WARNING: I'm not responsible for any new hobbies or expenditures this post may create.
I love scrapbooking. It's probably an addiction. It's my absolute favorite hobby, more so than sewing or sleeping. I sew for utilitarian purposes: it's cheaper than buying certain outfits (namely girls holiday/party dresses) and I can also guarantee that the kids will be dressed in decent clothes that are the right size and colors. It's not exactly easy to find 5 reasonably priced, coordinating holiday outfits (sorry, I'm anal like that) in 4 different sizes. And I sleep cause we have a comfy pillow top California king sized mattress and down comforter. hehe
But I digress. Scrapbooking is such an awesome hobby, bear with me as I highlight its qualities. First, it's all about preserving history and displaying photographs. So it does have a true purpose beyond the artistic value. It's annoying to find a really bizarre picture and no one knows who the people are or when it was taken or what they were doing. Or in my case, which identical twin that is. LOL Even worse, having pictures destroyed by improper storage (yeah, storing photographs in a plastic bag in the attic or boxes in the flood prone basement are not good ideas...) Scrapbooking solves all of the above.
Second, it's all the best parts of art class all over again. Cutting and pasting, playing with colorful paper, fancy pens, ribbons & buttons & more. This is also known as the expensive part of scrapbooking. hehe It used to be just pictures and journaling. Now it's accents and embellishments, patterned paper and matching pens. And fun!
Third, immediate crafty gratification. Well this works if you think in terms of finished pages, not completed albums. In my case, albums just become volumes of books. There's no real end to it. But a page only takes a few minutes to a few hours to complete. Much quicker than say quilting or knitting a sweater or most cross stitch projects.
There are other good reasons to scrapbook like the social aspect (scrapbooking with others) and of course, the shopping! As far as hobbies go, I think it's a very worthwhile one. It's both an artistic outlet and a purposeful one (saving pictures and memories).
I'm an odd scrapbooker or at least compared to those I know. Most people keep a family album with baby books for their children and the occasional travel album. In some insane moment of my life, I decided that I would make chronological albums for each of the kids. Yes 5 individual albums. As if I didn't have anything else to do. And amazingly enough, I'm only a year behind. It is actually easier than one would think to keep up 5 albums. For many events, I can use the same idea and just change the pictures and journaling to tailor the layout for each child. One of the main reasons I make individual albums is that I don't want the kids to ever feel short changed because there are 5 of them. With just a little extra effort on my part, they will all have their own memories and pictures. No one will be fighting over the family albums years from now. I hope they appreciate this. hehe
Anyway here's an example of my multiple "similar yet different" layouts. Club Scrap paper (love the stuff!), misc stamps, twine.
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So in conclusion, it's a great hobby and I think anyone who has pictures and a history should give it a try. If you'd like more information, feel free to stop by my forum: Scrapbook Corner
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