School year scrapbooking can be difficult for parents, because sometimes we are unsure of what our children might wish to retain in the future, and what might be best that we just toss now. Here are a few tips I use to sort through my children’s school work and decide what to keep for now.
First, if the item is three dimensional, in other words, it won’t fit into the scrapbook, either I take a photograph of it (usually art projects, science fair projects, etc.) and then I throw it away. The photograph serves as a good enough memory, and I don’t need the item to do the same job. This allows me to include the photographs on layouts in their school albums, and not have to worry about how and where I am going to store it.
Second, if the grade is not that great, it gets tossed. No reason to keep bad grades or even mediocre grades. This helps to eliminate things I know they wouldn’t care about later.
Third, if it is an essay, report or writing assignment, I read it. I look at the grade, and I decide if I think that they might wish to see this again later. Usually the personal writing assignments are the ones I keep. The reports and essays on plants and animals and famous people, are the ones that usually get trashed.
Where do I store all these things before I get them into albums? I purchased five cardboard file boxes (I have five children) from the office supply section. Their names are written on the outside of the box, and inside the box contains the current years papers. At the end of the year I usually sort the items the way that I described above and then I clip the things I am keeping together, stick a post it note with the child’s grade in school and their teacher’s name on the front and then I file them into a second box that I have for them. This is where they stay until I am ready to work with them.
There will be plenty more articles on school years scrapbooking coming up in March. Keep a look out in the scrapbooking blog for more great help in organizing your child’s memorabilia and placing it into the scrapbook.
Nicole Humphrey writes articles for the Scrapbooking Blog and for the Frugal Blog. She also guest blogs on a variety of topics. You can read more of her articles by clicking here.
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