Where to start

When you start scrapbooking, start by organizing your photos into themes, seasons, year, or event. It is a good idea as you are sorting to write down memories that you have about the photo such as names, dates, and places. If you want to write on the back of your photos, it is important to use an acid-free pen.

When making your first page you should choose an event that you have a few good photos from. It is probably best to choose photos that are not necessarily “special” to you. You should save baby books, wedding photos, and anything else that you really treasure until you have developed a knowledge of what you like in your pages and the skills to make your album as precious to you as the memories are.

Most people use an odd number a photos on each page. If there is one special photo from the event then make it the focal point of the page. You can do this by matting it in a special way, enlarging it, or having it on one page with the title and the other photos on the next page with the journaling. If you need to you can crop your photos to enhance a specific image or remove unwanted background.

Choose your paper. When choosing the colors for your paper, you should look at your photos and see if there are any colors which stand out in all or most of the photos. You can choose plain, striped, checked, or printed paper, - it doesn’t matter as long as it tells your story.

It may be necessary to crop some of your photos to remove any unnecessary background in the picture. If you crop make sure you have the negative or a copy of the photo just in case you crop too much.
It may be necessary to crop some of your photos to remove any unnecessary background in the picture. If you crop make sure you have the negative or a copy of the photo just in case you crop too much.

You can matt your photos if you wish. Usually, your focal photo is matted in a different way to the others. This may be done by matting it in a different color, a different size frame, an extra layer, or a few extra embellishments.

When journaling, remember that you want to tell your story. The photo doesn’t tell it all - who, what, when, where, your feelings, and memories.

If you want, you can add embellishments to further highlight your story. These may include such things as stickers, die cuts, wire, eyelets, bottle caps, ribbons, beads, buttons, and tags.

When you have arranged everything onto the pages use an acid free adhesive tape, tabs, or glue to stick everything down. If you have any memorabilia that may damage your photos by being not archival quality, you need to use memorabilia pockets or archival spray. When you have completed your page you should place it in a page protector inside an album to preserve it.