Crafting one’s Special Memories

Have you ever experienced in your former school days, whether in elementary or in high school days, where you were given a project by your teacher to compile some stuff and in your own creative way, present it in a form of scrapbook? Some may find it a bit lame, especially the boys, while others find it fascinating and are enthusiastic on creating one especially on designing it. Scrapbooking is a creative way of preserving one’s history such as one’s family tree or even the special events and celebrations of one person by gathering photographs, printed materials and memorabilia, and they are being contained albums or scrapbooks, which are being decorated.

Creating one’s scrapbook is not really that difficult. The materials needed for creating one don’t necessarily have to be expensive and detailed. Making one’s scrapbook is just like picking together pictures from a certain event and placing them in a photo album. However, when one talks about scrapbooking, one can mostly see the artistic side of the creator of the scrapbook with the designs present in every page of the scrapbook. The good thing about this art is that nobody really needs to follow certain standards or criteria in crafting it. It is simply one of those crafts where one can freely express the imagination in one’s mind by playing with the different components of design like the different colors, shapes, lines and the available resources which can be placed in a scrapbook. One can even combine various kinds of crafts and art in designing one’s scrapbook.

Even simple artworks such as mosaics and painting – which can be done with water color, colored sprays, colored pencils or even an available set of crayons, can already make one’s scrapbook full of art. This is the part of scrapbooking which is fun for the creator of the scrapbook. One can even decorate the scrapbook with the aid of friends or family members. The design in the scrapbook should be enough to leave some spaces of the more important content inside it, the photos and the different mementos.

The next part of the craft is the selection of what should be placed inside every page that will mark an impression on the person viewing the scrapbook. Some people are very sensitive in the selection of the different stuffs to be included inside the scrapbook. They usually prefer to choose some stuff, which looks pleasant and good inside the scrapbook. However, a lot preferred to include every photo during the certain event and even tried to squeeze in many other items with the little spaces available in the scrapbook. Whether it’s a piece of candy wrapper or a big piece of a souvenir item, or a funny and embarrassing photograph or just a simple pose of all the members of the family, as long as the creator finds it significant, it will be posted inside the scrapbook. With every picture and object inside the craft, notes composed of some phrases may be attached to it. It doesn’t really matter what the words are being posted in every page, since one can surely tell by the pictures the atmosphere and the feelings present during the event.

As soon as the whole scrapbook is finished, one can feel the satisfaction and happiness for the accomplished work as each page of the scrapbook turns. That a good part and memory of yours are being concealed with much effort and time spent. Some may not really appreciate the designs and the efforts being poured into the accomplishment of the scrapbook, but what really matters is that one can preserve one of the important events in one’s life in a nice and creative way. One should be proud in such accomplishment since only a few could be kept and present such as memories in an artistic way. One’s personal touch on the craft speaks a lot of how significant the event has been to one. In every paged turned is like a piece of a story, which may not be arranged in a sequential order but still, it has thought and full of meaning. One can feel the emotional connection with the creator of the scrapbook while reminiscing over the memories and moments which happened during the event.

SCRAPBOOKING: An Art and Leisure

Scrapbooking is both an art and a leisure.  It is an art because one expresses his or her personal style by decorating the memory books.  It is a leisure at the same time because one enjoys and have fun doing such activity.

Unlike photo albums that include pictures alone, scrapbooking , creates a story based on the pictures and texts written on the page.  In other words, it documents a maker’s personal history – on the things that happened to him or her. Scrapbooking adds personal touch and makes us enjoy more in looking at the pictures because of its headings, texts, comments or whatever and the decorative materials being added into every page of the memory book.

A lot of people keep their pictures simply on a photo album.  They just insert every picture into the album until every page is consumed.  There are also photographs that we want to put into frames especially family pictures, solo pictures, a couple’s pictures and other pictures that we consider special. However, there are some of us who are not contented with this kind of photo arrangement.  They think it gives little meaning to those who look at the picture and does not fully share the memory it depicts.  They wanted to divert into scrapbooking because they think that it displays the significance of the photos through the added texts and other forms of embellishment that are put  into it.

Scrapbooking is a way of expressing our personal style, our mood, our story and our life.  Photos alone are not enough.  Creative texts, backgrounds, coloured papers, stickers, beads, embroidered materials and other forms of embellishments are very much needed.  These added materials make the memory book unique and more meaningful.  Scrapbooking gives out the best in us as  an artist in our own little way.  It can also serve as a favorite pastime for those who are fond of making scrapbooks.  Lovers of scrapbook making do not experience boredom and tiresome everytime they indulge into this kind of activity.  Fun, enjoyment and excitement are always experienced.

There is no such thing as a correct way or wrong way of scrapbooking.  Because, scrapbook making depends primarily on the makers style.  It reflects who you are and what is important to you as a maker of the scrapbook.  As they say, anything goes.  And  that is what scrapbook- making is all about.  You have the freedom to put what you wanted to put and to write what you wanted to write. No limitations set.  No hassles. Full of fun.  Exciting.  So, why not try scrapbooking?

Why Scrapbooking is Fun

The concept of scrapbooking started out as a unique means of preserving and recording memories. Unlike a photo album, a scrapbook is much more substantive because it can be creatively done by placing decorated albums of family or personal pictures. However, photos are just a part of a scrapbook since integration of comments, memorable souvenirs and other small memorabilia such as letters, wedding tokens and baby stuffs in accordance to the photos are placed to enrich the memories and create a much richer artistic impact. A photo album, on the other hand, is just a mere sequential listing of photographs and nothing more.

Prior to the influx of advanced digital media and scanners, the traditional and hard copy scrapbooking existed in the vogue way back the 15^th century where paper is considered an economical commodity. During this time, the majority of the people simply used scrapbooks to write poems, letters, quotes and recipes. Despite the rising cost of pictures, this fad continuously flourished as time went on with the substitution of pictures with handwritten messages from friends and loved ones. Friendship albums turned out to be a popular gift by the 16^th century, similar to our modern-day diaries were a pal can leave a small note or little scribbles upon request of the scrapbook owner. As time moved in by the 18^th and 19^th century, scrapbooks were considered a cherished method for creatively inclined individuals to store visual reminiscences. School scrapbooks were commenced and many schools and college students started using it for documentation of their personalized experiences. It was only during the 21^st century that modern scrapbooking was introduced and the invention of photography and the easy accessibility of cameras paved way for a huge cost reduction in taking photographs. And due to its affordability even to an average person, ingenious scrapbooking took an exponential jump forward.

With the Internet, the development from the original, paper-based method of scrapbooking to the electronically-based digital scrapbooking format was a foreseeable step in the evolution of this craft both to the veterans of this art and to those who are new to this wildly creative pastime. Digital scrapbooking has come out as an incredibly admired occurrence given the endless possibilities of a huge range of online scrapbooking concepts and crafts ubiquitously available on the Internet— no wonder creation of a digital scrapbook of professional quality is within everyone’s reach.

Digital scrapbooking was much sluggish before when the Internet was in its snail’s pace. Its process was more complicated too when it initially hit the market. However, this is not anymore the case, since there is already an improved Internet connection and there is an overabundance of scrapbooking sites available to readily download ideas, tools and other fun embellishments to make your scrapbook one of its kind.

It is never difficult to achieve an enjoyable and fulfilling scrapbook. First, you can decide on a theme or a special event that interests you. It can be broad one like Wedding, Baptism, Christmas, Birthdays and Anniversaries. Or you may want to be more specific such as Grandmother’s 80^th Birthday, Abigail’s Farewell Party, Mary learns how to walk, Peter’s first Christmas in Australia, or John and Beth’s 20 years of happy marriage. Then, you can organize and sort out the photos needed. Lastly, you can decorate, select some embellishments, and pick out main color for your background as well as the accent colors considering the event or theme. If the event in the pictures is focusing on girls, you might take into account the color pink or light pink. As for the layout, this task will greatly test your creativity skills. Arrange the pictures in such a way that it will appear beautifully. You can pile them randomly, and in any way you want. Then place the bigger trappings first while the smaller ones last making sure that there is still space for a few journal, enough to tell the person looking at the scrapbook the story behind the pictures. Making use of descriptive words can help give life to your pictures.

There are many things that will motivate you to start scrapbooking such as having an intense desire to preserve and recall your past long after you have forgotten them, augment your present and reveal your own life story with photos and words to prompt hope for forthcoming generations. There is no right or wrong way in doing a scrapbook, as this is your way of expressing yourself. And for as long as you are willing to put time and effort, then your scrapbook will turn out to be beautifully crafted.