history lesson angie svoboda | board member materials Journaling Box by jackie Eckles (designerdigitals.com) • Papers and alpha from "Pocket Full of Posies" kit by Paula Duncan (sweetshoppedesigns.com) • Ribbons by Natalie Braxton (thelillypad.com) • TK turtle and CK to do list fonts

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This wonderful hobby of digital scrapbooking has made us all historians, and high tech ones at that. I don’t know how many times I’ve received a series of cute little questions from my kids asking about where we lived before they were born, what our different houses looked like, what pets we had, and what kinds of cars we drove. You know the drill, so many important questions and so little time to answer them. To help my kids find their answers late one night I scanned my old photos (many photo labs offer this service), fired up my computer and used an online company to make a “History of our Marriage—The First 20 Years” book for my children. It was so easy; the online company already had a template for me to follow. All I had to do was pick a color scheme, drop in my photos and add journaling. The rest was history—I was the hippest mom ever. 

Then the light bulb went on! I thought of so many possibilities for me to make more books. For example, my niece and nephew, who are twins and the coolest teenagers I know, graduate this year. Of course I have a ton of photos of them from the last four years just sitting on my hard drive. (No not them sitting on my hard drive—the photos sitting on my hard drive. Can you tell I am excited?) How fun will it be on graduation day to watch them open up their books with all those wonderful photos? I can just see them now in their little college dorm rooms showing them off to their new friends. Yep, another “Hippest Aunt Ever” award goes to me.

Oh, and my 25th high school reunion is next year, which reminds me I need to lose 10lbs, buy a fancy car, and rent a good looking model for my husband—wait I already have a good looking husband (glad that one is covered). Even in high school I was the geek with the camera, and if you’re reading this article I bet you were just like me, right? I still have all those high school negatives tucked away in my home safe. I can’t wait to scan the negatives, even scan old homework assignments I saved, make a digital copy and put together a book for my class of 1983. Thank goodness I have Photoshop to make me look good in all the pictures. It will be so fun to take a copy to the reunion and then provide my classmates with an online link to order a copy for themselves.

Some of my favorite companies to make these books are Heritage Makers, Shutterfly and Creative Memories. They’ve all provided digital scrapbookers with the right tools to be great historians. What are you waiting for? Go make a book! You’re “bound” to be a hit with your masterpiece.
 

Download Angie's chart of detailed comparisons here.