Memorial Days - Scrapbooking

Memorial Days - Scrapbooking shows that one person's junk is another's decoration. By Dennis Cass

Several months ago I was at a Longaberger basket party where the discussion turned to scrapbooking and one of the guests said, "That's a cult-y hobby." A round of laughter rose up, but there is an uncomfortable kernel of truth to her statement. I've heard other people say they spend about an hour per page while working on their scrapbooks, adding tiny embellishments, cut-outs and stenciling lettering.

As a former English major, I feel compelled to write, lest I lose the skill amidst a host of IT projects. I've been keeping a scrapbook on and off for several years now. One of the first pages I created was about watching the Blair Witch Project at the drive-in. (A great movie to watch on a moonless summer night, while surrounded by a grove of trees and mini-vans.)

Originally, I used art supplies for scrapbooking, such as a big spiralbound sketchbook and Crayola markers. Now supply stores such as Archiver's have introduced an educational component to the scrapbook hobby, and everyone needs to learn to use the acid-free supplies and not glue pictures on regular paper. While this is wonderful for photo preservation, it's not so wonderful for the pocket book. I've joined the craze, striving for photo-safe conditions whenever I'm scrapbooking with pictures, but a bit of the excitement is gone. It takes much longer to document things properly, in fact, so long that I no longer have time to memorialize "trivial" events such as a drive-in movie.