I’ve been catching up on my scrapbooking before the baby comes. This week I FINALLY, FINALLY finished our wedding scrapbook. I also got caught up on our scrapbook of all our home renovations (volume 2!). Next I’m going to get caught up on our daily living scrapbook and then (hopefully!) redo my college/sorority scrapbook which is two volumes and done with rubber cement. (Bummer! And my age is showing!)
But, my question is… How do you scrapbook your baby stuff? My thinking is that I want a scrapbook for Peanut that she can have when she is older, but I also want my own copy (of course!). Do any of you double scrapbook everything? This whole scrapbooking with the future in mind for someone other than myself is totally new to me so I’m wondering what other people do. I’m starting to look at baby books, pages, stickers, etc. so I want to have a plan in my mind before I start buying.
Thanks for any insights anyone wants to share!
It is too hard for me to scrapbook double with 3 kids…I tried and it just made me more discouraged. I now only do ONE family album. I will just have to divvy them up between the kids when I’m older or dead and gone.
I have made each child their very own BABY book (like birth-age 1) and that will be their special book to have when they leave home. I am also doing each child a homeschool portfolio scrapbook. But everything else goes into ONE family album. It is more time and cost effective for me that way.
Find a system that works for you and go with it. If it is double, then do it. If it is single, it will be okay too……
I have thought about all the time and energy I invest in my scrapbooks and I’ve warned my husband that if any of my children take them and use them as coasters or toss them in the attic and forget about them, well, I will HAUNT THEM!!!! 🙂
This isn’t about scrapbooks but I wanted to recommend you buy a baby calendar – one of those that comes with stickers that say “first tooth,” “rolls over,” and such. These calendars are invaluable. I hung ours in the children’s room and wrote in each day’s box when I tucked the kids in at night. I have baby books with barely any writing in them but because I wrote in the calendars, I have a detailed record of each baby’s first year. Just my little bit of advice for you. I’ve been keeping up with your pregnancy and am very happy for you and your husband. I can’t wait ’til your little Peanut makes her arrival. 🙂
We make movies instead of making scrapbooks. You can make as many DVDs as you want! With a mac and a digital video camera, it’s very easy. (We also back up the movies on hard drive AND recorded onto DV tape. Tape actually has a longer shelf life than DVDs. Hard drives are supposed to last pretty long, but we’ve had several fail. We only got our data back off of one.)
However, I do put together albums for each of the kids with some photos, artwork, and what they’re doing/saying at each age.
Digital Scrapbooking could allow you to make as many copies as you want, you could also use the pages as Christmas gifts. I saw some great ones (OK, the first and only ones I’ve ever seen, but I really liked them!) at one of the ladies blogs I found through the Carnival of Beauty. It was by Natalija, Sarah’s daughter. Her website is: https://sarahsdaughter.lifewithchrist.org/
and you can see her digital scrapbook pages here:
https://www.digitalscrapbookplace.com/gallery/showgallery.php?cat=500&page=2&ppuser=265
Her digital chore charts are cool, too:
https://www.digitalscrapbookplace.com/gallery/showgallery.php?cat=500&page=1&ppuser=265
I would have to agree with Lindsey that double-scrapbooking is hard to keep up with. I do a big, fancy scrapbook as our family album. I like that this also keeps the child in the context of the whole family–knowing that Daddy graduated just days before she learned to walk, for instance. But then I also buy these “Big Story” baby books at Hallmark that have fill-in-the-blank questions to answer, lists of firsts, doctor visit details, growth charts, and places to put a few of the best photos. This makes sure that, should something happen for me, my kids will know what was “normal” for them when they were babies.
This is, of course, just what works for me…
I too have struggled for many years on how to scrapbook for our family and for our girls.
I recently read a scrapbooking book called “The Big Picture” that describes a family library system that is brilliant. It has changed how I scrapbook and how I organize what I scrapbook – it’s brilliant!
Hope that helps!
Blessings to you and your family!
So far it is all I can do to scrapbook for myself. But I am hoping that one day when I pass on that my kids will be able to share what I have done. I try to make sure that all the pictures I have taken, been give and use for my grandchildren get copied onto a CD and each year on the grandchilds birthday I present a copy to the parents (of course that has been easy so far as we only have 1, with the second one due in 4 weeks). That way they at least have copies of the pictures. I also try to do a small 12 picture book for them that captures the best of the year! A very simple book.
My big books are all themed (ie, one is all vacations, one is all holiday events, one is about the kids, etc) so they can actually be broken down if needed in the future. Again I have scanned or copied(now that all my pictures are digital) all pictures onto CD’s that as more time passes and the older kids are wanting to have reminders of the past they can make copies to work from of their own.
Hope this helps a little bit!
It’s funny I just opened this because I’ve been working on straightening up my shelf of scrapbooks today. I have almost 30, and most are ‘works in progress.’ I have four kids but I make time to do this because it is relaxing to me–better than therapy (and cheaper!) I have individual baby albums for each kid, which they will inherit. I don’t do double albums. I have family albums, various holiday albums, heritage and pet albums. I don’t make myself crazy trying to finish anything by a certain time. This is supposed to be fun. I still find ways to improve the baby albums and my oldest is 23. One thing I do is to put paper, embellishments and photos together in a protective sleeve and just leave them for when I’m actually ready to sit down and do the page. That way it’s all there for you. Oh! And be sure to Google “Free Scrapping Supplies.” There must be 100 sites that offer freebies you can download, print and use. I pay very little for supplies now. A lot of these sites offer full kits–and having it all coordinated makes it much easier for you! Here is the link to one of my favorites:
Hey I happened upon your site. I am at the other end of the spectrum of scrapbookers – i.e. I have a cupboard full of photos. Do you have any advice how to get started or some good photo album/scrapbooking web sites to advise? Thanks. :o)
Whew! If you manage double scrapbooking you are an amazing woman. What I have found is that I take plenty pictures for lots of scrapbooks without having to double. When I first began scrapbooking I lived with my parents. My mother always joked that when I moved out she’d steal all my scrapbooks.
Well, the truth is, I had more than enough for us to split books. Both my children have several of their own scrapbooks and I also have several family scrapbooks. I do vacation scrapbooks seperately as well. (I may do a vacation page in each child’s scrapbook too.)
When they grow up and move away, if you are an avid scrapbooker, you will have tons of scrapbooks. Select a few to give your child (they may even have one in particular that means a lot to them.) and you keep the rest. You guys could even trade up after a few years to display differnt ones on the coffee table!
Hope that helps!
So many interesting perspectives and ideas! But Mrs. HH, I am definitely going to do the calendar on the nursery wall idea! Thank you!
I guess the reason I contemplated double scrapbooking is because it doesn’t seem like that much more effort to make the same page twice. For me, the hard part is either figuring out what to do with the page or just getting in the scrapbooking groove. Once I get rolling, I’m fine. But sometimes I stare at the photos and flip through my paper and stickers and such a LONG time before I finally get my idea. But once I have the idea, I move right along.
Mrs. Blythe – You asked about getting started. I think it depends on what kind of a learner you are. There are tons of books and magazines. Or you could attend a Creative Memories workshop or crop. If you have a good-sized scrapbooking store near you they probably offer classes. Or if you know someone who scrapbooks and you like what she does, you could ask her to teach you some basics. My biggest piece of advice is this: DON’T START WITH THE MOST MEANINGFUL ALBUM! Start with something basic. I started with my wedding album when I didn’t have the first clue what I was doing. It took me a while to find my “scrapbooking voice” and now I wish I could redo my whole album. I finally just came to terms with the fact that it isn’t going to be my very best album and finally finished it. But start with just every day pictures rather than a baby book or a wedding album, IMHO. 🙂
My son is 5 1/2 and has 8 scrapbooks–;) I said those puppies are mine–he can have them when I am gone!
I did all the regular baby book stuff in his scrapbooks and did not do an additional baby book.
Here are a few of my layouts
https://www.twopeasinabucket.com/userprofile.asp?user_id=147399
(If I did that wrong you can go to http://www.twopeasinabucket.com and search the gallery for pjsmomma)
Finding out how you want to organize the books is an everchanging process I think.