Slow Progress

Was hoping to get so much more scrapbooking done today. But instead I have been down with a horrible cold - temperature, headaches etc. So instead of doing some scrapbooking pages I have been lying on the bed.

Thankfully this afternoon I have managed to make some progress on sorting out photos and putting them into the photo binders. It seems a never ending task though. Serves me right for taking so many photos over the years! Just wish the 7x4 pages I orderd would come into stock as it is holding me up on sorting out last years photos. May just get them reprinted in the smaller size instead. Will see.

Another First

Did this layout a long time ago. I can tell this mainly due to the fact I have no journaling on it. But it is an example (and the only one I could find quickly) of how I have used multiple photos on a layout. This used small printed out photos on my home printer (two to a 6x4 page) but if I had photos taken from a long way away I could of cut them down to get a similar effect.

Could of been a great photo

When I started this layout the story was gong to be different but it kind of evolved with the layout. This layout is very “fussy” for me and took me ages to do!

Used the “gems” from Poundland for the centre. The flowers are proper paper scrapbooking flowers which I had to stick down using double sided tape strategically placed so it could not be seen. But if I did not have them I would of either used images from the computer and coloured in, flowers cut from patterned paper, or dissected a cheap “silk” flower from the Poundland – these I would of probably stuck down in the centre with the brad. I used ribbon for the strips on this layout going across the bottom of the page but normally I would use patterned paper – or you could use colouring pencils or paint to do similar thing or stamps – basically what ever grabs your fancy

Summarising Christophers 2009

I did everyone this double layout, using numerous photos taken throughout 2009 in which they “starred” in and just added their name and the year. This summarised the year.

I used 3D foam pads on some of the photos. But if I did this again this year I think I would not use so many photos and may be put a bit of journaling next to some of the photos. Mainly where they were taken or when.

Botex in the Future?

Botex in the Future Layout used lots of 3D Foam Pads. The letters where from stamps, but could get the same effect using the computer I am sure. Stuck on to the page using 3D Foam pads. I printed to copies of the photo out. Cut one up to give the centre image, mounted on black card and then used 3D Foam pads to stick on top of the flat photo. I did this as I did not want to lose the background but I wanted my niece playing her Nintendo and her face to stand out as this was the subject of the layout.

First Day at School

This was a layout design I got from Stacey Julian and modified slightly.

Silver edging is using acrylic paint. Stamps are used for the letters, I was brave and stamped directly on the page then used a black marker pen to go around to highlight them. Patterned paper was used for the strips. (I cut a larger piece of patterned paper up but you can buy 12x12 Papermania strips of paper packs in a variety of patterned paper ranges – The Range is the best place)

BUTTONS

I have a thing for buttons and do not use them that often. They look much more pretty in my glass jars. But on this layout I used the buttons on the centre of the flowers. Cutting the flowers from patterned paper.

Alternatives I could of done was ...

 For the Flowers:  Use flowers cut from clipart and coloured in, Flowers which are stamped onto the page directly, or on other paper then cut out and stuck down.

Examples of alternatives I could of used for the centre of the flowers are: Brads, Gems, Beads

Using the ABC

For this one I took the name of my boyfriend – Christopher and a photo I liked of him. Using 12x12 size paper I first printed the picture A4 size. Then I cut out some letters and wrote down some journaling about him from my view point.

I enjoyed doing this one. Have to say though it was difficult to think of things which where part of Christopher but began with the letters of his name. But once I got started it was much easier.

Songs that mean something to me

These two layouts are about two songs “The Eye of the Tiger” and the theme tune of “Fame” and what memories they spark for me.

Binders

Part of LOM is to sort your photos by event and year. (Done some of that.)

Next you put them into photo albums which you can look through and take out photos to scrapbook. (Or of course you can just use them as normal albums and use the index cards to make comments against the photos – think you may just be able to see where these go in the below photos).

After searching a long time I found “Directfoto”  directfoto shop the best and cheapest place to buy them from.I bought the "Losse Leaf Ultimate Storage Album" (bottom album, £5.99). This album is really sturdy and will take a fair amount of battering, though it is heavy when full.

The binders are ring binders so you can move pages around or add more in. They have a variety of inserts you can use for different size photos so are fairly versatile.

Each binder will hold 200+ 6x4 photos and with the binder and extra inserts (you need around 4 – 5 to fill the binder) it works out at around £11. With free postage that is (I think) good.

Sorting out photos

I started with a pile of photos i had printed off

I then sorted them into events - holiday, birthday etc etc

Then using my time line I sorted them out by year and roughly by month. I found it easier to put the pile of photos into envelopes. Label them up with event and date (using memory and time line). Then when they were all sorted putting them in piles by year.

All ready to go into the binders - when they come.

PHOTO SORTING PART 1

OK so its been a while since I posted and its been a while sine I actually scrapbooked. So what I have been doing? Well all of my spare time has been sorting out photos as part of my LOM class. Now I know that sounds easy but trust me its not as straight forward as it seems! From what I have learned so far I would say:

Do your time line to start with. Yes you are going to be adding events on it as you sort more photos out but having a rough time line to start is a big help in figuring out when different things happen.

1. Sort out your digital photos.
2. Make sure each event is in a separate folder.
3. Have a backup – at the moment I have all of my photos on CDs and on my second hard drive. But I am also investigating some online album storage.
4. Go through each event folder and DELETE photos. I worked on the basis if they were blurry they went (a few exceptions), if there were duplicates then only 1 or 2 were kept.

When deleting photos I would ask myself:

• Could I see me scrapbooking them?
• Could I see me wanting them in a photo frame?
• Could I see them being needed to go into a specific event album or mini book?

If I answered yes then they were kept. If I answered no then they were deleted. And deleting them is so cool. I know I have backup so I know they are not “gone forever”. And the numbers of photos I have for an event have so gone down. I can actually “see” the photos.

For already printed photos I just went through them and picked out the ones I wanted to keep following the above guidelines and then put the rest into "cold storage". (more on that another time)