Welcome to another edition of our Tutorial Tuesday series here on The Digital Press blog! Today, I thought it would be helpful if I shared a few ideas for documenting the passage of time within our scrapbooks! This is my favorite way to scrapbook. I love seeing, at a quick glance, how life has changed throughout the years… and how my boys have grown up before my eyes.
There are many different ways to achieve the goal of documenting time, and I hope this tutorial inspires you to dig through all those years’ worth of photos and start creating!
Document the Passage of Time by Day
Documenting a day in the life — or even a week in the life — is a simple and effective way to pull together a photo summary of a certain period of time. You can document your day by taking a photo on the hour, every hour… or by taking a photo of each new activity throughout the day… or by simply taking photos of most everything, all day long! Once you have all the photos, go through them and pick your favorites (or the ones that will help tell the story of your subject); multi-photo templates are a great tool to help showcase multiple photos on a single layout!
For this layout I documented a simple day in our family’s life…
And here, I documented two days (a.k.a. a weekend)…
Document the Passage of Time by Month
Month-in-Review layouts are a great way to wrap up a time period in your life. I have noticed that many scrapbookers seem to be gravitating to this form of memory keeping (choosing it over the “daily” style of pocket scrapbooking, etc.)! Documenting each and every day can start to be overwhelming, and some days are just not the best to document. So why not showcase the highlights of an entire month?
You could even focus on the 4 seasons, if 12 individual months seems like too much to document… as I’ve done here…
You could even document an entire sports season, or the passage of time within a given event in a persons life, as shown here…
Document the Passage of Time by Year
At the end of every year, I try to compile a single layout (which can be either single or double page in format) that showcases the highlights of our year and/or favorite photos from that year. These are some of my most treasured layouts, and the ones that deserve a place in everyone’s scrapbook! There is just something awe-inspiring about seeing a whole year of photos together in one place.
Here’s an example of one of my two-page spreads…
You can also document a year by subject. To complete a project like this, you have to start off with the end in mind. Yearly photo projects are time consuming but so worth it in the end! For the next layout, shown below, I pulled together all my photos from my Instagram feed. I started the year randomly documenting my feet and where they took me throughout the year… and hashtagged the photos #whereistand. I’ve found that Instagram and other social media sites are super helpful when pulling together a year long photo project (especially because you can search by hashtag; you can create your own hashtag and use it to help sort through all of the photos later!)…
Another method is to document a year “by person.” I try to do this for each of my boys, to wrap up their yearly albums. I like to pull together photos from each month and all the highlights in between; the big things and the little things that made a year in that person’s life special. A simple photo-filled layout with dates and simple blurbs make for a wonderful year-in-review page for a child’s scrapbook album!
Check out this example…
Document the passage of time by years.
This is a fun way to literally see the passage of long stretches of time on one page! To achieve this look, you will have to spend some time going through all of your photos & pull out a favorite (or two, etc.) from each year. This can be done easily if you have your photos organized; I organize my photos by month & year, so it is somewhat easy to find what I am searching for — but this can still be a long process. I don’t mind it, though. Going through older photos always brings back memories and I enjoy the process of finding photos I have yet to scrapbook! Additionally, you can always plan ahead and take the same photo each and every year at the same time. Back to school, birthdays, holidays… these are all times when photo-taking happens at similar times / in similar places / etc. Use these photos together on a layout to showcase just how quickly your subject has grown!
For instance, here’s an example of documenting a child’s growth with a timeline of many years, and simple tidbits (in text format) about who they were at a certain age…
You can even showcase the same person over a period of years, with a similar theme to the photos. Whether it be a certain place, a certain toy, or a specific sport/activity… the similarities within life exist, and it is fun as memory-keepers to bring those moments together on our scrapbook pages…
Holidays are also a simple way to showcase the passage of time. You can compile all of the photos from many years into a simple grid, and marvel at just how fast time does fly…
Another idea… you can document relationships using a photo from each year together…
There you have it! Whether you document the passage of time by day, by week, by month, or by year… it is always fun and interesting to record the passage of time on one page, where it’s possible to see the subtle (or not-so-subtle) differences throughout those treasured memories of life. Creating pages like this will bring you joy when you see them in your scrapbooks for years to come!
Jennifer Hignite is a mom of three boys and new homeowner with her fiance in the mitten state of Michigan. When she is not scrapbooking, she enjoys photography, watching her boys play sports, decorating, and shopping at Target.
mom this is aiden and i just wanted to say that you are my favorite mom i could ever have it is an amazing feeling when i make you happy and when you get mad or sad i get mad or sad so thank you so much by the way this was from the school.