Each year around this time, I pull out my scrapbooking supplies and do a "marathon scrapbooking session". Since my kids were in kindergarten, I would do this every year! They are now in high school. I can't believe how time flies by. But, to be able to do an entire school year of scrapbook (Affiliate Link) pages, I needed to be organized - really organized! Every supply and tool must be accessible and contained in one area. I have two 15-inch deep by 24-inch wide shelves (Affiliate Link) that store all my scrapbooking stuff. This post will show you scrapbook (Affiliate Link) organizing tips for any size space, especially small craft rooms. It seems small, but it holds a lot of stuff. Here are some products I use to keep the marathon scrapbooking session organized.
Jump to:
- What is the definition of a marathon scrapbooking session?
- Sort 12 x 12 papers and other sizes of papers
- Have a storage place for photos for works in progress
- Keep Cutters Organized and in One Place
- Have all your Markers in one place
- Gather all the ribbons together and store them in the same place:
- Stickers, borders, and decorative paper can be tricky to organize, so pick the best way for you and how you use them:
- Store your little supplies (like glue sticks, glitter, flowers, etc...) in a larger divided carrying case
What is the definition of a marathon scrapbooking session?
A marathon scrapbooking session is where you can get a lot of scrapbooking pages finished at once. The trick to do this is to do the following:
Line up the supplies for assembly. Start with the paper, then go to the photos, stickers, notes/pens/writing, and finish with the embellishments.
Have a large surface to lay out all of these items.
Starting from the left and moving toward the right makes the process of assembling the scrapbook (Affiliate Link) page easier to finish.
That's it! Below are my favorite tips to help me do these pages more efficiently.
Sort 12 x 12 papers and other sizes of papers
The first of my scrapbook (Affiliate Link) organizing tips is to store the paper by size. It works great; you can see the colors easily and pull out just what you want instead of going through lots of different piles of paper. I like to sort card stock by holiday, solid colors, and patterns. If you have paper of different sizes, like I do, you can also use one for that particular well. I don't place my scraps in these because it would be difficult to see. I store them somewhere else. Here are various options to hold 12 by 12 paper so you can organize them by color and size. This link is from Amazon (Affiliate Link) (affiliate). I will receive a small commission if you click through and buy something on Amazon (Affiliate Link). Thank you for your support.
Have a storage place for photos for works in progress
I use something like this one for each kid. It holds the photos that I get throughout the school year. To make it even more organized, I use envelopes and write on the front the event name, the child's name, date of the event and place the scrapbook (Affiliate Link) picture and any other paper inside the envelope. Here are links for things to use to organize the scrapbook photos and pages in progress from Amazon (Affiliate Link) (affiliate).
Keep Cutters Organized and in One Place
Keep all the cutter supplies together. If you have shape cutters below, use a shallow drawer showing all the shape images on top. Magnet strips work great too for scissors if you have wall space.
Have all your Markers in one place
Another of my scrapbooking organizing tips are to keep your markers and writing utensils (Affiliate Link) in one place for easy access. Gather all the markers in one space. I like to keep the markers in shallow packets. This is where I place all my supplies. I have two of these, and they work great and take up little to no room. As you can see, I label (Affiliate Link) all the pockets. Since my kids and I use these, I wanted to know what we are running low on easily and labeling these packets, helps me do just that.
Gather all the ribbons together and store them in the same place:
I have two locations for ribbons (Affiliate Link). The larger ribbons (Affiliate Link) are with my wrapping paper station, and my smaller scrapbook ribbon is stored in the pockets (see picture below). But, all my ribbons (Affiliate Link) are less than 10 feet away, so I don't need to go far if I need larger ribbons (Affiliate Link).
Stickers, borders, and decorative paper can be tricky to organize, so pick the best way for you and how you use them:
I like to organize the stickers and other decorative papers by type. Some of my favorite categories to use are school, words, borders, girly, boy stickers, flowers, etc... I like using closed stackable bins to hold these topics, so I can shuffle through them when I need to find a sticker for a page. Here is a link from Amazon (Affiliate Link) (affiliate) that would help you organize the stickers(affiliate).
Store your little supplies (like glue sticks, glitter, flowers, etc...) in a larger divided carrying case
The last of my scrapbook organizing tips is to store your little supplies in a larger divided carrying case. It closes nicely and stores away on a shelf. Shoe boxes (Affiliate Link) are way too large and do not have dividers. Unless you have lots of scrapbooking supplies, you don't need them.
Scrapbooking can be very rewarding. However, if your supplies are not organized, you could spend lots of well-earned money on items you already have. So, by setting up a system for you, it will keep you from wasting money and help you go through your scrapbooking projects a lot easier. I hope this post inspires you to get your scrapbook supplies organized. Please leave a comment below: Do you scrapbook? How long have you been scrapbooking? What is your favorite scrapbook organizer product? I would love to hear from you.
Please note these are affiliate links through Amazon (Affiliate Link), and at no additional cost, I will earn affiliate fees if you decide to make a purchase.
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Kathy says
What great ideas for organizing all of your scrap booking supplies. These are some great ideas that I will share with my clients who scrap book. Thanks!
Sarah Soboleski says
I tried to get into scrapbooking, but it didn't work for me, though I love looking at other people's. I can imagine yours must look amazing. I think those clear packets you're using are great. You can keep the supplies separated by category, they don't take up a lot of room and they're see-through. A win-win-win!
Janet Barclay says
I really admire you for keeping this up every year! This is the type of activity that a lot of moms would like to do, but they just never get around to it. I love your system too.
Sabrina says
Thank Janet. I have a chalkboard Contact Paper affixed to the cabinet door where I list all the events for scrapbooking this past school year. It helps to keep track of all the events. =)
Autumn Leopold says
I used to scrapbook and loved it. I stopped when my son was two and just switched to doing photo books. I'm even behind on those now. I hope to get caught up this summer. That's great that you make time to do it every year!