After lots and lots of requests, I’m finally ready to show you around my scrapbook room and office. It took almost a year to get it to a state I’m happy with. But I believe that’s the best way to decorate and organize a room–to live in it and observe yourself and your needs before making decorative and organizational decisions.

My items are in a places that make sense for me now, so I have lots of tips to share…tips that are more like principles so they’ll help you make your own space work for you (as opposed to me).

Note: You can download the higher-quality episode by clicking here.

Are you trying to organize your space? Watch Ali Edwards’s blog because she’ll be sharing photos of her new room–probably tomorrow.

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8.5×11 Two-page Layout. Embellished area at the right side inspired by 2 Peas’ Garden Girl, Lisa McGarvey.

Paperclipping has been focused on scrapbooks for a big vacation, such as my family’s recent Disneyland trip. I’m working on my own album, as you work on yours.

Because many scrapbookers feel this project is overwhelming, I’ve broken up the process into a series of steps. But these steps won’t just make it easier on you. They’ll help you identify the rich stories you want to tell about your trip. If you missed the previous steps, here they are:

Step 1
Steps 2&3
Step 4

Step 5: Assess Your Needs

I know the temptation. The temptation is to find that super cute album you saw last week and to buy it for your vacation, without any idea how much space you actually need. That is a symptom of the number of products and projects in the magazines and online. But what do you really need to tell your story? If we are going to center our scrapbooking around the stories we have to tell, we need to start with the story and let that dictate the products.

How Many Pages Do You Need?

You’ve separated your pictures into individual stories. While you may end up changing this around a little (I have already), you should be able to count the piles for an approximation of how many pages you’ll need. Each story will normally equal one page, or one two-page spread.

What Size Of Pages Do You Need?

Approximately how many photos do you have for each story? The answer will be a major indicator for whether you need a 12×12 album, an 8.5×11 or something smaller, or if you can even use a more traditional photo album.

It will help to ask yourself the following questions:

1. Can you reprint some photos into smaller or larger sizes to better tell your stories?
2. Can you crop your photos manually in order to fit more into a smaller space?
3. How much journaling do you have for each story? Will you want to type and print it or do it by hand?

How did I decide on the size of my album? I had a varied number of photos for each of my stories. This meant I’d need some flexibility, making a traditional photo album more difficult (although, I was tempted to do this). I also wanted to type my journaling (for simplicity), and if I were to use 8.5×11 paper, I’d be able to type if right on my background pages.

I have a lot of experience re-sizing my original photos, so I decided 8.5×11 would be my best solution.

What Colors Will Highlight Your Pictures & Reproduce the Emotions Of Your Event?

If you were on top of Steps 1-3, then you should have a good idea in your mind of what the tone of the overall story is, and what colors will help you express that tone.

Originally, I skipped through this step and decided to go with white, just to make the project easier. But as I began working on my first page, I realized white wasn’t connecting with me, nor my story. I decided to find a collection of muted hues with subtle patterns that would give me the choice of warmth (browns and cream tones) or fun (light blue or red).

What Embellishments Can You Add To Support The Story?

Again, with so many wonderful products available to us, it’s easy let some popular or cute embellishments dictate our design, rather than the actual story we want to tell. I’m not saying we shouldn’t use all those embellishments. Just make sure you know what your stories are, and ask whether the embellishments support them or not.

Reuniting with some of my siblings and our parents to relive a regular childhood memory together and with our children was greater for me than the actual Disney park, itself. I decided to use minimal embellishments and instead, make the bounty of photos the real highlight of the pages.

I also wanted a very classic representative of Disney–one that I relate to all the way back to my childhood, since the story of this album is bringing together the past and the present at Disneyland. I decided to make a Mickey Mouse silhouette the main embellishment (and usually the only one) for each page.

Your Assignment

Are you still on track with me on this? If so, your assignment is to…

1. Count your stories (each pile of pictures and their story topics on notecards) to determine the approximate number of pages you need.

4. Choose embellishments that will help to tell your story.

You are now ready to play!

By the way, although I am now working on the third page for my scrapbook, I have yet to choose an album cover. It’s the least of my concerns because I know the cover will come eventually. It’s the story I’m most interested in.

Step 2: Get Your Photos Out Onto The Table

This step is not about organizing. It is about connecting and catching the vision.
Take this time to go through each photo so you can put yourself back into the vacation frame of mind. What did it feel like to be there?

Your photos are probably already in the chronological order of the trip and grouped by smaller events and activities. As you do go through the photos to lay them on your table, proceed with these steps:

1. Keep groups of photos together in loose piles so you can still see at least a part of each photo.

2. Lay piles close together so that you have a choice of seeing them in their various groupings or seeing them as a part of a whole.

Doing it this way allows you to keep the artistic, story-connecting part of your brain working, as opposed to the linear, organizing part. By seeing all the pictures together, you will be able to identify stories that go beyond the events.

For example, seeing pictures of my sister with her family and different points in the trip led me to the idea of telling the story of being at Disneyland with my big sister and little brother again. Had I kept my photos in a linear and organized manner, I might never have thought of that angle, which is part of the most important aspect of this trip for me.

Step 3: Organize the stories with their supporting photos and separate them into piles.

1. While looking at your photos scattered all over the table, identify the stories that pop into your head and begin writing the dominant idea of each story onto a note card. My note cards say things like, “Family & Faces–who we were with,” “Enjoying the scenery–just as enjoyable as the rides,” “Mom & Me,” “Splash Mountain-The big people and tiny little Sidney.”

Make sure you jot down a note for all the stories that come to mind, even if you have no photos to support them.

2. Match stories to photos. Sometimes this means pulling photos out of their event grouping to use it for a different subject.

At this point, we are only partially turning ourselves over to the organizational parts of our brains. There is no need to put these into a fixed order yet. You can still leave the piles in a haphazard manner on the table, allowing your mind to stay within it’s artistic play area of the brain. Or if you need to put them away, you can stack them in any order with your story note cards in between each stack of supporting photos.

What Is The Story?

You’ve now written down the individual stories. You’ve connected with your memories and made connections between photos you might have separated before. Is there an overall story or theme that is starting to creep out?

If there are any words or ideas running through your mind, begin writing them down. You can brainstorm or make a word map. However you do it, have a place to collect these thoughts so you don’t lose them. If you’re able to solidify a theme at this point, that is great! If you’re still trying to work it out, that’s okay, too. The next step might help you out…

Stay tuned for Step 4 as we proceed to turn our memories into memoirs.

* * *

Your assignment for today is to complete the two bolded instructions under each of the steps above.

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For my basic scrapbook albums I vary the size of my layouts from 12×12 to 8.5×11 to 8×8. Someone recently asked me how I choose the size for each layout. While I don’t spend any more than ten seconds to decide this, there are about five factors that help me determine what I choose.

Go With The Flow

Sometimes I just feel like I want to do a certain size. Maybe I’ve done a lot of one size recently and I’m ready to do something different. There’s not always a specific reason and I like to allow my moods to dictate what I do. I don’t dwell on this decision.

Smaller Means Faster

There are days I like to spend a lot of time on a layout and other days I want to whip through it. When I am in my fast-scrapping mode, I often choose a smaller layout size, like the 8.5×11 you see below.

I also like to work with 8×8 pages when I’m scrapping from a short journaled story instead of a photo.

Saving Space and Resources

A big size determinant for me has to do with how much space I really need. If I can tell my story and showcase my photos with a smaller size, I do it. Single-photo layouts don’t need a 12×12 sheet, let alone a two-page spread.

If you watch Paperclipping Live or have seen Episode 2, Brainstorming A Layout, then you know that I like to determine my photo placement before I choose my background paper. When doing a multi-photo layout and I’m not in the mood for lots of embellishment, I’ll pack all the photos onto one 12×12.

If I do want to add lots of designs and I can crop my pictures smaller than 4×6, then I can go with a double-page 8.5×11, which is why I chose the size for the layout below. The butterfly design wouldn’t have fit with a one-page 12×12 but a two-page 12×12 would have been more than I needed.

The Paper Is Screaming For A Debut

I prefer to let my photos and stories lead my product choices, but once in a while there is paper or a product that I want to play with. This was the case for the layout at the top of this article, High Places.

While going through my paper I realized that I really didn’t like the look of the original blue design and I was tired of passing over it. It was time to do something about the paper to make it more interesting. After adding the Stickles I fell in love and then it was all about finding a photo that would work with my paper.

Filling The Gaps In My Albums

As I get close to filling an album, I will have some gaps to fill, especially the back-sides of some of the smaller pages. When that time comes I will look for photos that will work specifically with those sizes.

Allowing variety in your scrapbooking keeps the hobby fresh and exciting, just like it was when you first started. 12×12 albums allow you to put all those different sizes together.

While I gave you 5 factors that help me determine which size I choose for a given layout, there is no “right choice.” Don’t want to waste time weighing the different options. Make a quick decision and trust it.

Related Articles:
Varying The Size Of Your Layouts
Five Tips To Scrapbook Your Stories

A Leftover Photo

The main photo in this layout is a leftover from last year’s Easter and didn’t really fit on the layout I made for that holiday.

I decided it was time to make a decision about whether or not to scrap it on its own page or put it into my box of categoried pictures (pictures I took out of chronological order and put into topics and sub-topics, according to Stacy Julian’s system).

I thought about the possibility of the photo featured in a single page layout. It struck me that with all the cousins present to play with, my kids, Aiden and Trinity, decided to sneak off together to their own quiet place.

Making A Connection

Suddenly it occurred to me that I had just done a layout about these two and how sweet their relationship is. I wondered if I had other pictures of the two of them interacting. I scanned through one of my photo albums (of photos in relative chronological order that I hope to scrap) and found two applicable photos that I don’t need for other layouts.

Then I went to my categoried photos and found two more behind the tab, Us Together. I now had five photos that tell a beautiful story. It took me about two minutes total to conceptualize my topic, locate my photos, and plan a design scheme.

Easy. Meaningful. And fun to look at.

* * *

Location of Layout: In the “Us, Together” album, which fits into my “This Is Us” category of albums.

I have a feeling this book will be my choice for Best Scrapbook-related Book for 2008.

Photo Freedom is the book I’ve been waiting for since I read Stacy Julian’s previous book, Big Picture Scrapbooking. In that one, Stacy described her philosophy of focusing on the pictures, stories and memories, and letting go of the pressure to scrap every photo and be “caught up.”

She introduced a system called, “Library Of Memories,” which she developed for the flow and management of photos. That system allows her to live her scrapbooking philosophy.

Since then, many of us have been trying to figure out how that system works. In Photo Freedom, Stacy shares the exact details of her system.

Stacy’s Instruction on her Library Of Memories System

She shares the details in a way that is fun and easy to learn. Sharing the details of any system can be tedious, but not with Stacy.

She made use of visuals–mouth-watering visuals–to give much of her instruction. She gave just enough information, but no more than necessary to get how it works.

I blew through the book in one night and then began it again the next day.

Stacy’s System Can Help Improve Your Scrapbooking

A fun part of the book is a section that showcases some of Stacy’s layouts. It outlines exactly how her system enabled her to develop her stories (or identify patterns) and put pages together in less time than it would without her system.

Not only is it fun to see her layouts and read her stories, it also clarifies why Stacy’s system works so well. It simplifies the scrapbooking process, helps you identify some fabulous stories you wouldn’t have thought of otherwise, and allows you to find the photos you want much more quickly than a standard chronological system.

A little time up front to implement her system will save more time later.

Who Is This Book Good For?

I recommend this book to all scrapbookers. Because we’re all different, I never recommend a book just because I like it. I recommend books based on how you scrapbook. When I review a book, I state who will most likely benefit from the book. Rarely do I think one book will benefit all scrapbookers. Photo Freedom is one of those rare ones.

Stacy’s system is so flexible that anyone can adapt it to their own situation and ways of thinking. One of the best things about Photo Freedom is that Stacy dedicated a section of the book to showing how thirteen different scrapbookers incorporated and adapted the system to meet their own needs. Even if you want to continue scrapbooking and storing photos chronologically, you will likely find many parts of her system that will help you.

What if you already took her Library Of Memories class? Even those who took her class in the past are saying they understand it more having read the book. Plus, Stacy has added some new features to the system that are quick and easy to implement and will make scrapbooking certain pages faster than ever.

My Recommendation

Basically, what I’m saying in review of Stacy Julian’s book: Buy it. Just go buy it. See for yourself. It’s fabulous.

You’ll love this tour of Dedra Long’s scrapbook room. I just wish you could see all the details in person. It’s an inspiring place to sit down and scrap.

You can watch the video here..

I apologize that there aren’t any show notes for this week.

Those who participate in Paperclipping Live on Tuesday nights know I have a new scraproom. I moved into about a month ago and I’ve gotten it to where it’s fairly functional.

I took a whole bunch of really bad pictures (tiny room, low lighting) and uploaded them into a set on Flickr. I gave detailed descriptions under each photo regarding what is and isn’t working for me and what I hope to change.

You can click here to see the “Evolution Of A Scraproom” set and click on the individual photos to read my comments about each one.

As I make changes in the decoration and organization of my room, I’ll post my progress, both in my Flickr set and here on Paperclipping. If you’re trying to make your scrap area more functional, I hope the comments in my picture set will give you some ideas.

If you have your own ideas to share, please leave a comment.

This video is available to members only. Learn about a membership here.

I also have show notes available.

Ali Edwards blogged today about her current project, transitioning layouts from 28 albums into a new format. The photos of her stacks of layouts are amazing. Since she started scrapbooking she has always scrapped in a random order and then put her layouts in her albums in the order that she designed them. They were a hodge podge of topics and time periods. She is now in the process of arranging her layouts into a more sensible order: chronologically by topic.

My Album Topics

Reading Ali’s post reminded me that I wanted to share my album topics with you after releasing the Video, Inside The Album. Ali and I are using a similar system, which Stacy Julian inspired. I have multiple albums that fit into a series of topics. Here they are:

This is Us
1. One for each member of our family. (For example, “This is Trinity”).
2. This is Us, Together. (Layouts about more than just one of us).
3. Israel and I. (Anything about the two of us together, including our travels, gets its own special place).

People We Love
1. Grandpa Jerry and Nana Debbie
2. Grandma and Grandpa Buckland
3. The Hyman’s (Layouts featuring extended family on my husband’s side. Currently this goes in the same album with his parents. I will separate them if the album gets too full).
4. The Buckland’s (Layouts featuring extended family from my side).
5. Our friends
6. Keim ‘N’ Hyman (The Keims are our closest friends of almost 11 years…we have lots of pictures with them so they need their own album).

This is home-Layouts about our home.

Places We Go/Things We Do
1. Around town.
2. Vacations
3. Adventures In Geocaching-Geocaching is one of our favorite family activities. I bought a smaller 8×8 album for it. I could mix this topic into one of the other albums, but we have so many pictures of this activity alone, I think it deserves its own book.
4. School
5. Extra-curricular Activities

Holidays
1. Christmas
2. Halloween
3. Darwin Day-This will be a smaller album.
4. Random Holiday Memories-I am still unsure about this one, but I think it will hold layouts of all the other holidays not listed above. I will eventually separate Easter if there are enough layouts).

Allow For Flexibility

I need to go back through my first albums and reorganize them, just like Ali. But there are a few years in the middle of my scrapbooking life when I used Creative Memories albums and I can’t switch those to my new system.

In my opinion, Creative Memories has the highest quality albums in the industry, but I regret having used them. They are inflexible when it comes to switching the order or location of your layouts because you work directly on their pages, back to back. I would like to separate those layouts into my separate album topics, but because the pages are back to back with random topics, I can’t do it.

And that is why I have learned to look for flexibility in the albums I use. By using 3-ring binders with page protectors, you can easily rearrange your albums if you ever change how you want to arrange them. It’s a wonderful quality to be able to get a new perspective and change your mind. So even if you are sure you will always do things the way you are doing them now, remember that I was sure, too. I’ve changed my system three times now.

I hope it was helpful to see how I arrange my layouts. Do you have album topics that are different from mine? If so, please leave a comment and share with us!

Update: I added a couple topics that I had forgotten but remembered when Kari Daverson left her comment. I will probably separate the Places We Go and the Things We Do albums when they get full enough. Kari mentioned a topic she has that I really like. She said, “My favorite section is the Home Time section in the Things We Do albums. That covers everything from game nights, family movie nights, laundry day etc. My kids love those layouts most of all it seems.” What a great idea!

You see thousands of layouts online and inside magazines. But you really want to take a peek into someone’s actual album, don’t you? Come on, admit it. In today’s episode, I take you through one of mine.

If you had problems downloading some of the most recent episodes, please try them again. We made some changes so they should be more easily accessible to anyone.

This episode is in the archives. To learn how to access the archives, please visit the membership information page.

And I have provided show notes for the deaf members of the Paperclipping audience.

Are you planning goals or resolutions for the new year? How about making a mini-book where you can evaluate your progress, share your thoughts, and even add photos?

The picture above is a sneak-peek of my own book, still in progress. I will have it ready to share with you later in the week. So if you think you’d like to make your own, you might want to begin preparing your goals.

The mini-book is in a format that works with my own method for a year’s worth of goals, so I’ll share that with you now.

2008 Focus

I chose four areas that need my focus this year. They are:
1. Health & Fitness
2. My Home
3. Scrapbooking & Paperclipping
4. My One-on-one Relationships with my Children

Ali’s One-Word Challenge

Last year Ali Edwards chose one word to describe what she wanted for the coming year rather than making resolutions. I did this as well, and really liked the direction it gave me. This time I’m returning to resolutions, but I also chose a word that illustrates how I see my focus for 2008. The word I chose this year is BUILD.

I made “build” statements for each of my areas of focus:
1. I am building a healthy and fit body.
2. I am building a home that inspires and celebrates creativity.
3. I am building a scrapbooking resource that provides constant and regular inspiration to others.
4. I am building deep one-on-one relationships with each of my growing, evolving children.

Steps For Accomplishing My Goals

Once I chose my areas of focus, I made a list of things to accomplish or evaluate throughout the year so that I can progress in those focus areas.

Make A Schedule

You know how I am about schedules. Schedules are vital for accomplishment. I also believe that a person only has the capacity to focus on one or two big things at a time. So I assigned a month (or two months) to each of my bigger goals.

I also have smaller things I want to evaluate. For example, for one month I will focus on drinking water every hour. Hopefully one month of doing this will make it a habit. But in my experience, it probably won’t be enough to stick. So I’ve made that a side focus for some of the other months throughout the year. Most months have a big project to complete plus some smaller side things to evaluate.

Evaluate

Because some of the goals are subjective and require on-going reflective evaluation, I am designing my mini-book to allow me to write down my reflections, evaluations, and adjusted plans for improvement.

I will also be able to add photos if I want. In all, this book will be a reminder of all my goals, a place to reflect and track progress, and will eventually become a visual record of my direction and accomplishments for the year.

If you’re interested in joining me, you can begin formulating your goals, too.