Jul 2010
27
Getting Good Stuff Cheap
The basics of scrapbooking can often be found at yard sales, discount stores and clearance racks. You just have to use your imagination to figure out how they can be repurposed for albums. Spiral bound journals and note-book style photo albums are just waiting to be used as scrapbooks. Decorate the front, incorporating the pattern they come with and then go to town inside. For notebooks, just punch holds in card stock to put them in the album and then decorate. You might even find scrap books on clearance as the costly hobby loses in popularity in the current economic climate. You can even use personal cookbooks as scrapbooks, incorporating photos of the loved ones who made the recipes.
If you’re lucky, you’ll find some stamps, rubs, die cutters and other high-end scrapping materials on the cheap. Still, you can do plenty without them.
Repurposing for Scrapbooking
Greeting cards, wrapping paper, tissue papers, stickers, stamps, ribbon and string are all excellent scrapping materials and often can be had for free. Sometimes you just have some left over after giving, other times, you have them given to you. Keep a box handy for stashing the stuff and pull it out when you feel like putting together a page.
Use Affordable Materials
Watercolors are very affordable, often available for $1 at a discount store. You can do any number of creative designs with them, mixing the paint thick or thin to suit your needs. Borrow the kids’ markers instead of buying a set. Use crayons, they make a bold artistic statement that fits in so well for a family photo album.
Use construction paper from the dollar store to make your own elegant silhouette backgrounds. Just trace the shape of some wildflowers on two different colors, cut each out and place them on a third background the compliments the two colors. Place each silhouette at a different angle or flip one over for maximum effect. Techniques like this help you build beautiful backgrounds at very little cost.
Take a tip from artist James Castle. He drew on ordinary household objects like, the hash can labels on the right, whenever he had a chance. Never mind that he was poor, mentally disabled and deaf. He made art out of everything around him. You can do the same.
Use the Gifts God Gave You
These photos are from a photo album that a Billeater reader re-purposed to use as a baby scrapbook. She used neat tricks like keeping the birth documents and bracelets from the hospital inside a pouch made of gift bag paper. It opens with a tiny tab of Velcro. She also used cards from the baby shower to decorate the book, adding photos of the people who gave the cards and little notes of things she wanted the baby to know when he grew. This touching display of a mother's love cost five dollars, but for the cost of developing the photos. That’s right, it cost her next to nothing. How? The book was a baby shower gift and her incredible talents were a free gift from the almighty. The stickers came from the dollar store and most of the embellishments came from gift packaging and party decorations.
But the same ideas hold true for all scrapbooking. Look around for what you already have. How can you make them work for your needs? There are many materials that can have a lovely second life in your scrapbook.
An old pair of jeans, leaves or pressed flowers from the yard, your childrens’ artwork, and any other flat material works well. Think of things that instill nostalgia: sun dress fabric, lace, diaper pins, old magazines and artwork, small US flags left over from Independence day, puppy collars, candy wrappers, baby hospital bands, and newsprint are just a few materials that are perfect for scrapping.
...What more items can you think of? Where do you mine scrapping materials? Share your ideas with the crowd!
Jessica Bosari is an Internet copywriter and blogger for various publications and her own blog. You can read more of Jessica's work here.
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