Scrap Booking

Do you love to collect little keepsakes, reminders of happy times, and have a photo to go with every keepsake? If you have boxes of precious memories waiting for you to do something with them, you have come to the right place. Scrap booking will change your life! Not to mention organise and enrich it. I was a compulsive collector but felt ashamed of my unfinished projects. Now I can show and tell to my heart's content, with the beautiful craft of scrap booking. But don?t imagine I am finished, oh no! Scrap booking is a work in progress, with a new project always around the corner. Come with us as we delve deeper.

When I was a kid, scrap booking used to mean sticking all my treasured bits and pieces in a big book and adding a few notes and comments. It was fun but not that interesting or attractive for other people. But now scrap booking has evolved into a lavish craft with tons of style and widely available materials. Many people now use their love of scrap booking to document their family history and display their photos. It's a lovely thing to pass on to your family, especially when there are so many families separated for all sorts of reasons, so that face- to-face interaction is not possible. Scrap booking is one of the ways to connect your family with distant members.

Nowadays, there is so much scrap booking material on offer in so many places. Many big stores have a whole section dedicated to just scrap booking, but you can find things in craft stores, art shops, newsagents and online. There are great magazines and books full of ideas and inspiration, and you may find a group or course in your area too. Networking with fellow enthusiasts is exciting and opens up whole new possibilities.

Most people use a collection of books and ring binders to display their work. It can be as big or small a project as you like. It's good to decide on a theme you want to work on, have a look at the material you want to present, and then go shopping for your tools and materials. You don't need to spend much, and can add to your resources gradually. There are some lovely scrap booking cases and trolleys in the shops, but of course, you can start off with a box to store all your things.

What to begin with? Most of us have lots of photos, and scrap booking is a great way to organise and display them. You can add all the other little mementos from the time, too, such as invitations, tickets, newspaper cuttings, pressed flowers, ribbons, badges, pieces of fabric or even hair. The list is endless; you can't fail to be continually inspired. You might want to follow a child's life, or document a process (like building a house), or commemorate a special occasion, re-live a holiday or remember a pet. Life gives us all the raw materials for scrap booking, we just have to organise and decorate it.

So don?t have a panic attack when you look at the piles of dusty boxes waiting for you in the spare room or garage. Open one up, get a plan, buy a nice book, and fill any spare moments you can with snipping, arranging, and gluing. It?s a trip down memory lane you?ll get to enjoy time and time again.