How to Scrapbook Photo Journal

Our photo albums will tell a wonderful story of our lives even after we’re gone. Fancy layouts or decorations might catch their eye, but only briefly. It is the photos and the stories that hold their attention. Your journaling can tell the story even when you’re not there. After mounting your photos in an acid free environment, journaling is the most important thing you can do. The more you journal, the easier it becomes.

Do you enjoy showing your photo albums to visiting family and friends? As they thumb through photos or pages you sit next to them to explain, “This was where we…” and “That was right after...” This is exactly the type of detail that you write or journal when you mount your photos in your albums.

How to Journal

1. FACTS: Label every photo with who, what, where, and when. Many photos also deserve how and why.
2. CAPTIONS: Expand on this with quick captions and comments. These can be descriptive and funny phrases. Use lots of verbs and adjectives.
3. BULLETS: Some photos have more of a story to tell. For these consider using bullet points. Just make a simple list of phrases and thoughts. Begin each sentence with a bullet, a bold dot or a small sticker.
4. DETAIL: Photo journaling tells the whole story and encompasses a lot of detail.

What to Journal

1. Give a time and place to your history. Mention jobs, volunteer activities, awards, health, accidents, trips etc. Also mentioning national or world events taking place at the time adds context.
2. Record your thoughts and feelings about events. This allows the reader to peek into your soul.
3. Flesh out detail by and make your writing come alive by remembering your five senses – sight, sound, smell, touch and taste.
a. Sight – The sky was a flaming red and gold fire
b. Sound – The waves crashed on the beach
c. Smell – My brother’s shoes had a unique odor
d. Touch – My baby’s skin felt so soft like delicate rose petals
e. Taste – The sweet moment of fairy floss melting in your mouth

4. Capture events of a typical day. Day-to-day rituals make up our lives. These treasures should be recorded and included in your albums. For example: A before and after shot of cleaning up a bedroom
5. Add meaning to your memories with letters, quotes, sayings and poems.
6. Have children write their names at least once a year to preserve this treasured memory. This is perfect in a school album.

Where to Journal
• Under or next to photos
• Around photos following the contour
• On lines you draw; ensure that they are perfectly straight and perfectly spaced.
• On pre-ruled pages
• On pieces of ruled paper; use templates to draw shapes on ruled pages, cut them out and then mount the shape on a page and journal in the shape.
• On pieces of photo mounting paper; plan a space for your writing – it is the best decoration!
• Inside a die cut shape.
• Inside a shape; draw a shape from a template using a fine-tip or bold-tip pen and write short memories inside the shape. Or draw the shape in pencil and outline the edge with stickers.

JoAnn Clarke is an artist, author & entrepreneur based in Hervey Bay, Australia. You can view her portfolio at http://www.aglobalpartner.blogspot.com
Her website Scrapbooking has a whole host of inspiring ideas to preserve your treasured memories creatively.