Scrapbooking Teen Memories
by Rachel Paxton
By the time your teen is in high school, you probably aren't taking as many pictures of them as you used to. I have to keep reminding myself that I only have a couple of years left and no time to waste trying to capture fleeing teenage memories.
You might be thinking that I'm really organized to be already working on scrapbooking my daughter's high school memories. To be honest, I have a shoe box full of pictures of my daughter waiting for me to get to someday.
But if I wait until "someday" to continue taking pictures because I already have so many pictures I haven't done anything with, then my daughter's teenage years will come and go while I try to catch up.
I don't want to chronicle every detail of my daughter's life (nor would she want me to!), but I was trying to think of some memories that she might want to laugh about and maybe even treasure someday. So how do you do that without ending up with pages and pages of memories?
I decided to do two large (12x12) pages (facing each other in the album) for each year of high school. I will challenge myself to use this space creatively to tell the story of each year. When I started thinking of all the the possibilities, it really inspired me to start getting organized and collecting some great memories. And don't limit yourself to just photographs, your scrapbook pages can really be accentuated by other types of memories. Here are some ideas to get you started:
Photograph Ideas:
- High School Dances
- First Date/Boyfriend
- School Building
- Church Events/Retreats
- Braces (the day they're removed)
- Hair Styles
- Clothing Fads
- Learning to Drive
- First Job
- First Car
- Best Friends
- School Plays/Concerts
- Family Vacations
- Favorite Family Pets
- Babysitting
- Sports/Band/Cheerleading
- Musical Instrument Practice
Other:
- CD Covers (scanned)
- Favorite Song Lyrics
- Drivers' Permit
- First Pay Stub
- Programs from Play/Concerts
- College Brochures
- School Newspapers
- ASB Card
- Awards/Certificates
- Ticket Stubs (concert, movie, sporting events)
- Report Cards
You can be creative when you're arranging your layouts. Don't be afraid to cut pictures down or cut out portions of play programs or school newspapers. Just cut out enough to accentuate the other items on the page. You will create the overall effect from the entire page, not necessarily from an individual item.
Have fun and don't worry if you don't get it done all at one time. I figure if I can do one every summer for the previous school year, by the time she finishes high school (she's a freshman this year), all of her high school memories will be recorded in the family archives.
|
About The Author
Rachel Paxton is a freelance writer and mom who is the author of What's for Dinner?, an e-cookbook containing more than 250 quick easy dinner ideas. For recipes, tips to organize your home, home decorating, crafts, and more, visit Creative Homemaking at http://www.creativehomemaking.com. Email: rachel@creativehomemaking.com
|
Beware of Falling Minimum Payments
by James H. Dimmitt
If you opened a credit card statement recently and were pleasantly surprised to find that your minimum payment due was lowered, don’t be so quick to “jump for joy”. What may appear as a small boost to your monthly budget is actually the rock that can weigh you down in debt for a lifetime.
More and more credit card companies are moving to requiring a minimum payment of 2% of your total outstanding balance. Consumer Action, a consumer advocacy group out of San Francisco, found that the number of card companies with a 2% minimum payment reached 53%, up from 43% just a year ago.
Some creditors have even gone so far as to call this a “consumer friendly” move claiming it will assist consumers faced with today’s economic woes. In reality, 
Beware of Falling Minimum Payments
Recipe
.............................................................................
Television - The Great SATAN!
by Kayla Fay
I’ve often thought that in 6 million years, archaeologists will marvel at the devotion the 21st century Earthlings had to their household gods. Excavation will show these deities in virtually every home, obviously objects of devotion, the focal point in a room. The gods were believed without question. Families emulated them, discussed them, and scheduled their lives around them. The parent was secondary in influence to the various versions of these boxes with a glass screen that captivated an entire civilization.
Despite the title of this article, I do not really think that we are all guilty of worshiping the god of the underworld. I am, however, quite turned off by the amount of affection and devotion we give to the unworthy television. Last week Television - The Great SATAN!
Recipe
.............................................................................
Shadow Fun
by Deborah Shelton
Are you looking for fun projects to do, but are short on supplies? The answer is simple: Shadows!
Shadow Tag
Turn an ordinary walk to the mailbox into a lively game of shadow tag. It’s played much the same way as regular tag, except that instead of tagging a person, you tag the person’s shadow.
Silhouettes
Use the combination of light and shadow to create frameable works of art. Use tacks or tape to hang a sheet of white construction paper or poster board to the wall. Sit or stand next to the paper so that the shadow of your profile shows up when a light (flashlights work well) is shined on you. While you sit very still, have someone trace the outline of your shadow on the paper with a pencil. Once the tracing is complete, cut t Shadow Fun
Recipe
.............................................................................
Clutter Is Natural
by Stephanie Roberts
Nature loves clutter. Just think of all the stuff that drops from trees, washes in on the tide, or is blown by the wind into your backyard. Birds molt, animals shed, snakes slither out of their skin, and they all just leave it lying there to rot into the earth. Follow any two-year-old around for a day and you'll see that we're not much better.
Living in clutter does not mean that you are a slob or an undisciplined failure. It means that you are human, and your origins are showing. Way, way back in the farthest branches of your family tree, your ancient ancestors lived a somewhat more hand-to-mouth existence than we do. Stocking up was a smart thing to do when the antelope might not roam your way again for a while, and surviving a cold win Clutter Is Natural
Recipe
.............................................................................
CookDojo.com
