Making Scrapbook Page Kits: Background and Page Sketches
Making scrapbook page kits is such a good technique to improve your scrapping productivity. Mine have evolved, and as I learn, I’m passing it along for others to use.
Let’s backup just one step and fill you in on where my need for scrapping efficiency came from. My scrapbook goals for 2019 were, um, ambitious. I started out strong, but kept finding additional photos after I thought I had completed an album. It was certainly a learning experience and a situation I wouldn’t have necessarily wanted, but a lesson nonetheless.
My parents were downsizing and my mom had tons of photos. Some boxes and envelopes of photos I inherited rather quickly, while others stayed hidden in the chaos of paring down. As a result, I didn’t know the full scope of what I was working with when I first started.
“We didn’t realize we were making memories, we just knew we were having fun.” — Winnie The Pooh
As time went on, additional boxes and envelopes of photos continued to surface. And I’m not talking 2 or 3 pictures here or there. I’m talking dozens of pictures, pictures that belonged in the albums I was making. I just can’t leave any picture behind, much less dozens of them.
And I told myself it was a good problem to have because my mom had taken pictures through the years and kept them. Not everyone has that, so I accepted it as a blessing.
My March Status
Last year, I finished each of my two brothers’ albums, unearthed more pictures, and added those to the already finished albums. I thought I was finished, but then the universe helped me unearth quite a few more, which meant adding more pictures to the same, already finished albums. Now that the paring down has been complete, I feel pretty rest assured I know my full scope.
For March, I decided to go for a couple of quick wins and focus on getting both of my brother’s albums updated one last time with the latest (and last, hopefully) treasure trove of pictures.
The status for March is ready to be reported: a total of 57 pages between the two albums have been updated, created, or re-arranged. And the page kits were a foundation piece in achieving that.
A creative approach – making scrapbook page kits
I learned that in re-doing pages, or even adding pages, having ALL.OF.THE.PIECES, especially the background paper and page layouts already figured out was a HUGE help. I spent time on the weekends laying out the pages and making creative decisions which is when I had more mental energy to devote to it.
I’ve learned that by the time I work on these pages on weekday evenings, most of my creativity has been zapped. But if I have everything laid out and ready in a page protector —- some times I’ll also snap a quick pic on my phone if I venture into a new layout so I’ll remember the layout I had in mind, especially if I lay out 40 pages — I can toss a page together in 5-10 minutes! That is so less overwhelming.
While the total time to create a page, from the creative directing of it to the actual execution of it may not be all that different, making scrapbook page kits opens up the possibility of working on pages during those margin hours. You have something baking for 40 minutes, and can complete a page because everything is right there. Unlike if you had to scramble it all together and dig up an idea for the layout, etc., etc.
Since I was using a 12×12 album, my pages were also all 12×12. These techniques could be easily adapted to any page size, just by reducing the proportions.
“Birth certificates show that you were born. Death certificates show that you died. Scrapbooks show that you really lived.” — modified from Theshan Alewis
Backgrounds
I have used the heck out of these 2 techniques for choosing the background for a page. Let’s jump into those now.
Page Kit – Background #1 – Torn 12×12
This first one uses 2 12”x12” sheets of scrapbook paper. One of the sheets becomes the full background page, while the other is torn in half from corner to corner. No, not cut nicely with a scissors, but actually hand torn to get the inner white of the paper to show through — it adds a bit of character to the page. This can be accomplished by ripping “upwards” instead of “downwards”. The other half can then be used for another page in a similar fashion, so no paper goes to waste.
Page Kit – Background #2 – 8×8 insert
This second one uses one 12”x12” sheet of paper, with at least one 8”x8” (or bigger) sheet of paper. Most of the time I find myself cutting down a 12×12 sheet into an 8×8 piece, but any way you get there works. The 8×8 paper is inset on the page either straight on, or it can be rotated to look off-centered.
Using coordinated papers to accomplish this can make the options appear limitless, yet it’s still the same layout. I’ve also used the same coordinating papers on a 2-page layout. One side I’ll use the torn 12×12 layout, and the page on the right I’ll use the 8×8 insert, both pages using the same papers. You could do an entire album this way, simply by alternating these two backgrounds.
Now for the next gem of scrapbooking productivity…
Pages Sketches
You’ve probably heard of page sketches, like I had, and just thought, I have page ideas all over the place — in magazines, ripped pieces of paper, my Pinterest board, etc, etc. And that doesn’t count the ones I’ve created along the way in existing albums. How do I sync that idea up to this specific page?
How to create re-usable page sketches
I decided to sit down with my existing scrapbooks I had made over the years. There were some pages that I just fell in love with and kind of amazed myself with how well they had turned out. I also took a look through my Pinterest board.
I took those pages and sketched the general layout onto a 3×5 index card that I had cut in half. Each of these newly sized index cards, about the size of a baseball card, includes a pencil sketch layout (and I’m not an artist) along with the number of photos that are in the layout.
How to store and use re-usable page sketches
Baseball card holders like those used to hold baseball cards in a binder, can be used to slide each index card into. The order of the cards was based on the number of pictures in the layout.
The first few slots of the cardholder has layouts for a single photo. The next few slots are for layouts of 2 photos, and on up to 10+ photos. From here, the penciled sketches are traced over with a permanent maker and photocopied. Photocopies are stored behind each sketch and when a page kit is being put together, a photocopied layout can easily be dropped in. Voila!
At this point you have the background paper selected as well as the layout. The rest is execution and making it cute. For some reason, the initial steps of the foundation paper and layout are my biggest creativity drain.
Again, in the evenings when my creativity has been taxed from prior events in the day, I can easily pull out a page, with the background already selected, and the page sketch already selected, and with other embellishments already available, to produce a completed page. And as I mentioned earlier, if I go off course and try out a new layout, I’ll simply snap a pic on my phone and just toss a note in the page to ‘see phone pic for layout’. Eventually I’ll add these to my set of page sketches.
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Concluding thoughts on making scrapbook page kits
What are your go-to techniques for highly productive scrapping? What are your quick tips and tricks that allow you to scrapbook with speed and efficiency? Please post a comment below. I’d love to hear from you!
Making scrapbook page kits — backgrounds and page sketches
