Can I just vent about scrapbooking for a minute?

I currently have to design scrapbooking stuff for my job, and doing research for it is starting to really get on my nerves.

First of all, the materials are outrageously expensive. I cannot believe how much people will spend on this stuff. And most pages only have room for one photo after you're done gluing on all the overpriced extraneous stuff. Secondly, everyone is just copying everyone else's designs that they find online and in magazines. I keep seeing the same stuff over and over again. Where's the personal touch or the creativity in that?

But what was really bugging me today (as I looked through pages and pages of layouts to look for "trends") is that people are spending time and money to scrapbook things like: the contents of their closets, their love for Dunkin' Donuts coffee, a trip to get gas at Costco. I. KID. YOU. NOT.

Now I don't begrudge anyone their hobbies. But if you've got *that* much time on your hands to be taking pictures of your kids at the Costco gas pump then spending hours scrapping it, wouldn't that be time better spent *WITH* your kids?

In fairness, I will admit that my opinion is partly colored by the fact that I hate my job. And also by the fact that I used to be a collage/assemblage artist but I stopped doing it after everyone and their brother decided to start scrapbooking. But good grief, who are these people with that much free time and money?

'Myspace Phenomenon'.

Be sure to read about it in my upcoming manifesto on the subject. :)

completely narcissistic to me. It's the kind of thing I would've written in a journal when I was 15 and never shown anyone. Only to laugh at it 10 years later, embarrassed at my teenage ramblings. Now it's pasted on a page and posted online for the world to see. Not too different from myspace at all, really.

There were more than a few layouts that I saw and thought "eesh, you are going to be soooooooo embarrassed that you posted that in a few years."

(Of course, there are lots of pics of Mr. LIW, the kids, and grandparents also).

I've even included pictures of me that I personally can't stand. The reason is that my mother made dozens of photo albums out of our family photos many years ago, and there are hardly any pictures of her. She was always behind the camera, and she hated being photographed. As her daughter, I desperately wish there were more pictures of her joining in on the family fun instead of always taking the shots. I figured that my kids won't care if I was having a bad hair day, or a "fat" day, or had a big old zit on my chin - they will want pictures of their mother (I hope) just as much as I want pictures of mine.

I make sure when my parents are here or we are visiting them that I take lots of pictures of her. It kind of makes up for the lack of earlier photos of her.

you are hardly what I was describing. I never said simply having pictures of oneself is narcissistic.

but only because of the aforementioned bad hair, fat days, zits, bad expressions...

taken. LOL! I meant more along the lines of personal, TMI kinda stuff that should be written in journals. It's bizarre to me that not only do they scrap about it, but they post the pages on the internet, on a site that gets a brazillion hits a day (scrapbook.com).

I cannot even imagine you having fat days.

I find it soothing and fun. I do create my own page layouts, and I don't take pictures of stupid stuff like what's in my closet or myself pumping gas. (??)

Yes, it's a fairly expensive hobby, but what I get out of it is priceless. I like to think of it as helping to preserve a family history - I always include names, dates, and places. There's something very frustrating about looking at old family photos and not knowing who the people are in it.

But the layouts I just spent the last 3 hours looking at were far from what you described.

and maybe a small cute sticker here and there. Is that so wrong?


All that crap that people glue on and over the pictures is annoying as hell.

A nice design is good as long as there are interesting images and dates and descriptions. Preserving family history is a nice thing.

But that's not what a majority of the layouts I'm seeing are. They're ramblings about things that interest no one else. I can't imagine going to someone's house and having them show me pages like this. It would be like the old joke about seeing someone's vacation slides where they didn't edit out any of the bad or uninteresting shots.

and have something that's worth showing afterward, unlike paint by numbers or other crappy art products designed for the uncreative.

Sure, most of the scrapbookers are copying ideas and patterns from other people, but at least they have something that's actually usable afterward AND gets them doing something at least marginally creative.

This is not to deny your feelings or defend scrapbooking as an art form, but of all the common-person sort of art/creative things they could do, scrapbooking is pretty high on the list.

And for those who are creative, scrapbooking offers a huge-ass pile of possibility.

It also encourages people to actually put their photos into albums, organized, with names and captions so future generations actually know what the pictures are of.

I also agree that the prices of stuff are hilariously outrageous! One can buy a half ream of construction paper for $2, or buy fifteen pieces of construction paper cut into squares and ovals for $5. :rofl:

don't know if it's gone out of business. On busy Saturdays there would be no one in the store. Mostly now I see the stuff in Target.

has tapered off a bit as of late. Places like Michael's and Hobby Lobby take a lot of business too. There are a few other superstores like Archivers, but I read somewhere recently that the trend is going more toward digital scrapbooking.

While there are facets of digital scrapbooking that I like, I enjoy the constructing apect of cutting the papers, trimming ribbon, and making little doo-dads to put on the layout.

fsc

I'm a very tactile person. I enjoy making the pages, and I enjoy sitting down with a completed album and looking at it.

I get most of my supplies at Archivers.

I'm with Left is Write. I ADORE scrapbooking. I spend SHITLOADS on paper and stickers and ribbon and fibers and other CRAP. I'm a genealogist, and use my books to illustrate family relationships and stories that have been passed down. I actually travel with my books in suitcases to meet new cousins so they can see what's going on with the book I'm writing and want to share MORE pictures with me.

That said, I think it's wonderful that people who formerly might not have been considered creative have a niche that they can enjoy too. And sometimes it's not even as much about the story in the layout as it is the experimentation with techniques and products. And while being a mom is great, even a mom sometimes needs an outlet-- something competely for them that they enjoy that helps them blow off steam. I don't think anyone could begrudge them that quiet fun time that scrapping provides.

And while it may seem vapid or inconsequential to you now, just think if our planet survives for more years than we think it might. If the stuff we create now endures for awhile, genealogists in 50-100 years will delight in seeing what we created just as we enjoy looking at those old books of clippings and such that our grandmothers and great aunts created.

Dunkin Donuts and things like that may not seem important now, but in 50 years, someone writing about their grandmother will get a chuckle out of Grandma's coffee jones.

Just my 2 cents. :hi:

captioning pictures, and putting them in an artistic, eye-catching arrangement. But damn, why do you need ribbons and glitter and shit? I'd rather look at THE PICTURES than the stuff around it.

Whatever, it doesn't bother me, it just seems that people get WAYYYY too into it.

It's a hobby, like any other.

Now THERE is a bad hobby!

Where is that line? I suppose when someone is spending more time scrapping about their kids than playing with their kids. Or spending more money on supplies to the detriment of their household budget. Or driving everyone around them insane with their incessant photography and staged shots. If you don't do that, then you've not gone too far. But there are people who have. I imagine it can become an addiction like anything else. Like that couple that let their kids almost starve to death while they played D&D. There's nothing wrong with D&D, but there is something wrong with getting too into it.

I'm sure I do stuff that is mind-bendingly boring to everyone else, I'm just saying I don't get it :shrug:

Scrapbooking is a hobby that seems to inspire a lot of ridicule and disdain, and I guess I don't know why.

that there are SUPERSTORES devoted to it.

I think it's the money, more than anything; why spend so much, when you could do it yourself, and have it mean more?

Construction paper can do wonderful things (as someone else in here said)

I'm making these scrapbooks to last more than a lifetime, and I'd prefer not to degrade my photos.

I also like paper that's a bit nicer than construction paper.

There are (clearly) many other people who enjoy the experience for what it is-
a chance to preserve your memories in a very unique and artistic way.

I'm not hating on people who like it, I just don't get it :shrug:

like country music, or knitting :D

But country music???
I hate it too!!

Even as far back as high school I was ALWAYS the picture person
and I used to make my own little albums.
Guess who my friends turn to now when they want to remember the past? lol


Then I took a creative memories class once and was hooked.
2 years ago, both of my nieces were graduating high school. I got their parents
to give me hundreds of pictures of them which I went through and scanned what I wanted
& got prints from Kodak. I used K&Company books which were SO nice.

I'm not really into getting the magazines and copying other peoples layouts-
I do my own thing using sticker, papers, stencils & free hand drawing.

The last page of the book for each of them was a baby pic, a toddler pic, a Kindergarten pic,
and 6th grade pic, their first high school dance and their senior portrait- along with the words
to Rod Stewarts "Forever Young". I've never seen people cry so hard when they saw it.
Heck, I got choked up doing it for them. It took me from November-June to do both books.


They both keep their books in a prominent place in their apartments and they both love them.
One of them just asked me if she gave me her college pictures if I would make a scrapbook for her
of those.

Scrapbooking is about memories- when I was growing up my grandmother always took tons of pictures and
created these beautiful albums. I wanted to carry that tradition on.

I think some people go nutso over it & want everything to be JUST SO. But others of us just do it
because there is beauty to be found in documenting your (or someone you love) history.

though we do scrapbook on occasion in my home. It's not really something that I enjoy on my own but my seven year old loves it.

Sometimes, when I have a few extra dollars, I buy my daughter a disposable camera. We decide that it's not important to necessarily take pictures of any one person or thing but to just take pics of anything that's interesting. We have one afternoon to take the pics then get them developed at a one hour photo. From there she scrapbooks to her hearts' content.

She does get some really cool pics that way and has fun not only taking them but designing backgrounds for them.

practice it. I haven't seen the on-line albums you're describing.

I have seen pages posted in the window of a local scrapbooking store and I even took a class myself because an acquaintance was starting her own business. My reservation about much of what I've seen is that it strikes me as way too "busy." I prefer that the focus be on the photos and descriptions, instead of a lot of clutter surrounding them.

Me? I'd be thrilled if I could just get my boxes of photos slipped into an album with dates, much less turn it into more of a project. ;)

Seriously. I now do have some of those nice boxes which hold 4x6 photos at least categorized by family, cats, Wyoming, travel, Alaska, and a pretty wooden box that I found on a sale table with our Florida trip etc. However, the time and materials involved in actually organizing and decorating them...NO WAY...obviously LOL.

I can't even decorate my house! My artistic skills are limited to my kitchen!

I have a few scrapbooks, and have dabbled in it as a hobby -- I found that you are correct - the commonly available supplies are annoying and overpriced, and most of the things people "make" with them suck donkey balls.

Mine are more the cool paper + duct tape + ink + photos/journaling variety. Dirt cheap and fun to look through.

I've switched most of my energy over to sewing and knitting though bc it did feel sort of... useless and time consuming. I am still really committed to holding onto photos and dating/describing them - I have very few from my childhood and I want my daughter to have them when she's an adult.

I think that is one sick trend. "Let's film little Tommy every minute of his little life!" Ewwww.
I remember other parents filming every baseball practice, every birthday party, every
vacation. :puke:

Who WATCHES that shit? Do those kids grow up to wonder why other adults don't seem to give a F*ck what they're doing?

Just sayin'.

OTOH, a scrapbook is a nice family archive - as long as it isn't too obsessive....
:P

a full trot. He made a loop around the gallery with his video camera running, then went to the next gallery. I'm guessing he did the whole museum this way, because I saw him a couple more times throughout my visit. Not once did he stop to look at any art with his own eyes. At least he got his cardio done for the day! :eyes:

But you need a Segue to get the full effect.

Can you just see him zipping through the galleries? Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzuuum..............

:spray:

People should have to spend 20 hours at Tact and Art school before allowed to video tape any family crap, and another 20 hours at Manners and Hospitality school before they are allowed to even ask anyone to watch their *#(& videos.

Sweet mother of God, you are right - the world's most tacky and boring scrapbook is light years better than a video.

I'd like to see cops permanently stationed outside the stores so that as people buy video cameras, the cops can take 'em to jail as soon as they walk out the doors.

"Bought a new video camera, mate, did ya? Yeah, well then, off you go."

JUST DON'T FORCE ANYONE ELSE TO WATCH IT UNLESS THEY ASK.

I remember my husband's cousin bringing over a video of the birth of their son. At a holiday dinner. I'm not grossed out by much but I still found it really inappropriate.

Had a client who needed help executing her "concepts" so what's what I did. Anytime I'd try to add a little class or sophistication to the stuff, she'd shoot it down. Seemed like the tackier it was, the better she liked it. I guess it sold OK... I still see some of it in Meijer now and then.

The strangest project I did involved doggerel "poems" about various sports. Yes, sports. She'd had a "poet" write a few that were horrid. Part of the requirement was to include as many buzzwords and slang as possible. I slapped one together sort of to demonstrate how horrid the other ones were, and of course, she loved it and I ended up writing a bunch more. Couldn't bring myself to sign my name to the things... she couldn't understand why not, and I just said, "uh, well, you paid me to write it" and signed a fake name to them. They paid pretty well, but it was like having a gun to my head at all times, so I managed to gracefully exit. Also, she and all her employees were total fundies, so I'd get to hear about that and was surrounded by the paraphernalia whenever I met at their office. To her credit, she didn't enquire as to my "beliefs" (maybe she presumed they were the same as hers) or get preachy with me.

Anway... I'm amazed that it's still going strong as fads go.

This lady showed me her scrapbook of her trip. It was an entire photo album type book filled with every possible memoriabilia from the trip - from the tickets stubs to board the ship to the napkins. I thought... when will you ever look a that book again.

Those of you how memorialize every experience - please tell us why.

station or the contents of your closet. It was a significant event. I'm not sure why every molecule of the experience needed to be recorded but whatever. But can you imagine what it must be like for the kids of the super-addicted scrappers (and no, I don't mean any of the people here, sheesh!)? "Mom! Can I just finish putting on my socks now? Haven't you got enough pictures?" or "Mom, the tank is full and there are people waiting. I don't think you need another picture of the gas pump."

When I went to Italy back in 1991, I saved ticket stubs and whatnot. I put them in little trip diaries at the time, but now I want to put them in real life scrapbooks. Some of us are just more nostalgic for parts of our lives.

I enjoy sharing my scrapbooks with people too. Most of them enjoy it. But if I see eyes glazing over, it's obviously time to put it away, as these folks have better things to do.

And I don't use the cheap cheesy looking stuff. I usually buy a lot of Karen Foster and Seven Gypsies-- stuff that already looks well-worn and sort of old-- lots of subdued colors and classy accessories. The really brightly-colored gummy, sparkly overdone crap I won't touch with a ten foot pole.

And I LOVE scrapbook superstores.

...I did set up a blog for my recent trip to Germany for a friend's wedding. The intent was to show all my friends and relatives the same photos and stories in one place - so that I don't drive myself nuts trying to figure out if I told Aunt X about the side trip to Denmark.

and i aspire to create a scrapbook encapsulating my antipathy for the current state of humanity. it'll be there to help the archaeologists, of course...
;)

mostly they're in boxes and since my digital camera, on discs

but then I don't have kids.....

thing into another reason to feel like a bad parent. Like when my kids happen across a photo of themselves as toddlers and say, "OH. THAT's what I looked like." :blush:

"Scrapbooking." It's like "gifting" and "birthing" and every other goddamn annoying remade word out there. Fingernails on a blackboard to me.

And I know that's a stupid thing to get irritated about but so are a lot of other things. That just happens to be mine. :P

What do you call it? I don't know what other word to use. "Working on my scrapbooks" is awful wordy.

We can coin a new term! :D

But I suppose if I did, I'd say, "I enjoy making scrapbooks" rather than "I enjoy scrapbooking". It's one of those completely irrational irritations people have which I freely admit is absurd.

I'm going to make a great grumpy old lady. :P

we called it 'working on my scrapbook', and we LIKED it! What's with all this newfangled 'scrapbooking' lingo! Kids today! Speaking a new language, I tell you.

Hey buster! Get off my lawn!"

:P

I've always been negative about the "Verbing of America."

I am guilty of using scrapbook as a verb, mostly in a shorthand way. I often do say "making scrapbooks" instead of "scrapbooking."

The only thing that bugs me a little more is "scrapping." I never say I'm "scrapping." To me, scrapping means something else entirely.

Pretty soon you're not vacationing. All you're doing is taking pictures.

I hate seeing that. He's missing his vacation because he's too busy trying to record it.

it was rather sad and pathetic...

she had ornate scrapbooks detailing a birthday party...meanwhile...she never read a book to her kids..

it was really bizarre.

I am lucky if I put photos in an album...

My mom didn't scrapbook but she has all these "fond" memories of the wonderful things she did with us and for us. Meanwhile she conveniently forgot how many times she flipped out and abused us. Are some scrapbook addicts trying to create some kind of happy life that doesn't really exist?