The weekend crop. It was awesome.

I know that traditional scrapbooking is falling by the wayside.

I know this because traditional materials are getting harder to find. Creative Memories, the company from which I've been buying materials for more than 15 years, has undergone a complete restructuring and is no longer developing products I want to purchase. And the companies that ARE still making them don't guarantee their safety the way Creative Memories always has.

So I'm really savoring my twice-yearly weekend scrapbooking crops while they last. They are my two favorite weekends of the year!

Many of you have asked about the way I organize my photos once they're printed. I separate them into events, then into the albums they'll go into. Those four stacks of family photos you see below? Those are four of the five stacks ... those pictures went into each of the kids' books and in our family book. But the single stack at the center bottom with the picture of Nathaniel on top? That was the day he got his braces put on, and those pictures only go in his book -- so there's only one set of those.

Once they're sorted, I put them into this photo sorting box behind each person's initials. Then, as I work through each person's book, I just pull out the next set of pictures to work on. Being organized makes ALL the difference in how much you get done.

When I start thinking about a page, I decide which papers I'm going to use -- either as "wallpaper" behind all of the pictures or as accent paper at different intervals. For the fall family pictures, I pulled several options that incorporated the colors we were wearing.

I laid out a few of the pictures across the papers and decided I kind of liked them all, so even though I was working on Amelia's book at the time, I kept all of the papers pulled out, and I made a note that I wanted to use these specific papers with these pictures when I got to them in the boys' books. That way I'll be sure not to use them for anything else, since they're CM papers and I won't be able to replace them.

Here are the finished two-page spreads in Amelia's book:

The next pictures I worked on in her book were from Breast Cancer Awareness Week at our elementary school, and the boys had worn pink. I left the black background of her pages largely exposed, but I hand-cut some green flowers and pink dots to mimic the large flowers on her outfit. I don't routinely spend that kind of time on details like that, but I was feeling ambitious.

Next up, I tackled Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas ... some of the biggies.

I take so many pictures that I try to get as many of them on a page as possible when I scrapbook. I know my pages may look crowded to some people, but to me they're just ... efficient.

And lest I forget the biggest perk of the weekend at this particular B&B -- aside from the scrapbooking and fellowship with my friends -- THE SUNSETS. Night #1 was cloudless and clear, and the lake was as smooth as glass.

Night #2 was a little cloudy with a slight breeze, and the sunset was sompletely different. Both stunning in different ways.

Want to read more about my scrapbooking style and adventures? "Adventures" is a strong word. But you know what I mean. Click here.

Weekend scrapbooking crop wrap-up

When I went to the semi-annual scrapbooking crop last June and wrote my post about it, I was reminded of how much you guys like to see what I did while I was there.

The most recent crop, in late January, was another really productive weekend for me, but I spent some of the time working on things for other people, so I didn't get QUITE as much done as I usually do on my own books. I still had a great time, though ... I worked almost exclusively on Amelia's First Year book, and I got it completely finished!

I needed to complete June through September, which doesn't sound like a lot, but they were action-packed months.

First, I tackled her first trip to the beach ... our annual family vacation with Grayson's side of the family:

(Oh, and I apologize that these pictures are a little fuzzy. I took them after I'd already put all the page protectors on, but I didn't want to remove all of them again to take the pictures. Sorry!)

Next on the agenda was our trip to Tennessee to go to the lake with our friends Honor and Doug and their kids.

August included some random around-the-house shots, as well as Amelia's school pictures.

August was also the month we spent a good bit of time at the pool, which she LOVED. I definitely had to memorialize that in her book.

September was a bittersweet month to work on! Even though she's 17 months old now, it was hard to scrapbook that milestone of 12 months old. One year! Wow. I'd saved several pages at the end of the book to document her many sweet faces. Awake ... sleeping ...

... and playful.

One of the last things in her book is her first birthday layout, which actually took up two more pages after these two. All of the good cake-eating, frosting-covered face pictures are on those pages.

And then the last thing in her book is her letter from me, which is the letter I write to each of the kids on their birthday, and I post them here, as well.

So now I've officially started her second book! I'm going to stick with the black pages for her, I think, although I use natural (tan) pages for the boys' books. I love the way the "girl colors" pop off of the black pages.

I'd love to hear from any of you who scrapbook, too!

One of my favorite weekends of the year

Twice a year, I am privileged to be able to attend a weekend scrapbooking crop, led by my dear friend Laura.

Last weekend, we went to a B&B we'd never been to before (we usually go to the same place every summer, with a different place in the winter), and it was amazing!

I was really impressed with the room the innkeeper had set up for cropping.

Every cropper's six-foot table had task lighting, and she had large fans set up if we needed them for air circulation. The overhead lighting was bright, we had a small fridge stocked with Cokes and a basket full of snacks.

And the French doors looked out onto the lake!

The sunsets were just gorgeous.

My spot is always crowded with my papers, stickers and cutting tools. I don't typically use my laptop while I crop, unless I need to log on and order some extra prints or something.

This is Leslie's spot ... she used her laptop a good bit over the weekend, as did Honor.

We worked well into the wee hours of the morning on both Saturday and Sunday. It is SO wonderful to be able to spend 18 hours a day cropping for two days! (I know that probably sounds like hell to some of you, but it's heaven for me.)

If you're new here, I post about scrapbooking occasionally. I scrapbook mainly using a "block technique," which you can read more about here. 

Whenever I go to a crop, people ask me to post pictures of some of the pages I worked on, so here are a few from Jake's book:

Several from Amelia's book:

Nathaniel's book:

And Nick's book:

I have a scrapbooking tag in my sidebar if you'd like to read more about my scrapbooking style.

As far as last weekend's crop goes, I had a GREAT time and can't wait for the next one. We adored the Sunset Inn & Retreat and plan to go back for years to come! Innkeeper Randy was a wonderful hostess and terrific chef, and the venue was my favorite that we've ever tried.

If any of my readers ever want to come, let me know! I'd love to meet you, and we get a LOT of scrapbooking done!

The template revolution

Linking up to ...




I started the week off talking about scrapbooking, and I'm going to end it the same way. It's on my mind a lot, since I went to the weekend crop last weekend (and wish I was going back this weekend!), and I hope it inspires you to start or continue working on your own.

As I've said several times before, I try to get as many pictures on a page as possible. (When you take as many pictures as I do, that's a necessary efficiency!) To help me do that, I originally bought a number of plastic templates -- which unfortunately were discontinued and I can't find them anywhere to link to them for you.

So I did the next best thing: I took my favorites and mocked them up for you so you can print them out and use them for reference in planning your pages. They can be used in any of the four directions, so each template design really gives you four options for laying out the pictures. (You should be able to click on each one and open it up in a separate window to print it.)

These templates are supposed to be 12x12, but I don't know if I got them exactly square. The secret to them is that you can combine any of the boxes to make bigger boxes, or split them even farther to make smaller boxes.

I typically do the former rather than the latter, and I use the smallest boxes for blocks of accent paper and/or embellishment. Also, I've been using them for so long now that I actually don't USE them anymore. My eye has gotten trained to the template way of design, so I make them up as I go. The concept is simple once you get used to it.

One of my next goals is to take a series of eight or nine pictures and show you how to lay them out in three or four different templates so that you can see how to crop them the best way for you, leaving appropriate room for embellishment and journaling (journaling is SO important!) ... so be looking for that sometime in the next, um, year?