Last month we made a splash talking about ways to add water elements to your pages and going on beach adventures you can read that post here. This month we are shifting our focus to family.
Family doesn’t always mean blood relatives, many of us have married people who became our family, adopted pets who have become family or in the case of this layout where I focus on my best friend and his family who are absolutely part of my family.
Bob and I have known each other for nearly twenty years. In that time we have gone through divorces, and marriages and lots of children – for him! I have been so lucky that as Bob’s family has grown they have embraced me and brought me along for an incredible journey.
I created this layout using eight photos from a recent visit with my family. I chose bright, fun, happy papers because that is the story these photos tell. I used a big sparkly title because I wanted to for sure shout that we are awesome all together. I sprinkled the page with word stickers that absolutely sum up how I feel about these people and finished it with plenty of journaling and a splatter of ink!
It can be hard to include family in the pages of your scrapbook. Sure we might document the kids on Christmas morning but how about five fun ways to add more family to your layouts.
- Don’t be afraid to use a lot of photos – I used eight photos on this page and thought about turning this into a two page spread to add even more. This helps to make sure every member of the family is included.
- Document current favorites – Have conversations with your family and capture what everyone’s favorite food, book or movie is right now. It will be really fun to look back on what everyone was into at a particular moment in time.
- Get those stories down – Tomorrow isn’t promised to anyone, make sure you tell those famous family stories on the page. This is something I have to do much more of, I want to interview my dad and get some of his stories down on the page. What family stories do you want to scrapbook?
- Let your family be unconventional – There is no question that Bob and his wife and those kids are my family but it might not be a conventional situation and I know there are people that don’t understand our very cool dynamic but I celebrate it often. I take lots of photos, tell lots of stories, I spotlight all these kids and the bond I share with each of them. Don’t let society dictate who gets to go in a family album if you consider them family that is all you need!
- Make a mini album – Yes you can absolutely document a family vacation or a big family holiday but you can also create a mini album where you just focus on family members, maybe each page is a letter to a relative sharing why you love and admire them. You can create a mini album full of funny family catch phrases, how fun would that be?
Are you ready to add your family to your pages? If you need more inspiration head to Misty’s June post where she includes lots of tips for documenting the Past, Present and Future. Click here to read Misty’s post. I’ll see you next month and as always you can find me over at AdventuresbyDani.com.