Scrapbook Fun

My love of office supplies began early on...

When I was a kid (Tracie speaking here), I began a love affair with office supplies.  I was especially fond of the carbon copy pads that waitresses and shopkeepers used.  And, of course, this means I had (still have!) a fondness for pens. 

I'm reminded of this because just today we received dozens of new American Crafts gel pens, markers, presion pens, slick writers... you name it. There are particularly wonderful silver, gold and dark red pens for all the holiday crafts I want to make, and lovely muted pink, blue and green markers for the more modern holiday papers that grace the Clubhouse shelves. When I visited Utah last year on business I was able to take a tour of American Crafts and actually see them making their precision pens (Black size 08 is my personal favorite).  So cool!   Stop in and check them out.

Found a Treasure

At today's Scrappink Crop #1, I've found a treasure to share with all of you. Sue Ross showed me the greatest little album/love note. Here's the story behind it: her son Marco had to choose between playing in the Little League Championships and going on the annual family vacation to Cape Cod. Guess which one he chose. Right--the championships. His family understood, but he was missed. So they bought a little doll in a baseball suit, one that bears a resemblance to Marco, and they took it everywhere they went on the vacation. If they were out for ice cream sundaes, if they were at a cook-out, if they were at the beach . . . Little Marco was with them. Sue then made a little 6 x 6 album about the vacation to give to Marco.

Here's a couple of pages from the album:

Be sure to note Little Marco on the boogie board, on his grandmother's shoulder, and in the sand.

And here's the beautiful final page where Marco is reminded one last time just how much he is loved and how much he was missed in Cape Cod this year:

And friends, that's what I call scrapbooking!

Simple Layouts Class This Sunday

We know lots of you out there want more simple layouts, not just because you're short on time but because "simple, clean, classy," are good words to describe your style. You can catch up on some of your summer photos and make two double-page summer layouts this Sunday with these two designs by Wendy. The cost for all four pages is only $20, and the class meets from 12:30 to 2:30. If you've got the time, we've got the fun. Just call 860-399-4443 to sign up.

A Diva Is Born

Staffer and Diva, Angela Renaud, asked if she could bring a friend to the design session Saturday night. She said her friend is facing back surgery and needs some cheering up, so I said sure. What Angela forgot to mention is that this gal, Alice Clark, is one talented lady! Look what she did with the new Owl minibook we have from Best Creations:

And two inside pages:

And last, but absolutely not the least, here's the back cover:

I've been having fun all morning thinking of occasions for which this book would make a perfect gift: like telling a parent that (at last) you appreciate all of his or her good advice and wisdom or celebrating a Big Birthday and the wisdom that comes with age, or how about a special gift to reward a child for making a special effort in school?

Alice does more typical layouts too, as you can see here:

Apparently had a pretty good time at the Clubhouse that night, because she sent me this photo the next day:

Best of luck with your surgery and recovery, Alice. May you recover fast so you can get back to your Club!

So Much to Tell . . .

I certainly won't be able to show and tell all in one post, but at least I can begin. We gathered some of our Design Team Divas around us Saturday night for dinner, a little wine, and designing with the new products that are flooding in right now. (And by the way, because we moved the wall of color, we can no longer fit all our new products onto the endcaps when they first come in. If you're the type who's hungry for something new only and just check the endcaps, I'm afraid you're going to have to hunt a little harder. But don't despair. Looking at the very slightly older products in the other aisles (we're taling a matter of weeks here, sometimes days, for heaven's sake) is often inspirational. Highly Exalted Diva Jean Banning, who's been shopping here fervently since we opened, is still surprised by something she never noticed before! Let's face it, there's a lot of eye candy in this store!

To return to my point, the designers did an outstanding job.In fact, I was floored at the speed with which they created--I'd go out into the store for a little while and come back into the crop room and there would be three more layouts in the growing Diva pile. Give me time and I'll try to show all of them to you.  Here's one by Diva and Staff Member Kathy Tomasek, using the gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous new Passport line from Making Memories. (Can you tell I like this line?)

Fortunately, just in time for the Diva Design session, we received a huge order from American Crafts, featuring some exciting new products. All the Divas went nuts for the latest and greeatest from this wonderful company. They're called "Details," and they're packages six dimensional felt or foam embellishments that you just pop off the sheet and press on to your layout for a simple, cheerful boost. Here are examples of some of them:

Jean used almost the whole pack on her Christmas layout:

We Have a Winner!

Thanks to everyone who participated in the multi-store Passport program; we loved meeting all of you who traveled to our store for the first time. Indeed, one of those people is the winner of our Summer Passport prize of a $75 gift certificate: Donna Seitz of Ellington, CT, come on down!!!

Mini Moments

The publication of Ali Edwards's new book about creating mini-books has got me (and a lot of other people) thinking about the whys and wherefores of the mini. If you've never done anything but a 12 x 12 page, follow along with me as I explore the advantages of this form of the scrapbooking art.

A mini-book is the easiest, most effective, most satisfying way to stretch yourself outside your scrapbooing box. Let's say that your daughter has had some pretty significant life moments in kindergarten, maybe she experienced great growth in this period, and you're thinking that you'd like to give this experience the attention it's due. But . . . you've got a big 12 x 12 album for all the kids' school years and she's only supposed to have a double-page layout for each year of school like the other kids have, and suddenly your creativity is drying up while you subject it to a whole lot of "nos," which is usually NOT the word you want to use with your creativity. You can solve the whole problem by making the two-page layout of her year the way you've done the other kids' and by making a mini-book about her special growth. Later this month we'll be having a class called Take Note, where you can make a book that celebrates, with lots of charm, the scholastic life of someone dear to you, including yourself.

A mini-book can be any size and any length you want. You no longer have to worry about having too many pictures for a two-page layout but too few for a four-page layout, for example.

Now here's the best part, you can step outside your box all you want in the mini-book because it doesn't have to go with anything else! You can use your daughter's favorite colors, stress her feminine or tomboy nature, let her write or dictate some of the journaling. When you run out of things to say or show--the book is done. It's as simple as that. And when another kid has an extraordinary year with a sport, say, you can whip up another mini-book.

Perhaps even more important than kindergarten and soccer triumphs, the mini-book is a great place for you to document yourself. You've heard me say it before but I'm still going to say it again: decades from now if your kids inherit scrapbooks that are all about them and not about you, they're going to feel a painful loss. No matter how wonderfully you've told THEIR story, you've deprived them of YOUR OWN. Address this problem now and have fun doing it by making a little mini-book or two about yourself: the jobs you've held, the friends you've cherished, the places you've loved, the values you hold. Make it as long or as short as it needs to be and feel the freedom of making the book in any fashion you like (check out Ali's book, of course, for dozens of inspirational pages). And just in case you can't cross this frontier alone, watch for more mini-book classes this Fall and do it with our help!

Exclusive QuicKutz Fairy Die

As a proud member of the Crafters Home Independent Scrapbooking Store group, we're excited to offering you this exclusive new QuicKutz die--and what a doozy it is. I can't wait to see what Tracie and the Die Kutz Club members think of to do with all it's parts. This die is only available from Crafters Home stores and is $34.95. Please call the store at 860-399-4443 to reserve yours, as they will be shipping very soon!

Ali Edwards's New Book

FINALLY! Ali Edwards's new book, Sharing Your Story: Recording Life's Details with Mini Books, has arrived. Ali says in her foreword: "To me, mini books are freedom. They are confidence-builders. They are fun. They are a break from the process of scrapbooking in your regular format." She adds, "One of my favorite things about mini-books is that they tend to fit within your own two hands. They feel alive. Often there are no page protectors, so you can literally feel the textures of the accents and the photos and the written words. My books have been touched by many hands . . . this is part of the beauty for me. What I want to do more than anything is sit here and read my copy, but I've got more new stuff to receive for the store, so I must move on . . . but believe me, you can be SURE this is what I'm going to be reading tonight!

One Photo or Many?

A customer commented today on how many layouts she sees with just one or two pictures on them. “I’m trying to get as many pictures as I can on a page,” she said. “What am I missing?”

You’re not missing anything, I assured her. It’s just that there are two different approaches to scrapbooking, one where the scrapbooker has a bunch of pictures from an event or a story to squeeze into a layout and the other where the scrapbooker just wants one or two stunning photos. Which one is right? If you know me at all, you know I’m going to say that they’re BOTH right. There are no rules when it comes to scrapbooking style, but each of these camps does have something to learn from the other.

Lots of times I see people struggling unhappily to fit all the photos they have into a layout, even though they could easily trim the number down and make their lives much easier. If they cut out the bad shots and also cut out the ones that are virtual duplicates of each other, they very quickly have a manageable number of photos to work with. (If you can’t bear to throw the unused photos away, just slip them into the pages of a regular photo album.) I’ve also known people not to scrapbook a memory because they don’t have lots of pictures. If they stop thinking of a scrapworthy event as something they have an envelope full of pictures for—in other words, if they take a page out of the one-photo scrapbookers book—they can scrap every wonderful memory they can think of—even ones with no photos.

In this layout, Prima Diva Sandy Gonyea captures a precious moment and tells a story that people will love hearing for generations to come: the adventures of Aidan the cat and the venetian blinds. Clearly no other picture is needed--in fact, another picture might detract from the elongated feline perfection of this one.

Single photo scrapbookers have something to learn from their photo-happy sisters, too. For example, instead of limiting themselves to the one 8 x 8 photo of Jr. digging on the beach that they consider the best, they can add a few 2 x 2 photos that capture different expressions on the boy’s face during the dig. The result will have the tight focus of a single photo layout but tell much more of the story of his day.

And while we’re at it, let’s talk about single-page layouts versus double-page spreads. I know many of you are nervous about doing single pages even when you don’t have enough to fill two pages. You’re scared that two different layouts sitting in front of the viewer will look bad. If you share this inhibition, I urge you to browse through one of your favorite magazines. Notice how often the left-hand page has nothing to do with the right hand page and how it doesn’t disturb you at all. Then relax and have some fun making one-page layouts!

In this layout, the remarkable Karen Russell captures a moment in the life and loves of her large family. Each picture relates to all the others because they all convey the same message: this family loves loving each other! There's journaling too, but it's hidden under the transparency at the right side of the page so she can fit in as many pictures as she wants. This layout goes in Karen's album right next to another layout of an entirely different look and subject matter because Karen knows that single page layouts can be very different and still look great together.