Frugal Babe

About five years ago, my sister-in-law got me hooked on scrapbooking.  Before that, I was one of those people who made fun of things like scrapbooking, and yes, all of my pics were in shoe boxes in no particular order.  But the more I looked at her albums, the more I was inspired.  I had recently returned from two years in the Peace Corps, and I had stacks of pictures from my time in Africa, but they were all in - of course - a slightly squashed shoebox.  So I decided to make a Peace Corps scrapbook.  It ended up being tons of fun, and also somewhat therapeutic, as I was feeling sad about leaving Africa, and ambivalent about my next move.  Since then, I’ve made a scrapbook each year, with all of Jay’s and my adventures.  I’ve also made scrapbooks for friends and my mother.  I love my scrapbooks, and so does J (or so he says as he glances at the pages during a commercial break in the Monday night game.  Maybe if I picked a better time to show him the newest creation…)  Everyone who sees my scrapbooks likes them, although I tend to only show them to people who like me, so the sample might be slightly biased. 

But I digress.  The point of this post is that I have managed to combine my love of scrabooking with my aversion to spending money.  I’ve heard people say that scrapbooking is the art of turning a $0.20 picture into a $20 page, and I don’t doubt that is true for a lot of scrapbookers.  I live near a HUGE scrapbook store that sells thousands of doodads (for thousands of dollars), all very tempting.  Which is why I only let myself go to that store about twice a year. 

There are magazines that highlight the current ‘trends’ in scrapbooking.  What, is there a scrapbook fashion show that I’m missing?  The interesting thing about the trends is that they usually involve more and more complex techniques that include expensive equipment and supplies.  Since I use scrapbooking as my creative outlet, I’d rather sit and create a page from what I have combined with my imagination, instead of buying the latest and greatest equipment.  Plus, since my home office is also our guest bedroom and my scrabook area, I don’t have a lot of extra room for more stuff. 

My favorite scrabook supplies - the ones I come back to over and over:

• embroidery floss (I buy tons of it when the local hobby store has a 10/$1 sale)
• colored and patterned paper - I rip it, cut it, stitch it, layer it, crinkle it, sand it…
• black pens with good ink that doesn’t gunk up
• my flower punch ($5, much cheaper than buying precut flowers, since I put flowers on lots and lots of pages)
• sheets of felt (also purchased 10/$1 at hobby store sales)
• brads (scrabook stores sell literally hundreds of these, but I tend to stick to the original small ones, which are usually about $3 for 100)
• a hole punch
• colored pens
• a few - few is the key here - rubber stamps that I use a lot (otherwise rubber stamps are pretty pricey)
• my imagination

All of the supplies that I keep coming back to are basic and cheap.  I still end up with tons of different pages and have a great time making them.  And the glossy magazines with the current trends?  I check them out of the library, get lots of ideas, and then spend a happy evening using my tried and true supplies to turn my new ideas into pretty pages. 

tags: scrapbooking