Scrap Booking Babies First Year

There is a lot to be said about capturing those precious moment you have with your newborn. These little guys grow so quickly it is hard to keep up with them as the move from just needing to be held to rolling, blowing raspberries, and crawling. As the time passes by it is great for you to be able to look back and reflect with your hubby or just have a misty eyed moment when they are too big to want to be held.

I am they type of girl that likes things basic but clean and uniform. When I first went to Michael's when I was pregnant to start a pregnancy album, I was very overwhelmed by all the choices. There is a whole aisle of books/album covers to choose from. These can range from canvas to leather and everything in between. I would recommend picking your colour theme at this stage. For example; if its a boy, maybe blue or green, a summer trip maybe yellow or electric blue. I do love being able to look at the covers on the shelf and know what each one is, but you may want something more aesthetic keeping them all one colour. Most of these albums come with pages in them and some even come with a complete kit. Keep in mind that you may just want to start with what's there and add the pages as need be. I have gone with the kits and with buying separate and found that I am cheaper when buying the kit. If you give yourself too many choices you end up with too many stickers and add-ons that you may not need.

I would also recommend printing off the basic photos you would like to highlight in your album. At least this way you will have a better gauge on the types of stickers, stamps and other applications you would like to add to the pages. This will also give you an idea of what size of book you will need. If you have a lot of photos you may want to double up on each pages' photos or even have more. Also take a look at the photo's and decide on a colour theme. If you are going with all black and white it is usually better to stay that way but if you are doing colour, try to not drown out your photos with everything else on the page.

The next major step is mounting the pictures to the pages. You can do this a couple of ways. I have used both the double sided option and the corner tabs. I prefer the corner tabs when it comes to a more formal album as it gives an antique look. If you are going to be cutting edges and adding borders, I would recommend the simple dispenser.

A few pointers that have kept my scrapbooks interesting is the things I have collected along the way. I have included the wrist and ankle bands from the hospital, the card that was placed on my sons incubator and pictures of his first shoes. These will be the things that will bring the experience and story back to life for you. I also find that sharing my albums is a bit more interesting.

A few products you will want to pick-up to make sure your project is straight, and in the end not a hot mess...

• Great set of scissors a small pair and large pair
• Scoring Score Board and Envelope Tool Martha Stewart Crafts EK Success
• Martha Stewart Tools, Circle Cutter 
• Great First Year Page Kit

A couple great books to take out from the library or buy would be:

• The Big Picture: Scrapbook Your Life and a Whole Lot More
• Clean And Simple Scrapbooking: Ideas for Design, Photography, Journaling & Typography
• A Designer's Eye for Scrapbooking & A Designer's Eye 2 - Patterned Paper

And my final point would be that this is a great activity with a group of other moms! It is amazing the creativity that comes out of other mom's and a group collective. The additional benefit to this is that you can share and trade supplies that you have with other moms. 

Please share any other links that you may find helpful for other moms!