I normally hate computers, but.....

I am about to tell you why I love digital scrapbooking! Yes, this is me, the one who said that nothing could ever replace the feel of the paper and stickers in my hands. Take my words into consideration, put them in the back of your mind, because you may someday decide to make a digital album, too. The pictures I have chosen today are a bit odd, I admit. However, I took them to use as backgrounds and cut outs for my son's digital album. Everything matches the photos! I love his little clothes, and this is a way for me to still "keep" them digitally, once he outgrows them.

Just imagine these with photos over top of them in a Christmas layout. I can use them as borders, backgrounds, mats, "stickers", really you can do so much more than you can with a traditional album as far as coordinating your embellishments on a page.

Find the bib odd? Well, it looked great as a background for Christmas!

I have to say that when I ordered my son's album yesterday and it was nearly $250. after shipping and tax, I gulped big time! It was a 12x12. Here is a tip, if you do an album, just order an 11x8.5 .It isn't that much smaller, but the price difference is phenomenal! I have always made that size, and now I plan on going back to it. Example, I ordered this size a few weeks ago and it cost me around $150. And the smaller and cheaper size even had 8 more pages in it!

So, I figured out how much I would have spent on a traditional album with nearly the same amount of pages. (You can only fit 80 in a traditional album compared to topping out at 100 in a digital.) The price was considerably lower for a 12x12 album using the original materials, (album, pages, protectors) however I didn't add the price of paper, stickers, adhesives and photo processing. I'm thinking that would have changed things!

So here is where we are with my insane hobby. I am working on my son's first birthday pages in a brand new book. That means I'm one month behind for him. He has 2 digital albums already ordered and a 12x12 traditional album with his professional pictures and little mementos (like hair clippings) in it. This album is 52 pages. Sadly, in my daughter's album, I am working on her birthday, which is in May. I went to a scrapbooking night and was only able to do maybe 2 pages because I have gotten so used to working with the digital albums that I found it hard to do the traditional! Uh OH! Have no fear, I'm not giving traditional scrapbooking up! It is completely different, so it's a challenge. But I like a challenge!

Scrap Happy!