Scrapbooking Articles Tips & Ideas

More than one person has been turned on to scrapbooking because her creative heart yearned after the pretty papers and embellishments she came across in the crafts store. If you’re creative or artistic, your eye automatically compares and contrasts colors, patterns and images as you go through your day, and decides the best way to bring those ideas to life.

But scrapbooking requires two things, not just one. In addition to your innate creativity, it also requires organization. As a creative scrapbooker you might get overwhelmed with the choices in front of you, especially if you are just starting to get your family photos together and have a long way to go.

Don’t let it overwhelm you. Take a deep breath and follow some of these tips.

Start recent. Knowing where to start is half the battle in both artistic expression and organization. If you look through years worth of photos, you will be overwhelmed, but if you start slowly with one event or one idea, you will know what to do. An event might be something like your sister’s wedding, your office picnic, or your child’s Christmas pageant. Now collect the pictures and materials for the one recent thing you are working on and go from there.

Organize and design at different times. Pick out an afternoon sometime when all you’re going to do is to organize some of your photos-not all of them, only some. Pick out a handful and begin by putting them in big Ziploc plastic bags labeled however you decided to label them. By year works, as does by family member, or by family occasions (”Christmases,” “summer camping trips”). On this organization day, you’re not doing any of your pretty layouts, you’re just sorting through things.

Put your things away. Try to find a place where your materials can be cleaned up but will not lose the organizational work you’ve done to get them that way. If you’re not good at organizing, you certainly don’t want to repeat it!

Modzy.com’s Great Deals on Scrapbook Organizers

First, decide if you want to organize your photos chronologically or if you prefer them by their theme. Determining how many photos you actually have can help you decide on how to organize them.

If you have photos spanning years and cannot really decide on which themes to categorize them under, in the meantime, you can have them organized chronologically. If for instance you have many themed photos and you know exactly under what theme to categorize them into, you can then have them organized by theme. Either way it entirely depends on whichever you prefer.

Chronological: Sort your photos in chronological order by year, month and even time if necessary. Even if they are not categorized by theme you can always label the envelope with a topics or events held at the particular time. Keep it brief and clear. Put them in small photo-safe folders or envelopes to separate them.

Theme: Arrange them by their themes e.g. baby photos, wedding photos, and birthday photos and so on. The advantage of having your photos categorized this way is that it is more specific. It is especially helpful if you have many photos of events. You can then put all of them in photo-safe envelopes or folders. Do not forget to label all the folders or envelopes.

Keep them in a roomy box away from direct sunlight. You might want to find an archival quality box if you do not want to use envelopes or folders.
You are not limited to one or the other. You can always organize your photos both chronologically and by theme. This can be helpful for those of you who have a very large number of photos. Sort them chronologically first and for every year or month and then classify each photo under their more specific theme or event.