Scrapbooking Questions

[kimmee]

I have a few questions that will probably seem really dumb but -- I am overwhelmed.

I have been building my photo albums since the 80's before scrapbooking became what it is. Before there were so many stickers and whatnot (fancy paper pages, stamps) I just used to cut cute little things off cards and out of Magazines to put around my pictures. As time went on I started buying all the stuff to make the books fancier or more fun to look through. About half way through one of my older albums ( Started with Aimee in "92 - ended with all three kids in '95) the pages staarted to look dramatically different. Because of all of the added fun stuff. On one hand I would like the whole book to match and on the other hand It is kind of a historical charting - you know simpler, what was available, etc. What would you do ???

1.  Redo the origional Pages.
2. Leave them on concentrate on the new ones.

Also - Because of my wonderful organizational skills I keep finding photos evrywhere else in boxes and what not that belong in the time frames of the older books. What do you do with those? Do you go back and insert them?

I am just soooo behind and the jobs seems so daunting that I don't know how to catch up - I would like to have them finished and/or current before the kids grow up and move away and Aimee's already 12!!!

[Missy]

Well, its not an easy task, yet it will be rewarding.

What I would do is start from the beginning and rework your books. Are they the "magnetic pages"? If so they will likely need a new book. Teh adhesive in "magnetic" pages isn't archival and slowly begins to deteriorate, when it does it releases small amounts of gas that yellow, fade, and deteriorate your pages, photos and embellishments. Magazines and cards were not made archivally either, same results over time. Yet those embellishments aren't all lost forever. There are products available to neutralise the acid and lignen of papers that aren't already free of those substances.

Archival Mist is one that comes to mind immediately. What i'd do is get a scrapbook and some cardstock and begin moving photos, and embellishments ontot the cardstock. Spray your embellishments with Archival mist before mounting to the cardstock. I am a firm believer in matting. I would mat questionable embellishments on cardstock mats.

Having said all this, if you could see what i have here at the house...I have years worth of moving photos and memorabilia out of old magnetic page albums and into scrapbooks. Am I in a hurry to do so? No, i'll get to it. Do I know that tiem is only going to affect the pages more so than they already are? Yes, but i know i will get there. Will I get to them all? Probably not, but that's ok to me. I will get to it someday and if not...well, that's ok with me too. my hope is that i will get them all out of the deteriorating books. But i am not going to obsess.

Hope that helps.

[sixfreds]

I would keep the older pages, time change and scrapbooking styles change and can change again before you are done with scrapbooking so I would keep the older pages and just do the newer updated scrapbook stlye on the new pages....

As for finding older photos I would make new pages and place the new pages into the book at the right time frame. Then you can have the best of both worlds the older style pages and some newer style pages all together.

Scrapbooks are so much about personal style so if you like the work you did on the older pages I would keep it and just keep on going with the new pictures...

Eileen