Scrapbooking With Your Kids

Summertime is a great time to scrapbook with your kids. It will keep some of the skills they learned in school from being forgotten as their minds stay active, and will be an enjoyable activity to share as a family. Teaching them at a young age to preserve their own memories is so valuable (and if they keep it up, they won’t get so far behind like the rest of us!). Your children see the world differently than you do and it is wonderful to get their perspective on events and life. Your child’s teacher will thank you that their writing skills were also practiced over the summer as they journal on their pages. Scrapbooking is educational, emotional and a wonderful way to bring the family together to enjoy an activity. It will also emphasize the uniqueness and worth of your child. You’ll probably be amazed at what they can create and they will spend many happy hours looking through the albums they create.

Child toolbox: Depending on the age of the child you are scrapbooking with, you will want to limit the amount of tools they have available. Younger children need to have safe, easy to use tools such as kids' blunt scissors, paper punches, pens, adhesives, a paper trimmer with safety features so they don’t cut themselves, and a pencil and eraser. Older children will also enjoy using some of your cutting tools and stamps and inkpads, and templates. A personal die cutting machine is also great to use with supervision. You can let them personalize and decorate them with pens, stickers and rubons.

Child supplies: Cardstock in a variety of colours, patterned paper (they won’t care if the paper was last years model!), stickers and more stickers including alphabet stickers, brads, ribbon, glitter glue, pre-cut mats and photo blocks, die cuts, and photos are all great additions to your child’s supplies. You can pull most of this from your own stash of supplies and possibly take them on a special shopping outing to pick out a couple of papers and stickers of their very own. It is very exciting for them to choose their own and they will feel very grown up.

A place of their own: Your child will feel very important if “their supplies” are kept in their very own spot. This could be a scrapbook bag, a Rubbermaid tote, a desk drawer, a special place in your scrapping area or whatever space you use. It is a good idea to keep flat items such as paper, stickers and die cuts in one container or file folder or drawer and the heavier bulkier items in a separate container or drawer. Your child can even decorate the container with stickers to personalize it. They will also enjoy their own supply of photos to work with. You can order duplicates when you get your photos printed or pull some from your own supply of photos. These can be stored in a photo box so that they are ready to use when your child will scrapbook them.

Getting Started: If this is the first time your child is scrapbooking, you will need to take some time to show them how all the tools work and how to clean and care for them. Teach them how to safely use the paper trimmer and how to mat a photo. Show them to punch upside down so they can make sure the paper is all the way in the punch. Show them how to ink a stamp and press down without rocking the stamp. Go over the different types of adhesives and how to use them.

They will require different levels of help depending on their age. If your child is not in school yet or too young to write, they could paint/draw a picture and you could narrate (journal) for them. The photos they choose may not be the ones you would choose, but this is their creative process and these pages will be wonderful to look back on. Don’t be surprised if they want to jam tons of stickers onto one page either – that is part of the fun for them.

Early school aged children will need assistance in matting photos and spelling certain words. At this age, you can start to show them about layout design and how their page can tell a story from beginning to end. Also teach them about “grouping” embellishments and stickers into “clusters or groupings” for them to have more impact. This is a good age to teach about odd numbers looking more pleasing to the eye than even numbers – e.g. use 3 stickers or embellishments. You can also prompt them for their journaling – e.g. Who is in the picture? What were you doing? What do you remember about it? . You could also type up a “list” type journaling box that they could fill in in their own handwriting. It could include different journaling prompts about the event.

Older children just need to be shown the basic principals of layout design, how to use the tools and then let them create. The pages may not be the way you would do them, but they will be great windows into their minds.

5 Basic Steps to Creating a Scrapbook Layout:

1. Choose Photos and Crop them. Help them choose photos for a layout and show them how to “crop”. “Do you want all this sky in your picture or should we take some of it out? How about we take out this ½ of a person on the edge of the picture. “ etc.

2. Choose papers to go with the photos. A good rule of thumb is a background colour and 2-3 other colours that go with the photos or the mood. Show them a sample of colours and let them choose. (Again it may not be your choice, but it is their page). Show them how to mat a photo and tell them also that not all photos need to be matted.

3. Journal. The child includes the story told in their own words (some help may be needed). A title can also be made.

4. Adhere. Mount it all onto the page. As the child gets older, you can explain about balancing the layout, and presenting the story from beginning to end.

5. Embellish. Add stickers, ribbons, die cuts etc.

Some children may love the creativity of pulling together papers and stickers from their stash, others will enjoy the process more if you make up “kits” for them of matching supplies. Your child can create in 12x12 or may find it easier doing an 8x8 or other mini album size. Some children will have lots of ideas for pages to create, others will need suggestions such as a page about their friends or their rooms, their favourite toys, their holidays, or their school time. Once your child starts scrapbooking, they will also love to be able to take some of their own photos to scrapbook. Help your child as needed, but also resist the urge to make their “creation” how you would do it. This will be an enjoyable way to spend time with your child and you may even find they will sit down to scrapbook even when you aren’t!