines and Books -Learn from professionals who make a living putting out layouts of magazines and catalogs. See the colorful sales brochures? Where is the text located? How big are the photos? The best resources are sometimes the design magazines and real estate. They take photos of their products at very unique angles.

You can learn a thing or two from these professional publishers.

Inspiration may also be found from a book that has nothing to do with crafts, or an old calendar.Note that the beautiful and scenic photos from calendars can be good materials for your backgrounds.

Maybe you can create your “best memories” scrapbook according to the lyrics of your favorite song, poem, or quotes.

Lastly, you can learn a lot from friends. Why not propose a get together with friends and family who may or may not be into scrapbooking? You can obtain briliant ideas from their handiwork, or they can give you tips on how to improve a layout you’re already working on.

Family Occasions and Holidays: On a Budget

Crafts and Scrapbooks. Cards that need sentiments written on them. Did any occasion come to mind yet? Christmas, Holidays and Family Events! These are rare occasions that need your focused attention. This is when families come together. How important are holidays to people? Most families that have grown apart will have members in different places around the world. The only time they can be together are holidays, so these are a HUGE deal.

And, we all know that big deal events cost money right? Not necessarily. Here are a few tips to help you save up for holidays and events.

Buy Ahead of the Rush

The higher the demand, the more expensive the dwindling supply. Most seasonal things skyrocket in price during the season when they are most needed. Buying off season will get you far in terms of lessening the cost later on. Decorations and trimmings are among the many items you can buyu off season. And these are mostly available in the following stores.

Thrift stores are great places for all kinds of finds such as fabric, buttons, silk flowers and ribbons. These will be available in their raw state (hence the price). The best thing about it is, you can buy the small things on a budget, and your imagination and creativity will do the rest. Some of the best scrapbooking supplies can be found in thrift stores.

Discount Department Stores. Your local store will usually inform you when they are having a sale. PLan ahead and think of what you will need during the holiday season. Need masks for halloween? Maybe they have unpainted masks on sale because Halloween is at least 3 months away?

Find great decorations to spice up your living room and front lawn. You can store these in conspicuous places so that you won’t forget about them. How about discounted greeting cards? Buy in bulk so that everyone in your family can send cards to their friends using the discounted cards that you bought early on.

Your own home. Admit it, you have stuff in your home that don’t seem “special” now because they were from last year’s Christmas events. These are probably collecting dust somewhere. Bring them out, air them out and clean them… they will be good as new when the holidays hit.