The good news is, that’s exactly how I felt almost 7 years ago, but now not only I have I learned the secrets to creating really great looking scrapbooks, but it’s become a passion so I get almost as much enjoyment out of building the books as I had in the first place at the vacation, birthday party, graduation, etc..

So, that all sounds great, but how do I get started you ask!!  Its all about getting organized.

The first thing to do is save what you have from being destroyed. If your photos are in a shoe box that’s probably better than the grocery store bought photo albums, which contain acid and this will slowly eat away at your precious memories. Get them out of those albums NOW!!

I usually have an idea of what types of books I’m going to do, for example, a book of our annual vacations over the past 5 or 10 years, kids’ birthdays, anniversaries or a book for a special vacation or honeymoon. Then I’ll sort all my photos into piles, 1 for each book that I want to do. Once you’ve broken the problem down into smaller chunks, it doesn’t seem so bad after all. You should store the photos in an acid free box until you’re ready to put them into your book.

If you have your photos on computer disc make sure you have multiple backups. Put them on more than 1 computer if you can, and copy them to CD or DVD. You can never have too many copies. For digital photos, you can organize on disc in folders and print out what you need when you need it.

Scrapbooking isn’t just about the photos; I keep everything, ticket stubs to plays, concerts and programs for recitals, graduations. Even plane tickets and coasters from restaurants or bars, anything that can remind you of the event you are going to scrapbook. You should store this memorabilia separately from the photos.

In the next article, I’ll talk about Scrapbooking How To Get Started.

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