Very Basic How-To: Scrapbooking

This is how I used to do Scrapbooking. This kind of Scrapping is artistic and creative, but does take a lot of time and effort. I'm proud of my work, but I have scads of pictures to put into albums still, and I found another way to do it that is equally satisfying, and might mean that I get them into albums during my lifetime.

I get this kind of album from Michael's. It is a mega-album, 50 pages, black paper inserts in plastic sleeves. Michael's does delivery and curbside right now and often has sales or coupons.

These are my basic supplies: a cropping tool, photo sticker squares, self-adhesive photo corners, and a white pen. Amazon has photo corners in packages of up to 360, and probably everything else too.

I write with the white pen, in cursive, on the black paper. For me it is simple and elegant, and I enjoy it.

Here are some more examples:

It's kind of a vintage look, where the photos speak more for themselves, with captions as needed, so that some day, when my memory is even worse than it is now, I'll have given myself clues as to who and what the scenes are all about.

When I have many, many photos of an event, and I still have many after thinning out the duplicates and the duds, I make page blasts or collages like this, especially where captioning is not really needed:

And it is also fun to included brochures, ticket stubbs and other ephemera to add color and interest.

So, if you are thinking that being stuck at home might present a good opportunity to organize all those boxes of old photos you have stashed away, but you are not inclined to the more elaborate forms of scrapbooking that involve buying lots of extra supplies and tools, this might be a way to go for you too.