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I want to give up scrapbooking - Page 2

post #21 of 51
6/19/07 at 5:25pm
When DD was born, I got very into scrapbooking for about the first 6 months - she slept a lot, and I needed something to do!

Then, she got mobile and I discovered digital scrapbooking and I haven't looked back. I have several hundred dollars worth of paper scrapbooking stuff that I'll never use. But I LOVE digital scrapbooking - I can knock out a page super fast, and then come back to it months later and it's exactly the same and if I hate it I can easily change it. And if you're careful about sizes, you can get the pages printed pretty cheap (I do a lot of 8 by 10 pages because you can print them for $2 each locally).

I plan to keep the leftover scrapbooking stuff so she can use it for crafts when she's older. If she never does, I'll donate it to a local school.
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post #22 of 51
6/19/07 at 5:34pm
Quit! It isn't worth the stress is you don't love it anymore.


Then, look online or go to your local scrapbooking store to hire someone to make an album for #3.

No guilt. No stress.
post #23 of 51
6/19/07 at 9:23pm
I didn't make it through all the responses. I understand how you are feeling, though. I have had moments of guilt because I did things (not a scrapbook, but a journal, among other things) for dd that I have not done and do not plan to do for ds1&2. But I have realized that it's okay. I am a different person now than I was 4 years ago. As people, we grow and change. We do not always do things the same way. I feel that our children will understand that. We cannot and should not try to give the SAME or everything EQUAL to each child. Each child gets what s/he needs and what we are passionate about as parents at that moment. Just some thoughts.

As for preserving photos. Do you have digital pictures? You can just burn the photos to a disk and they will all be there to view. Or if you want to be more creative, you could make a DVD with slideshow & music.
post #24 of 51
6/19/07 at 11:39pm
CM (Creative Memories) has a new sort of album with the 4x6 slide in pockets and then you can just make up one or two 4x6 cards with journaling,etc for each page or spread. I am getting back into scrapbooking, but doing it the easy way this time around. DS is 8 now and is starting to show an interest in creating his own albums, so I may be "off the hook" for his future albums.

Oh, I am no longer a CM consultant, and not trying to push their products; just sharing something fairly new to them. You could prob. apply the same idea to any "safe" album with the slide in pockets.

PS If you do give up the "habit" LOL, keep your supplies for lapbooking with the kids later. I can see lapbooks as useful whether you are a home or public schooling family.
post #25 of 51
6/20/07 at 1:38pm
Why don't you people who want to give up scrapbooking just sell your stuff on the trading post? There are some people *cough, cough* who would love to buy your unused stuff...
post #26 of 51
6/20/07 at 11:33pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by PajamaMama View Post
Why don't you people who want to give up scrapbooking just sell your stuff on the trading post? There are some people *cough, cough* who would love to buy your unused stuff...
That is right ummm clear my throat real loud even though you cant hear it.
post #27 of 51
6/21/07 at 1:21am
Quote:
Originally Posted by averysmom View Post
Then, look online or go to your local scrapbooking store to hire someone to make an album for #3.

No guilt. No stress.
Oh , EXACTLY what I was thinking.. or better yet... if you don't have the money to hire someone.. trade them your supplies for their work! Your 3rd child gets a handmade album like the others and feels just as special (cause you can never be to sure which kid will be the one it bothers, there is a lot of that in my family now as grown ups... ) AND you will be DE-CLUTTERING all at the same time!

I am up to year my son's 3rd birthday and he is almost 21 now. I have a 2yr old who I haven't even printed pictures out of now that everything is digital (I feel the same guilt)so I will do something for her as far as an album someday. What I do currently is I set up an G-mail account for her in her name(so it's linked to picassa because I too am a photography junkie)... and I email her special messages and stories when she has done something cute or learned something new, reached a milestone etc, and then attach a pictures of that time to the email. There was no internet when my son was a baby in the mid 80's, so different ideas for different times. I think she will get a kick out of reading all these emails someday! Don't you?

Anyway just some thoughts.
Good luck.
~Cynthia
post #28 of 51
6/21/07 at 10:44am
I don't scrapbook. SIL gave me a mini scrapbook for DS at my baby shower. I've started it but have bogged down. We use the Kodak site to store pictures. DH is good about uploading regularly and labeling albums.

I expect if I had gone to a scrapbooking party I could have easily gotten hooked.

I love Cynthia's idea of trading supplies for a finished book for your DC3.
post #29 of 51
6/21/07 at 11:13am
Quote:
Originally Posted by KathleenRay View Post
I guess I am looking for permission to give up, but also suggestions anyone might have for fast, simple ways of effectively preserving family photographs and memories. I am the family photographer - I do love photography and take many photos. The thought of them sitting in an album never to be enjoyed makes me feel very sad.

TIA.
Well, I agree with everyone else who mentioned online photobooks. I have avoided getting into scrapbooking - it just scares me as another hobby to suck me in and fill my house up with stuff. I have enough of those hobbies already.

We just made two books on mypublisher - one for our vacation and one for all of our 2006 photos. They came out beautiful, and it was so easy. We use Photoshop elements as well, which makes sorting and finding photos very easy. We just uploaded the photos and got a book in three days. No paper, no scissors.

Another huge benefit is that these books are only about 1/4-to 1/2-inch thick...so much smaller than scrapbooks or traditional photo albums. So I can make as many as I want and it'll still take up very little shelf space. Less clutter even after it's done. I'm sold.

I also learned about picaboo.com - where you can make custom backgrounds and put text right on the photos. I've heard you can also create layouts like this in Power Point, and upload those to Shutterfly to print out a book.

eta: and it's a lot cheaper too. $30 to $40 for a book with 80 to 120 photos. It would cost at least $15 just to have those photos printed at 4x6, not to mention the cost of a scrapbook itself. In the photo book you can set the photos to whatever size you want - no need to worry about enlargements, etc.

Thanks also for the ideas of trading scrapbooking supplies on the TP. I have a couple of CM wedding books (gifts!) that I haven't touched.
post #30 of 51
6/21/07 at 12:16pm
I agree that photbooks are a great idea!

Just competed my second book on Shutterfly and it was FREE! I guess that I develop so many photos that they gave me a little gift.

Anyway...it was super easy. You can put one to eight photos on each page. You can caption or journal using different fonts and styles. You can choose your cover and background pages.

The photobooks are the most looked at books in my house. They are light, compact and so proffesional looking.
post #31 of 51
6/24/07 at 2:01pm
I LOVE the photobook ideas! I do still scrapbook, and truly do find it relaxing. But, as the kiddos get older and we all get busier, not so much time for this hobby.

So what are the best websites for making photobooks? Also---cost is a factor, so what are the cheapest?
post #32 of 51
6/24/07 at 9:45pm
I've never been into scrabooking, but I love photographs, so here goes...

I'd second (third? fourth?) the photobox idea. You can get prints, write information/thoughts/etc about the pictures on the back (they even make stickers with lines so you can do them all uniform, or you could print out labels with the information on it). Honestly, it seems like a more versatile way of presenting pictures and important documents... the kid can, when he's older, choose to put them in an album, keep them in the box, display the pics in frames, etc.
post #33 of 51
8/14/07 at 12:21pm
I know this is an older thread, but I just wanted to update. I took some advice from here and ordered photo books. One for DS's first year, and one for his second, and I LOVE them! I am SOOOO done with scrapbooking now, this is much easier!
I did have an issue with printing on one of the books and contacted them and they are sending another. So now I have 2 books (one with an error on one page) and I'm not sure what to do with the 2nd one.
post #34 of 51
8/14/07 at 12:46pm
Replying before reading all the other responses...

I was in a similar situation. My oldest daughter, now 6, has 5 12x12 paper scrapbook albums for just her first 2 years!!!!! And that's all. My second has one, only showing her up to 4 months old. I haven't really begun an album for my son, but I've made several digital layouts for him. When dd#2 was a toddler I discovered digital scrapbooking. It's so easy to open, and leave open, my work on my computer desktop (I use Lumapix Fotofusion and Adobe Photoshop Elements). No worries about children getting ahold of my materials, no having to get stuff out and out it away repeatedly, and so much easier to work with digital elements (which, unlike paper products, you can use again and again and change easily to match your layout).

After several months of exploring the options, I committed to digital scrapbooking by selling most of my paper supplies at a local scrapbook supply store's "yard sale", earning me $75 credit in the store which I used to buy several albums to hold my printed digital pages.

My first favorite site that helped me learn about digi-scrapping was
http://digitalscrapbookplace.com/
but now my favorite is
http://scrapgirls.com/
because they have a great daily newsletter which includes tutorials & freebies!

Regarding guilt, I just discovered this idea:
http://www.bigpicturescrapbooking.com/
I read the book over the weekend and feel inspired.

One more thing, there is a new digital scrapbooking magazine and a series of books on the subject that are all good. You might be getting the idea that I've read about it a lot more than I've actually done it, and unfortunately you'd be right. But that's because of my darn perfectionism and the guilt factor. The big picture idea (previous paragraph) feels like the answer though, and I foresee enjoying creating many more pages for albums than I have been.

Good luck!
post #35 of 51
8/14/07 at 12:50pm

photo books

Oh yeah! Forgot to mention photobooks! I like them too. I've given a few as gifts. I've used snapfish, shutterfly, mypublisher, and blurb.com. Blurb is the best for the number of choices they offer! And I like working on my books offline (you download their software).
post #36 of 51
8/14/07 at 4:35pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Leta View Post
Okay, I don't expect this to be popular, and I'm not trying to be mean, but...

My mom made these scrapbooks for me that were about girl scouts, softballl, blah blah blah. And I do have them- but I'm only keeping them out of guilt. One of the last major decluttering missions I have to do is to go thru the three huge "memory boxes" in my basement, and the scrapbooks take up a better part of two of them.
I personally have no interest in ANY of my stuff that my mom saved - pictures, school stuff, clothes, etc. Every time I toss something or <gasp!!!> don't save something (like his first clipped hair, his coming home outfit, etc) she says, "He may want to see that when he's older." He might. He probably won't. I'm not saving it.

I started doing digital scrapbooking and loved it. I was going to do a book for each of his first few years but petered out halfway through his Year One book (when he was almost two). I felt slightly like I should finish the layouts anyway but didn't and it doesn't bother me now. I know I have very little sentimentality about things like keepsakes etc. It wouldn't bother me in the least if my siblings had books and I didn't.
post #37 of 51
8/14/07 at 5:05pm
i also agree with doing a digital scrapbook. this is my plan - even though i do have a book started for dd#1 (long before we did all digital photos). with 3 kids i jsut don't have the time, as i also crochet, sew, etc... it might be something for me to consider after the kids are bigger and (slightly) independent, that i might enjoy doing.

i borrowed an awesome digital scrapbooking program from my local library system - LOVED it! need to buy that! i wish i could remember what it was called
post #38 of 51
8/15/07 at 5:19am
Yep, photo boxes (easier to handle), digi stuff (saveable), and hiring/trading w/someone to do it for you are all great. Frankly we would barely have a photograph of our son at all if not for my mother who documents his every move, and fortunately for us she somehow got herself into scrapbooking too so we have one massive album for his first year and oh my god FOUR for his second year. (And I'm not talking mini occasion-size books either - I mean the full-on 16-inchers or whatever size those things are! ) She uses pretty basic supplies, many pictures on a page, and finds a way to use every sheet of paper in those wierd bargain packs, matching them somehow to a group of photos and adding dollar-store stickers and her own captions - they come out lovely, low-key, but it still takes her a ton of time! (He's 2 1/2, she's starting his 3rd-year books now.)

Anyway my point is that letting someone else do it so you can catch up and let the hobby go will really relieve the stress.
post #39 of 51
8/15/07 at 6:20am
scrapbook-bytes.com hard drive storage takes up way less space then real paper and supplies
post #40 of 51
8/15/07 at 11:25am
I have 4 albums of my oldest son (covering only the first 15 months!), 1/2 an album of #2, and nothing specific for #3. But I am planning on doing it because I love it so. And I did a 6x6 album of a trip with #3 in it (the older 2 didn't go with us). It will take forever, if I ever catch up at all, but it's about the process for me, and I enjoy it.

But....if you want to be done, be done!
You could instead do what a friend of mine decided to do when she knew she couldn't keep up. She does 1 page for each month that includes all the children, sort of a highlights page.
I would think you could cut that down even more, say a 2 page spread for the whole year with the highlights? Then you'd only have one album from here on out.

If anyone wants to unload scrapbooking supplies, I'm always interested!!! : It's the one thing I won't be decluttering...in fact I look at the rest of my decluttering efforts as a way to enable more scrapbooking and craft space & time .

- Krista