WHAT TO SCRAP?

As there are absolutely no posts in this forum, I thought I'd start one and it's a question that's been bothering me for ages.

I scrap people. Only people. At the mo, mostly Mia I admit, but I do do other family members and I have a B.O.M. on the go.

Now, I know a lot of you do it, so forgive me as I know it's each to their own, but I can't see the point in scrapping pictures of flowers and stuff like that. (Mind you, before I started scrapping, I couldn't see the point of any of it.)

Why do you scrap things that probably will mean nothing to future generations? Can you give me a good reason to scrap things other than people?

Is it a case of looking at scrapping as 'your' memories rather than making it all about memories for future folk or what?

yes, for me its exactly that.

i dont have any children, nor in fact anyone to pass this on to, so i do it purely for my own pleasure of looking at my albums. i do scrap people too, but I do alot of inanimate objects, like I did a DLO of my new shed project cos i was so pleased with it and it wanted to remember how it was all new etc and how i felt. My flowers I scrap because they often look better in the scrapbooks than in real life (!) and I scrap buildings and places and scenes out of pure nostalgia - since leaving leigh on sea, i love looking at pics of the old town etc, places that were special and i have so many memories i want to ecapsulate. I may not always live in France or in this village or soemthing so i want to encapsulate that in case i need it later.

I guess some people would call it living in the past, but the fact is i enjoy my photos alot more in nice layouts in scrapbook albums than stuck either on the computer or in piles or envelopes or even in flip albums. Looking through the books makes me happy. thats why i could never be a digi scrapper (and the small matter of being inept with photoshop too) because i do it to have the lovely fattening albums.

I expect my scrapbooks will die with me, but so would my flip photo albums if i didnt do the scrapbooks.

Lorraine, a very interesting question...i feel this will stir a big debate.

For me, i would say that although i don't get to do lots of scrapping..in fact...none for ages, i personally love looking at scrapbook pages on the subjects of:
Famous buildings,
animals
countries
Houses and homes, inside and out.
Flowers, rivers gardens etc.
poems/verses and songs (classics and modern)
films

I think that anything that someone has any pride in, e.g. from a flower or veg they have grown from seed, to family......if you are amused by it, pleased or proud of it...scrap it.

I can see what you are saying..but i think for me..its the story behind why it was chosen to be scrapped that holds the meaning.

Yes it is a tricky one, I used to Scrap for the family to see, now they all seem too busy, and I really dont know if they will bother to look when I have gone, they say they will but I have my doubts.
At the moment I am trying to Scrap my family history, I thought I had done it, but now I have changed my mind how I want it to look, so I am re doing it ! a lot of work but I do enjoy it, for myself to look at,I feel over crafted at the moment ,I think I watch too many craft progs on Tv, so I am cutting down on them, and with Christmas coming, I wont be spending on Craft, I really have too much now, its getting silly, So Scrapping, yeah I will do the pics that I am interested in now,sometimes you just cant be bothered , eh ?

i just scrap whatever i enjoy seeing , or whoever i like being with ,a special occasion , my albums are for the family , but also for us for future reference . i use my old diaries so many times to find things out , that hopefully we can use the albums as picture diaries at times , remembering dates of things , ie which year we went to greece , what year so n so got married .when did we have the new fence put up , that sort of thing , as well as a record of family events etc

the lo's with flowers and bugs in etc,,, i can see being ooohed and aaahed over in years to come as they say that the current climate changes are going to wipe out many species of flora and fauna and insects etc , so in years to come they just may not be around , you never know they may be worth a fortune in years to come .

I have never done a scrapbook page in my life, I wouldn't know where to start. I do have a couple of blank scrapbooks that came in a kit I bought but they are still sat, unused, in my study.

Tim.

This is interesting, I too love to see all subjects, I enjoy what everyone else does.

Tim as Bobs does Scrapbooking a lot of your memories together are probably done and beautifully too.
Would you be interested in doing a Book of Me? (meaning You of course.)

I have never done any scrapbooking either but hope to have a play with some papers and the family tree stuff, thought it might make a nice album.
I suppose anything like flowers/places etc are things that people are interested in and enjoy, so pages of them are special to the maker.

Personally, I love to scrap photographs of the people that I know and love.

Saying that, I also have some really old photographs of family members from years gone by, so instead of leaving them mouldering in a drawer, only to be thrown out when I die, I will scrap them and hopefully, make them more 'real' to my children and grandchildren.

I wouldn't say that I would never scrap photos of views, or flowers or anything like that, but at the moment, it isn't in the pipeline!

Short of doin my back in and reaching to get my albums down i can't say whether I have scrapped inanimate ojects-although the cats could fall into that category. However if I did then I would have to have a reason which would be journalled somewhere on the page, the story behind the object etc. One day i will scrap Joseph and his technicolour thing, I don't have any pictures and will take them from Google but it has a lot of meaning to me and I will write about it. It will mean something to the boys and any grandchildren and then any future generations would understand the story if not know all the people concerned

Actually Lorraine, I am really surprised you asked that question - you who take such wonderful
photos. I could turn it round and say, why do you take photos of flowers, flies etc.?

Personally, I do scrap mostly family and family occasions BUT I have done lots of other things.
We have a bush in the garden that has bright purple berries in winter when there is no other
colour about at all. I scrapped that. I scrapped our water pump with layers of snow on it
just because it looked so pretty. I will scrap anything that takes my eye and leaves a moment that
I would like to keep and not lose to the past.

There are so many beautiful non human things to see. Before now I have made Den stop on a
journey if there has been a great view. They don't always turn out good enough to scrap. Oh, I
love odd shaped trees.

yes, as Steph said, anything that catches a 'moment' in time that you dont want to lose.

and as for Pet scrapping - well thats obvious. I wont always have these Pets so much nicer to remember them in a beautifully scrapped book than a pile of dog eared photos or a flip album.

I think Lorraine was playing devils advocate with this question to be honest - and it has sparked an interesting debate.

Ruth - Im intrigued what you mean about scrapping joseph????

Di Masters wrote:I have never done any scrapbooking either but hope to have a play with some papers and the family tree stuff, thought it might make a nice album.
I suppose anything like flowers/places etc are things that people are interested in and enjoy, so pages of them are special to the maker.

The great thing is about scrapping Di, is that you can do your own thing. A friend
commented on something I had done - can't remember what it was now, but basically
it wasn't something you did in scrapping - I said to her, I scrap for myself and hopefully
for future generations, I don't care what is 'pc' in scrapping. If I like it, it stays.
Do'nt listen to others and do what feels right for you.

I would like to do an album for each of the boys, especially as they would have different family tree because of having different Dads. Neil is interested in the family history, at the moment Gregg isn't but probably will be when he is older. It would be good to do them for when they are older and a lot of people no longer around.

This is a good topic Lou.

As most of you know, i dont do any paper crafting of anysort unless i fancy having a bash (cant afford beads and cardmaking / scrapbooking stuff lol) although i know if i was to 'buy' some stash it would totally consume me like my beading does. Anyway, i have often thought about scrapping stuff, especially pics of the kids (which would be absolutely fab as i have loads of pics of them from babies upwards) to inanimate objects too, to me it would be like a fancy photo album of pictures of stuff we have grown i.e. our apple tree growing from a sapling to a mature tree producing fruit etc, to how our house/garden used to look when we moved in, and what it looks like now etc. I think anything that has a fond memory, or something that catches your eye, it would be great to make a page or two on it. Something you could treasure for years to come. Something you could find in the cupboard years from now and not remember where it was unless you had written a little something about it. I am terrible for taking nice pics of snow or frost on the trees, and it would be nice to have a little album of sorts to remind you because as with all things, things change, grow, get replaced, etc etc.

Anyhow to cut a long ramble short, i think its a good way of keeping fond memories you have. With a memory like mine, you need to have something to remind you what seeds/flowers you planted last year lol.

I like the idea of doing a scrapbook page on things other than people. I love memories. Now im not going to do any mind you, i cant afford 2 hobbies lol, but i would love to do some one day. Im in awe of some of the fab things you lot come up with.

Carol XXX

Maria wrote:

Ruth - Im intrigued what you mean about scrapping joseph????

The show Joseph and His Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat with Jason Donavan. the tickets were a birthday present at a somewhat rough time in my life and I want to scrap it even if the gift were from idiot ex, back when he was a sensitve caring individual rather than a cold hearted b****** that he is now

then you must scrap it and dont let him ruin it for you or the memory of it.

Interesting replies, girls. Maria was right, I was playing devils advocate although I still didn't quite 'get it'. But....

Steph wrote:Actually Lorraine, I am really surprised you asked that question - you who take such wonderful photos. I could turn it round and say, why do you take photos of flowers, flies etc.?

When I read this, this morning, it had me thinking for hours. Steph, you made a very good point (and thank you for the compliment) and I had to think of the answer. Why do I? Because I enjoy it, of course. But then I realised what a pointless exercise it was because all I do is put my images on the computer and there they stay. A waste of time. So, I have decided to do exactly what I had the problem with. Scrap them.

I realised that my photography is part of me. I want my future generations, and anybody else that's interested, to know what my interests and hobbies were. Through them, they will know me better. Photography is an art form, like any other that we do here and so it should be treated so.

I have started an album today.

YAY!!!!! that is exactly right. that is the whole point.

Plus when you hit the big time you will have a nice album to show people your stuff.

Think how Nic and Mia will cherish it in the future too, think of the pleasure and inspiration you will take from it when you look over it.

And alsoLorraine, if your computer has a nervous breakdown any time, you might lose all that lovely work, you have to do it.

Phew, glad you got there before I could reply, it's a bit like why do we make cards, ATC's, postcards that will never get sent etc etc, we do it because it's fun and we like it. The social history thing is of course very valid too, but some people play golf, what is that all about?

thriftycrafter wrote: but some people play golf, what is that all about?

And they haven't got anything to show for it !!

or go fishing and then throw them back? I mean i so dont get that.

and lets be honest, most people spend large parts of their lives watching telly - at least we are beign creative.

DH was utterly incredulous when i told him I was going to alter beermats... why? how? whatever for, whats the point? To swap them I cried, which led to the inevitable war cry of all crafty Dhs

'But what are you going to do with them'

They just DON'T understand, do they??? No hope.

Lorraine wrote: They just DON'T understand, do they??? No hope.

Nope - Den has got used to my crafting and comping over the years. I think he
just leaves me to it - it keeps my quiet and out of mischief.

You meen I'm ment to use my loverly papers and bits. Not just stroke them, Gasp, (wheres the sharp intake of breath smilie). Don't tell my DH that.