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Scrapbooking

Scrapbooking Your Childhood by Crystal Jeffrey Rieger Using photos of your own childhood for scrapbooking can prove to be quite a challenge.  Follow these tips from Crystal Jeffrey Rieger to make the process a little easier. Article rating: 8.40

As you busily scrapbook your present life do you ever take a moment to scrapbook your childhood? It can be pretty intimidating task if you look at the big picture, especially if the photos look like this.

Or even worse - this. Every scrapbooker’s worst dream, magnetic albums full of photo eating acid.

So where do you start?  How do you take a pile of photos or even photos organized into albums and make a scrapbook with them? It is a pretty big task indeed. Especially if you feel like you need to scrapbook them like you scrapbook your current photos, recording every photo with all the details.

But, there are no rules saying that if you scrapbook your childhood you must scrapbook the entire thing. You do not need to scrapbook ALL the photos. Why not just pick and choose memories as they come to you and find the photos to match? Or vice versa. Look to photos to trigger memories and match up the story to them. The idea is to break down the overwhelming task into smaller, more manageable parts. Chronological scrapbooking need not apply!

So where do you start? Take a moment and grab some childhood photos. Look through them and let them dictate what you scrapbook. For instance take the photo below. As I flipped through photos I came across it and as soon as I saw it I knew the story I wanted to tell.

As soon as I saw this photo I thought of how my mother used to always dress us in matching outfits. I am not sure if she had an overwhelming desire to have triplets or if she just found it easier to stop the fights if we all wore the same thing. What I do know is this is not the only photo I have of my sisters and myself in matching outfits. I have no idea when this photo was taken or why but that is not what is important to me. I want to capture (and remember) the memory of the endless matching outfits. It is just a quick memory that, as an independent adult who now chooses her own clothes, makes me laugh. It is just one photo, one memory that floated to the surface when flipping through photos and one that I wanted to remember with a scrapbook page.

Make sure as you look through old photos that you have a notepad nearby to record the memories that pop up. That first trip down memory lane will flood you with memories – memories and stories that can get lost and forgotten again as you look through more and more photos.

Once you have exhausted your memory as a resource look to your photos to tell your stories. Did you have a favorite reading spot in your house that has been captured or a favorite place you visited as a child? Photos can tell their own story and even without dates or exact memories of the day they can be used to capture a part of your childhood.

Immediately upon seeing the photos in the above page I thought of all the trips we made to this park. While I do not remember the exact details of this day (I was three years old) I used the photos to tell a collective story of my childhood. One that was repeated often and one I want to remember. Having the photos collected together on a scrapbook page is enough for me. Enough to trigger memories of a childhood tradition that I want to remember. Remember scrapbook pages are not just for the future.  They can be created for yourself and just for your own enjoyment. Precise details such as dates or what you had for lunch are not needed to fully tell the stories.

Another resource for remembering childhood need not be through photos at all. Take for instance the page above. I do not once remember seeing my father in his red track suit but what I do remember is the endless teasing we gave him about it, even up to the present day. The track suit became a legend in our home and continued long after he stopped wearing it and long we had all moved out. Upon sorting through photos I came across a Polaroid of my father in the track suit, apparently the day he received it.  It provided the perfect visual to the family legend and offered the perfect opportunity to record this humorous story. Be sure to think of family jokes, tall tales and stories that are repeated at family gatherings as a source for your scrapbook of childhood memories. Record these stories whether you have a photo or not.

So in the end I do not have an entire scrapbook from my childhood. I just have moments or memories that bring a smile to my face that I would like to remember and revisit. It is an ongoing process for me. Something I add to over time as memories come to me. Do not overlook your childhood as part of who you are and as something that could be scrapbooked. You are the only person who can record your stories and that is something very valuable indeed.

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	n/a Posted by: kayla May 20, 2008 @ 4:49 PM EST
	good Posted by: kayla May 20, 2008 @ 4:50 PM EST
	this is great Crystal! Posted by: Katrina May 20, 2008 @ 8:7 PM EST
	By the looks of your storybook Gardens photos--you were from the London ONT area--I have many photos of those same icons!! Great tips on how to preserve the memories of your childhood. I am a Creative Memories consultant and I am always happy to see tips on how to journal about photos, past and present---a passion of mine! Posted by: Suzanne May 22, 2008 @ 8:29 AM EST

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