Scrapbooking Baby

LO: Baby Mini Book on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

Hi everyone, time to tackle another one of those common questions I get asked all the time, which is….what should I put on the cover of my Baby Scrapbook?  Well there is no right or wrong answer, like everything that goes into your scrapbooking, you have the choice to do it however you like, there are no set rules.

Some people like to create their own albums and design it all, the actual size of the album, the way it displays, (opens out in folds or turns like normal pages), some people like to pre-make the pages so it’s just a just of adding the photos, they design the cover, the possibilities are endless really.

However, if you are like me and really don’t have too much time to make things from scratch, it may be a lot easier and far more practical to just buy your album and save your creativity for your layouts inside the album.  I have made a few from scratch, but now days I just really don’t have the time.

When it comes to baby scrapbook albums, there are some beautiful albums readily available to compliment both baby girls and baby boys.  You can choose one that is more traditional and plain, or go for some of the newer and more interactive album that’s allow you to capture an impression of your baby’s hand or foot print.

I think these albums are really quite special, as there is something special about picking up that precious baby scrapbook years later and seeing that plaster imprint of your baby’s hand or foot.  It really gives you that sense of size, how tiny they were, photos are wonderful, but things like ink foot prints or plaster foot prints really remind and show you just how sweet and tiny they were.

But again there are just so many to choose from, so don’t go feeling overwhelmed, you can choose to go for a simple plain covered album, it is however only the album, the magic is inside, or you can choose to go with a specific baby themed album so that the album stands out and is never mistaken as one of your other scrapbooking albums, that is the joy of scrapbooking, the choice is yours.

Happy scrappin and talk to you soon.

When it comes to your baby scrapbook, you want to include lots of memorable things, and I like to add things that show a real size comparison too.  And well lets think about it, when you think of babies, you think of cute, cuddly, soft and sweet things.  So apart from your gorgeous baby, what else is soft, cute and cuddly?  Teddy bears!

Most babies end up with lots of teddy bears and other soft cuddly toys that can’t hurt them and creating a layout with some of these toys in it, can turn out to be a wonderful thing.  So I am using this example of a layout I did with my little girl, and no we don’t own the teddy bear, he was huge, but boy he was so soft and cute, I couldn’t resist quickly sitting my girl there and taking some quick snaps of her with that huge teddy towering over her.

Now this scrapbooking baby layout is not completed yet, (still looks very plain, it needs a title, embellishments, and some journaling) but I wanted to show you what is possible, she was mesmerized by the huge teddy and she was laughing and smiling so what scrapbooking parent could resist?  This was actually taken at one of our baby nursery stores, and the teddy was part of a display, but I’m sure lots of kids had played with him because he was just so cute.

So I got some snaps of the teddy and her, plus some just of her giggling and smiling about the whole situation, and then with two of the images I ever so carefully cut all of the background out with my Fiskars scissors.  Now you can not tell from the photo of the layout, but i have actually lifted the two bottom images off the page in a 3D fashion and I will include the instructions as to how I did that should you want to give it a try.

One particular bit of advice, that really goes for all scrapbooking, is you really do need a good quality pair of fine precision scissors for these tasks.  I brought mine many years ago and I can not live without them, they make things so much easier and you will see the difference if you do tend to crop images by hand as I have done in a lot of my layouts.  In fact the next post I might dedicate to the benefits of having a great pair of scissors just for scrapbooking, it really is that important.

So here are the steps I took to create the 3D Scrapbooking Baby Technique:
I traced the shape of the two cropped photos onto the background cardstock with pencil
Next using my sharp fine scissors I cut this shape out leaving two holes the same shape as my cropped photos
Next I used two pieces of the blue cardstock and glued them to the back of the background cardstock covering the holes
Next I turned the cardstock right way up again, and chalked the edges of the cream background cardstock with a light brownish chalk to create a shadow effect
Next using foam squares I stuck the photos onto of the blue cardstock.

So when you see the layout in person the two bottom images are in fact off the page and the blue behind them and the chalked edges around them all gives it quite a 3D look and brings those two photos to life.  This again is just a simple layout you can also create in your scrapbooking baby album, I have another one quite similar of her playing with toys in her cot, and again the results are really quite wonderful.

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Many thanks to all my wonderful readers and until next time, Happy Scrapping!

A few people have been asking me for some ideas for either scrapbooking baby layout ideas or for ideas on specific photos to take of their baby’s to capture specific memories. For me these ideas flow freely but I am also aware that sometimes we all get some form of mental block and end up at a loss for what to do. So I thought I would put this post together to give you all an idea that you may not have thought of.

One of my favorite layouts for newborn babies would have to be their hands and feet. They are just so tiny and sweet, so little, so perfect! But here you go, a big tip is don’t just click away taking photos of hands and feet, you need to plan the photo a little bit. For example, have you ever taken a photo something that was amazing large or small and later looked at the photo and found that the photo really didn’t do it any justice? Perhaps a really big butterfly and later in the photo it just looks like any other normal sized butterfly. Well that is what I mean, it takes a little bit of planning.

So when you take a photo of your baby’s hands or feet, make sure you also capture another object in the photo that gives a true impression of the size of your bay’s dainty sweet little feet or hands. You can use anything at all, you might choose to use your own hand or foot as a comparison or even a ruler to show the exact size. I do have a personal favorite when taking these kinds of photos and that is to use your wedding ring. Or if you do not have a wedding ring, any other ring you commonly wear.

I think it makes such a sweet photo, your wedding ring or rings hanging on baby’s big toe or around their thumb, it gives a true picture of how tiny their little feet or hands are, and it symbolizes your love by using your wedding ring. And then when you actually use this photo in your scrapbooking baby album, keep the layout clean and simple, don’t use too many photos, in fact I like to only use the one photo on the page and make that photo the center of attention. You could do a double page layout and have the feet on one side and the hands on the other side. Trust me on this one, it makes for the most adorable layout.

Give it a try and keep watching out for more ideas and tips in the coming weeks, happy scrapping.

Thanks to Amy from Flickr for the wonderful photo, simply stunning.