Scrapbooking Articles

When the going gets tough

It’s no secret that life isn’t always a picnic. But you wouldn’t know that looking at most scrapbooking. It is, after all, a craft perfectly suited to celebrating all the beauty in life – no matter how few and far between the high-points sometimes are. Most of us have a tendency to want to remember the happy times and forget all the bad stuff – but opening your scrapping up to include the hardships can be a liberating step. It not only takes you to a whole new level of expression – but it can also provide some much-needed therapy during a difficult period. Allyson Corbett explains.

Although it was more than 15 years ago now, I still vividly remember walking into my house that afternoon. The second I saw my mother’s face, the air was full of electricity and my heart nearly seized in my chest. Something was very wrong. She told me that my dog, Maisy, had been killed by a car in front of the house. Once the shock wore off, I cried for days. I wouldn’t go to school, couldn’t eat, couldn’t sleep – it was my first taste of grief. When my mother finally forced me into the car to go to school two days later, I didn’t think I would make it through the day.

But something unexpected happened once I got there. I cried to my friends, I drew pictures of Maisy in art class, I wrote a paragraph about her in English – and miraculously, when the bell rang at the end of the day, I felt a little better for the first time. When I got home from school, I sat on the floor of my bedroom with my pink lock-up diary and wrote page after page about how much I missed her. By dinner, I actually felt hungry for the first time since I had heard the news.

Scrapbooking through a divorce, an illness or a loss might not feel right at first – putting a struggle or a hardship down on a page can feel as unnatural as taking photos at a funeral. However, these intense feelings are not only capable of creating some really powerful things visually, but creatively expressing what you are feeling during a hard time can also lift some weight off your shoulders. Of all the different processes that go into a page, journalling is probably the key for this kind of layout.

Scrapbookers are naturally expressive people. Most of us would probably say we are passionate, emotional, and creative – not to mention (somewhat obviously) that we have a need to preserve pieces of our lives. People with these traits should really keep a regular, everyday journal. Life is busy though, and if you’re someone who just doesn’t have the discipline to write regularly, at least try keeping a journal during difficult periods. Writing can be like a siphon, draining hurt, frustration and sadness out of your body. And in retrospect, just flipping through the pages can be like a time warp taking you back to an exact moment or feeling. Once you’re in a better place, looking back through an old journal written in a time of struggle can also remind you how strong you really are and how much you have overcome.

 When it comes to adding journalling to a less than cheerful layout, being effective is the key. Sometimes saying less can really mean more. Often, with a tragedy such as the loss of a loved one, your feelings are so profoundly over whelming that they can never really be expressed in words – even if you were to write a novel. Single words and phrases – perhaps ones that have personal meaning when it comes to that subject – can be powerful and accurate tools to express a particularly hard-hitting blow. Choose one word or statement and make it a focal point of your page. Try using colour, font and embellishments to add to the meaning, so that the feelings the words inspire jump off the page.

 Attaching bits from your regular journal can be a great way to add an element of rawness to your layout. It hints at genuine feeling, whether it is sadness, hurt, frustration or grief. As a starting point for designing, try reading your journal page and feeling what it evokes in you. Consider the look of the handwriting and the paper, and let it determine the look you create. Once you know how you want your page to look, you might even want to rewrite your excerpt on different paper or in different ink, so that it fits in with the look and concept of the page.

If you feel that the journalling you want to do for a layout is too personal, a great trick is to attach an embellished envelope somewhere on your layout – or even on the back of it – and place a page of your journalling within it. This technique can add to the meaning and design of your overall page. It not only conveys that your feelings in relation to the topic of the layout are deeply personal, it also adds a bit of intrigue to the page – not to mention a unique embellishment.

Journalling is an important piece of any layout that expresses hardship or sadness. These layouts aren’t really about a beautiful photograph or a colourful embellishment. They are more personal – more for you than anyone else. The journalling that you do communicates what your page is actually about – so make sure that however you do it, you create something that really conveys a piece of the story you are telling.

No one escapes life’s struggles, but we all know that the only way past them is straight through them. Especially for creative minds, being expressive about your feelings during a bad time is part of the process of getting through it. Don’t be afraid to share these layouts as well. Everyone has been through tough times. Turning something painful into something beautiful is an age-old practice, without which, half of the world’s art wouldn’t exist. Next time you’re on the verge of losing it, try sitting down and spending an hour or so scrapping. You will almost always walk away feeling better.  

Out of the darkness
By Jeni O’Connor
Materials
Cardstock: Bazzill
Paper: Rouge de Garance
Other: Autumn Leaves stamps, Fancy Pants chipboard scrolls, BasicGrey rub-ons, 7gypsies rub-ons, Heidi Swapp plastic alphabet, StazOn ink, sequins

How can I explain?
By Jeni O’Connor
Materials
Cardstock: Bazzill
Paper: Urban Lily, Creative Imaginations
Adhesive: Helmar Scrap dots
Other: Heidi Swapp rub-ons, Fancy Pants rub-ons, Stamp-It stamp, Green Grass stamp, StazOn ink, My Mind’s Eye crystal brad, Crafter’s Choice flowers, May Arts ribbon, Heidi Swapp journalling circles, Heidi Swapp clock, ric rac, sequins

Waiting to exhale
By Jeni O’Connor
Materials
Cardstock: Bazzill
Paper: Creative Imaginations, My Mind’s Eye
Other: Creative Imaginations narratives, BasicGrey alphabet stickers, BasicGrey rub-ons, My Mind’s Eye transparency, 7gypsies stickers, Matisse paint

RIP Serafina
By Jeni O’Connor
Materials
Cardstock: Bazzill
Paper: Creative Imaginations, BasicGrey, Rouge de Garance, My Mind’s Eye
Adhesive: Helmar scrap dots
Other: Autumn Leaves rub-ons, Fancy Pants chipboard scrolls, KI Memories chipboard pieces, KI Memories tattoos, Making Memories alphabet stickers