Category Archives: getting started

Jan30

It’s Alive!

Posted on by
It’s Alive!

Won’t you please welcome to the world The Beginner’s Guide to Scrapbooking!

beginners guide to scrapbooking || noexcusescrapbooking.com

This is a strictly for beginner’s book! Really!

It breaks down the page creation process into simple steps, with three common starting points: your photos, your story, or your beloved scrapbooking supplies.

If you’ve made a page before, you’ll recognize all the steps. If you’ve tried but failed, it’s usually because you get hung up on design or journaling. If those are your problems, this has some quick and simple tips to help you work around them.

If you haven’t scrapbooked because you think you need to have all your photos printed and organized, and your supplies stored away in pretty baskets, that’s just not true. In order to preserve your memories, you just need paper, pens, maybe some photos, and some adhesive. Everything else is just icing on the cake.

Please, share this with all your non-scrapbooking friends! Memory keeping doesn’t have to be difficult, time consuming or intimidating. It just needs to be fun!

 

Jan20

Exciting things on the way!

Posted on by
Exciting things on the way!

There are so many fun things heading our way.

truth scrap button black

First up, on January 31st is the next True Scrap production, Truth Scrap! This one day online, live event will focus on the hows and whys of scrapbooking your faith. I’ve seen a couple previews of class samples, and they look amazing! If you are into art journaling or faith-booking, this is the event for you.

This will be the first True Scrap production I won’t be able to attend. Which I am rather bummed about. But I’ll keep my ear to the ground and let you know which ones my scrappy friends really love!

LOAD215 1000x500

Also coming up real fast is the next Layout a Day challenge, which starts February 1st. The theme of this year’s LOAD is “Once Upon a Time… Celebrating the Stories and Books of Our Youth.” As an avowed book nerd from a very early age, I’m excited to see where February’s month of prompts will take us. Lain usually comes up with some great, thought provoking ideas. I’ll be posting my daily layouts here, as well as on Flickr, so you’ll get to see how creating a page a day works. I think you’ll be surprised at how quickly you start to scrapbook once you’ve gotten into the groove of creating a page daily.

My book is almost done. I’m doing one final edit to check for errors and unclear sentences. I want beginning scrapbookers to understand what I’m trying to tell them! This book is intended specifically for the beginning scrapbooker; it lays out the process for creating a page from start to finish based on three common starting points. It’s very definitely process based, rather than project based.

beginners guide to scrapbooking || noexcusescrapbooking.com

By the end of February, I should have a class based on the book ready for sale. That will include three process videos, worksheets and printable PDFs, and possibly layered photoshop templates for the digitally inclined. If I do include the layered templates, I’ll probably include another video on how to use them. Maybe. I’m still finalizing details on the class. Also, there will be a bit of instructor interaction, with review of up to three layouts that the student produces.

That’s a lot of excitement for one day, don’t you think? I think I’m going to go calm down by doing my December Project Life pages. Yep. I do find scrapbooking therapeutic, don’t you?

Dec17

A Moment of Reflection

Posted on by
A Moment of Reflection

This blog has been up and running for two years now. How cool is that?

In the past two years, I’ve published 236 posts. That’s an average of a post every three days. Not too shabby.

The most popular post by far has been the post where I shared tools to help document a Week in the Life. A lot of people have been using it for inspiration for Project Life as well.

The most popular video has been the one that I made about how to cover an old vinyl binder with a large sheet of paper. Definitely NOT my best video. (So much time wasted, and so many goofy errors!) But it definitely has good information in it. My favorite videos are my very first– a start to finish process video, and a tool technique one, where I show three ways to use alpha stamps other than as titles or journaling. Also, the video I made for those who sign up for my email list, about ways to avoid making stamping errors is pretty awesome too. But that one you need to pay me with your email address.

I’ve made one mini-digital supply kit. You can find it here for free! I have plans to make more. I keep getting hung up on the idea that I need to be able to draw. I don’t really, but mental roadblocks are hard to work around sometimes.

I’ve done two full months of cards, in November 2013, and November 2014. I think that qualifies as a yearly tradition now, don’t you?

I’ve talked philosophy, and organization, and my favorite challenge, LOAD.

So many topics! So many posts! Each time I go through the archives I come across something I really like, either from a design perspective, or from a writing perspective.

Go ahead, pick a month from the archive list, I bet you’ll find something interesting!

Moving forward?

I hope to keep giving you inspiration that helps you avoid the excuses that get in the way of scrapbooking.

And for those of you who want to scrapbook but have yet to actually make a page?

I’ve got something coming for you:

beginners guide to scrapbooking || noexcusescrapbooking.com

I’m planning on releasing it on Kindle in January. Hopefully it will be the first of many. How’s that for exciting?

Jul7

Prepping for a Big Project

Posted on by
Prepping for a Big Project

Last week, I began a huge project. (And no I’m not talking about rearranging my craft room!) Last week I joined the Project Life/Pocket Page/Capture Your 365 bandwagon.

I’ve tried this before, and only managed to get through 2 months before the weekly printing thing pushed me over the edge.

Knowing that, I’m setting up a few processes that hopefully will help me keep the momentum going. I’ll get into that more next week.

More importantly, knowing WHY I want to do this should help keep me going, and keep me motivated when the occasional frustrations set in.

And my reason(s) why?

This kid grew 3 and a half inches in the past nine months.

This kid grew 3 and a half inches in the past nine months.

I’m living in a season of change. My children are growing so fast, it feels like they’ll be out of the house before I barely get used to having them around.

Being a parent is such a privilege. Watching my boys become young men is a gift I cherish everyday. And the details of our day to day lives are changing in subtle ways all the time.

I want to write down and photograph these details, so I don’t forget them all. (Forgetting most, I’m okay with, but I want to remember at least some of the little things!) I want to treasure the moments we have together as a family, because all too soon the boys will be moving on to their own lives.

So.

That’s my why. At least for this project. There are a lot more reasons I scrapbook, but that’s the important one for now.

As far as getting my product all ready to go, I’ve got all my journaling cards handy, and a three ring binder preloaded with divided page protectors. I’ve even gone through my stash, and pulled out patterned paper that’s got journaling cards printed on them, and cut those apart and added them to the pile. I’ve probably got enough cards on hand to do two years worth of pocket pages. That’s okay. I may decide to do two years of documenting. Who knows? Maybe I’ll do this until the kids leave for college!

I’ve got a pack of photo paper for printing, and a template for printing multiple photos on one sheet of paper. I’ve even got a template for printing a bunch of 2×2 pictures on a 4×6 piece of photo paper. You can download the templates below:

letter size multi 4x6 collage

4×6 photos on letter size paper

4×6 on letter size paper

4x4 and 3x3 collage

square photos on letter size paper

square photos on letter size paper

2x2 photos on 4x6 paper

2×2 photos on 4×6 paper

4×6 photo collage

For the most part, I’m playing this by ear. I’m not sure how this is going to go, but I know it’s something I want to do. I sort of like this sense of wonder and insecurity. I’m finding it very inspiring!

How many of you out there are on the daily photo/ Project Life bandwagon? Do you have any tips you’d like to share that help keep you motivated and on track?

Apr18

Pocket Pages to the Rescue!

Posted on by
Pocket Pages to the Rescue!

Earlier this week, you saw the picture-less spread about my trip to Jamaica, and read the whole long story about why I didn’t have any pictures.

Jamaica--no photos || noexcusescrapbooking.com

But then, I found them. And printed them. And used them.

pocket pages to expand a story || noexcusescrapbooking.com

A picture on the back of the wedding invite and cardstock insert added the most important details first, and pocket pages filled with some shots of the people and places involved rounded out the details. An enlargement of my favorite photo with some fun papers satisfied my need to make something pretty, while adding a nice final touch to the story.

pocket pages to expand a story pt 2 || noexcusescrapbooking.com

 

Putting together these pages, I was totally inspired by the pocket page classes I took through True Scrap in January. Monica McNeill’s class on batch processing, and keeping it simple helped me focus on what I wanted the end result to be: story and picture driven. Lilith Eeckels’ class gave me the additional permission I needed as well as inspiration to add a full scrapbook page in with the pocket page story. If you haven’t checked out those classes, you totally should, especially since they are only on sale till the end of the month. ($9 a piece instead of over $12! And, if you decide to buy all 6 pocket page classes, you can get them for $7.50 each. Just use coupon code SAVE40 at checkout.)

The best part? I don’t have to do anything else to tell this story. It’s done. I suppose I can use some of these pics to help tell other stories, but this story is DONE! And that feels good. 🙂

Have you ever lost any of your photos? What have you done to tell your story without them?