I’m not talking about the world; rather, I am referring to the end of the school year. I am definitely not working like a madwoman trying to piece together a Rapture-themed scrapbook; however, I am scrambling to put the finishing touches on my first grader’s school memory book.
If you are planning to tackle a similar project in the coming weeks, give yourself plenty of time. Chances are you will have to wade through a mountain of artwork, book reports and essays that your child has completed during the course of the school year. It took me hours to sort through my daughter’s stack of papers and decide what should and shouldn’t be cataloged.
Once you select the treasures you want to feature in the scrapbook, it’s a good idea to spray the artwork with acid-free spray in order to preserve it properly. If the masterpiece is too big to fit into a standard 12×12 album, then take a photo of it and place the image in the book instead.
Next, gather your photos, adhesive squares, scissors, acid-free pens, and other embellishments. From there you can organize your layouts and place them in the book chronologically.
You can place the artwork on the page in a number of different ways, though the most conventional means is to mount it, using complementary scrapbook papers and embellishments. Depending on the piece, I also like to add a journaling block, which includes quotes from my daughter about what inspired her artwork. You should also include the date it was created, and if your child is willing, allow her to give the piece a title and add that to the layout as well.
Other features to include in the scrapbook: school functions, field trips, sporting events, favorite subjects and most exciting or memorable moments of the year. Have your child write out a few sentences about each of his favorite school memories and add them to individual layouts. Or consider using a sentence or two as photo captions in the book.
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