Scrapbooking Tips For Busy People

Being busy seems to be a product of our lives and I know what it is like to be on overload. I am retired but find my life is busier than when I was working and had a young family. Fitting scrapbooking into my schedule is a real challenge these days. I'm sure you can relate to this as life pulls us in all directions.

I've been scrapbooking for over ten years and I am a fanatic scrapbooker. It is my favorite hobby, and I have found that I need to adapt scrapbooking to the many changes in my life and be realistic about what I can accomplish. Interests change and my approach to scrapbooking has even changed through the years. I would like to share with you seven shortcuts that I found have helped me.

1) Be Selective in Choosing Your Pictures - I can overwhelm myself with too many pictures. Sometimes I have four or five pictures of one scene. I have to make sure I get the perfect one. Will all those pictures really matter 15 years from now? Most probably you can get away with two or three pictures of one event. Think ahead to several years from now and decide what really matters. This will help you decide what to eliminate in your stash of pictures.

2) Keep your Most-Used Tools Handy - Keeping your pens, ruler, scissors, trimmer, adhesive, and the tools you love and use the most close by will save a lot of time. I love a caddy, especially a lazy-susan caddy filled with the most used tools at my fingertips. You can also take it with you wherever you go.

3) Assemble Your Own preassembled Kits - Performing one task at a time can be a real time-saver. I belong to a crop group that meets once a month and before I go I try to put together several layouts. I can spend an hour choosing the pictures I want to scrap and then another hour choosing paper and embellishments. When I attend the scrapbooking event I can put several layouts together in one day. Another hour or day I can add the journaling. Using this approach has enabled me to put several pages together in a short amount of time.

4) Use Preassembled Kits - Scrapbook kits have been designed to make your life easier. They have all the right pieces, coordinated paper and embellishments. They also come in themes such as Christmas, Baby Boy, Baby Girl, Halloween, Travel, and etc. This saves a lot of time because a lot of the work has been done for you.

5) Use The Same Sized Photos - This allows you to put more photos in a layout. Wallet size photos are great for putting many pictures on a page and telling a story. That saves you time and pages. I also have used a 4" by 6" picture as my main picture on the page and added several wallet size photos to finish the layout. It's all about fast scrapbooking.

6) Hand Write Your Title - Looking for the right font, size and color can add quite a bit of time to creating your layout. Instead, just get out a pen and start writing. Using a round, thicker pen with a fine tip pen adds interest along with a few pen squiggly shapes.

7) Use Repetition - Repeat different techniques such as layouts, colors, fonts, letters and etc. This saves a lot time, you don't have to think up something new and different and it will make you more efficient.

I hope these tips encourage you busy scrappers to get started in preserving your precious memories, and I hope you love this hobby as much as I do.

And now I would like to invite you to claim your Free Access to my mini ecourse on 7 Creative Photo Arrangements when you visit http://www.myscrappygals.com. You can use these photo arrangement tips to add variety and interest to your scrapbooking.

Some ideas for this article were drawn from: Becky Higgins, "10 Shortcuts to Scrapbooking Success," that appeared in Creating Keepsakes magazine vol. 14, issue 3, March 2009.