Monday, March 17, 2008

Happy Easter Scrapbooks!

Holidays make such great themes for scrapbooks. Easter is just a few days away and if you are going to make an Easter scrapbook, you better "hop" to it!

For some nice Easter scrapbook paper or digital scrapbook products for a holiday scrapbook, read on...



Free Digital Scrapbook Download:

I’ve got some quick ideas for Easter scrapbooks and scrapbook layouts.
First of all, there are some free downloads with Easter designs for digital scrapbookers
here.

And for more digital scrapbook products, look at these e-cuts alphabets - Easter Upper Case and Easter Lower Case - they are inexpensive to buy and download!



Easter scrappin' themes: bunnies, eggs, chicks, bonnets and then there are religious and spiritual themes for the Christian holiday make for a rich variety of images in a scrapbook layout. Since time is running out, a great time-saving solution is to use an Easter scrapbook kit, such as this one from Doodlebug Designs which includes brads, sequins, rick rack, ribbons, tags, stickers, several patterned paper designs, cardstock paper, and instructions. So, this kit provides just about everything you need for an entire Easter scrapbook. It’s versatile enough to use for making greeting cards, too.

Doodlebug Designs Easter Scrapbook Kit
Doodlebug Designs Easter Scrapbook Kit

Easter and Spring Scrapbook Papers

For patterned paper designs with Easter themes - or themes for Spring, this line from Reminisce is bright and cheerful:


Reminisce Happy Easter - Double sided patterned paperReminisce Happy Easter Scrapbook Paper



And a new paper that I just found is from Flair Designs (it may not be new, but it's new to me)- they have an Easter Surprise collection:



Flair Designs :
Jelly Bean Jam


Flair Designs:
Happy Easter Words

Flair Designs Easter Scrapbook Paper

Flair Designs:
Bunny Trail

Flair Designs Easter Scrapbook Paper


Flair Designs:
Egg-Stravaganza

Flair Designs Easter Scrapbook Paper


Flair Designs - Easter Stripe

Flair Designs - Daffodil Daze

Flair Designs Easter Stickers



Flair Designs - Easter Stickers

Flair Designs Easter Stickers



For other embellishments, there are lots of ribbons for Spring and Easter scrapbooks - I prefer the bulk ribbon, when they come in nice colors and patterns, such as the Bazzill Basics Bulk Ribbon Packs:






And, if you need more ideas, here is a good book with scrapbook ideas that I found at Amazon.com: Outstanding Scrapbook Pages: 250 Of the Best Pages and Techniques from the World's #1 Scrapbooking Magazine, by Memory Makers (Author), Kerry Arquette (Editor).

Scrapbook Ideas Book


Happy scrappin' and have a very happy, hippity, hoppity Easter!

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

Happy St. Patrick's Day Scrapbooks

St. PatrickI got a Happy St. Patrick’s Day card in the mail today. I didn’t even know there were such greeting cards, but evidently my Irish sister-in-law found some. I thought it was sweet of her to send it.

I actually have a little bit of Irish in me. I didn’t know about it though, until I got interested in genealogy. That is when I found out that I had some illustrious Irish ancestors who lived in colonial Virginia – there is one more thing I didn’t know about before (that there were Irish immigrants coming to America that early on in our history). Thinking about this Irish holiday triggered some scrapbook ideas.

For those who love everything Irish and St. Paddy's Day, it would be great to make a scrapbook with photos of the beautiful scenery in Ireland in it. I would probably enjoy pictures of Irish pubs, with me sitting in one (if I had one). Sadly, I haven’t been to see the land of the leprechauns. But if you are a scrapbooker who has traveled to the “Emerald Isle”, think about using any photos you took there to creating a lucky Irish scrapbook.


Free Clipart for Scrapbooks

I found some free clip art with Irish and Celtic themes. These are kind of fun, especially for digital scrapbooks. You can print them out, cut them out and add them to scrapbook pages. Here are a few that I thought were neat:




Source: Ireland Information

St. Paddy's Day Scrapbook Paper

Some nice scrapbook paper designs for this particular green-themed day (which we’ll celebrate on March 14th). Examples shown are 12 x 12 double sided papers from Rusty Pickle’s Lucky Collection and one of the Reminisce St. Patrick’s Day scrapbook paper designs.



I know the scrapbook paper I selected has subtle colors, but you can always find solid green paper to use if these more elaborate designs won’t work in your scrapbook. Bulk cardstock works if you need to save money when buying scrapbook paper.


Embellishments for St. Patrick's Day Scrapbooks

Some lucky green embellishments for scrapbooks include this bulk ribbon pack from Bazzill Basics:



Some Irish-themed stickers from Karen Foster Designs and these versatile Reminisce Green Day rub-on transfers (nice Celtic border designs with shamrocks) can add variety to your pages:



Green Scrapbook Album Binders

As usual, I want to recommend some scrapbook album binders would be a good choice. Keeping with the “green” theme, here are some binder options. For 3-ring binder lovers, this 12 x 12 Keeping Memories Alive 3-ring album in Forest Green uses those handy D-rings which help keep the contents of your scrapbook flat, while also making it really easy to get things into and out of the binder. To the right of that is a Westrim Renaissance Cloth Hunter Green Window Strap Hinge Scrapbook album.

Next is a postbound leather window scrapbook album from Making Memories - 12"x 12" - Meadow. On the right is a neat concept - a customizable album. American Crafts’ customizable D-ring scrapbook album: You can paint it, use rubber stamps on it, adhere die cuts or scrapbook paper to it, do whatever you want – this could become the most outstanding St. Paddy’s Day scrapbook. All it takes is a little time and a lot of creativity.



So, whether you are scrappin' your trip to Ireland, celebrating your ancestry, or you just like to make green scrapbooks, I hope you have a happy, scrappy St. Patrick's Day!