Scrapbooking, or scrapping, is a craft that lets you combine photographs, mementos, journaling, and a variety of decorative embellishments in a scrapbook to celebrate meaningful people, places, things, and events in your life. At one time, scrapbooks were large, bound books filled with photos, newspaper clippings, and other memorabilia. But years of improper storage, dust, and a lack of access to wear-resistant supplies would inevitably turn these books into crispy, yellowed remains of the past. Today, scrapbookers—also called scrappers—use archival-quality supplies that are specially treated to endure the test of time.
Modern scrapbooking hinges on the creation of archival-quality products, which are acid-free and lignin-free. These features ensure that the materials won’t degrade as fast or become yellow or brittle with time. Most modern-day scrapbooking supplies are archival-quality.
If a product is not marked as such, you can buy a special pH pen that tests the product’s acidity. You can also find a neutralizing spray at craft stores to help preserve non–archival-quality memorabilia, such as ticket stubs, receipts, and maps.
Table of Contents
Why Scrapbook?
Some people take up scrapbooking simply as a creative way to display treasured photos. But others become enamored with the artistic aspects of scrapbooking and take their hobby even further. Seeing it as an outlet for personal expression, they adorn the pages with modern color schemes and follow good design principles. Following are the most common reasons why you might take up scrapbooking.
Document the Birth of a Baby
View this post on Instagram
You can begin scrapbooking after a baby is born, as a way to manage the sudden increase in family photos and document the child’s growth and development.
Document Family History
You may want to kick off a tradition of documenting your lineage. Scrapbooking lends an artistic element to recreating the family tree. Scrapbooking family members past and present leaves a detailed legacy for generations to come.
Document Special Events
Scrapbooking is a great way to maintain a record of your loved ones’ lives. It also helps capture and immortalize special events, including:
- Birthdays
- Anniversaries
- Showers
- Births
- Weddings
- Holidays
- Children’s first or last day of school
- Graduations
- Performances (dance performances, music recitals, etc.)
- Sports competitions
- Parties
- Vacations
- Religious celebrations (baptisms, bar mitzvahs, etc.)
- Developmental milestones (losing a first tooth, learning to ride a bike, getting a first haircut, etc.)
Document Your Personal Journey
Though the typical scrapbooker is a married woman with children, even if you’re single, male, or childless, you may discover that scrapping provides a way to explore issues that are important to you. By using pages to express your views and document your daily life, you’re leaving a record of what makes you unique.
Express Yourself Creatively
The main point of scrapbooking is to record information that depicts a point in time, but you may find that you excel at the artistic aspects of scrapping too. For example, a typical way to scrap a birthday party would be to show a photo of the guest of honor and recount memorable moments from the event. But you may choose to take your scrapbook to a more conceptual level, capturing a dramatic photo of a child blowing out the candles and incorporating quotations that reflect how much that child has grown in the last year.
Elements of a Scrapbook
Once you understand the basic elements, it’s easy (and fun) to start putting together a scrapbook.
Album
Scrapbooking albums come in a variety of sizes, from the standard 12″ × 12″ and 8 1/2″ × 11″ to other variations, such as 6″ × 6″ and 18″ × 18″. Some albums are expandable and come with plastic page protectors; others are fixed and hold a set amount of pages.
- Expandable albums: These albums house a variety of pages that aren’t necessarily related to one another. You can add or subtract pages as you wish.
- Fixed albums: These albums have a set number of uniform pages that you might use to create a themed album about a specific topic.
Photographs
Photographs are the heart of a scrapbook. Whether you shoot film or digital, it’s important to create a method of sorting and storing your photos for easy retrieval. Although 4″ × 6″ prints are the most common size, it’s always good to experiment with other sizes too.
Mementos
Concert tickets, store receipts, and wedding invitations are all examples of mementos—souvenirs that add visual interest to a scrapbook page. Make a habit of saving special odds and ends from events. If you can’t find a place on the page for them right away, store them in a pocket or an envelope inside the scrapbook.
Embellishments
Embellishments are decorative items, such as paper flowers, metal brads, stickers, die cuts, and acrylics. Over the past couple of decades, scrapbooking has become very popular, and the craft industry has responded to this increased demand with a constant supply of new embellishments.
