Paper Crafts: Scrapbook for Beginners

Doing paper crafts is becoming a popular pastime for arts enthusiasts nowadays. Scrapbooking is a paper craft project, which is fun to do. It can also be one of the best ways to display pictures and to chronicle family history. Other paper crafts include making greeting cards and even making hand-made papers.

If you are still an amateur in making paper crafts, go easy at first until you determine what sort of paper craft materials you will want to work on. For instance, you might like using stickers more rather than using rubber stamps. If that will be the case, you be better off spending more on stickers and less on rubber stamps for your project.

Most probably, you have old photos collecting dust somewhere. Starting a scrapbook for those photos is a great and nice way to preserve and organize them artistically so many people can enjoy seeing them. You will need a loose-leaf binder, some plastic page protectors, and some colored cardstock for starters. If you want your scrapbook to last long, I recommend using only archival quality materials. For best results, use paper products, which are acid-free to prevent your photos from fading and deterioration. Your materials must also withstand sunlight because your scrapbook will bleach easily if it is exposed to direct sunlight.

To start with your scrapbook project, select photos that all relate to one event, such as a trip or your child’s graduation day. In addition, have a complementing theme in mind for your set of photos. This will make your scrapbooking easier because your idea will only revolve on a single theme. But if in case your photos are not related to each other, you may organize them into general theme for each page or if possible make a story to make them seem to be in unison.

Attach your photos on your cardstock using double-sided tape squares or glue stick. Decorate the page with stickers, paper cut-outs, or rubber stamp designs. You may also use colored gel pens to write captions or titles to your photos. However, always remember that everything that you will put on your page must be cohesive with the theme that you are working on. You can make it as simple as you want and in any way that pleases you. After all, we all have different artistic taste.

There is a wide array of scrapbooking materials available in bookstores or paper crafts specialty stores. This includes die cuts, which are pre-cut pieces of colored papers into different shapes and objects. You may also find special pair of scissors that will allow you to cut paper with an interesting edge design. Moreover, you may use a deckle or old pinking shears to make elegant looking scrapbook pages. There are also scrapbooking kits available with various designs and themes.


LESSON IN LIFE:
“Memories and old photographs are treasures, handles them with care.”