Simple Ideas for Creating Your Wedding Scrapbook

Why, you may ask, would you create a wedding scrapbook when you are paying good money for the hopefully more professional wedding album produced by the wedding photographer?  

The wedding album might be more professional, but it will miss out on much of what went in to making the wedding happen. The candid moments, the humorous snapshots, the story behind the day. The wedding album is a formal presentation of this special day, but the wedding scrapbook goes where no album can go. 

Things to consider when putting together a wedding scrapbook. 
 

First, assemble your materials. Snapshots, wedding invitations, fabric swatches, notes letters and cards from friends and relatives. Anything that might make a good entry into your project. 

Second, be selective. Yes, the wedding scrapbook is partly for all the photos and memorabilia that didn't make it into the album, but it's not a junk drawer. 
 

You will have to cut out a lot of what you gathered in step 1 in order to finish with a good piece of work.
 

Create an underlying theme and structure. Sometimes it helps to outline the scrapbook on paper first, labeling each section and assigning an appropriate number of pages. 

In each section, list the materials you are considering. 

For example, section 1 might be two pages on the wedding preparations. 

The materials might include: 

• A group photo from the night the parents found out about the wedding plans. 
• A copy of the wedding announcement which appeared in the local paper.
• A sample wedding invitation.
• Candid shots of planning sessions, dress fittings, tux selection, and discussions with the caterer about the meals to be served. 

Don't forget the professional wedding pictures. After all, you paid good money for them. While you don't want your wedding scrapbook to be a reworking of the album, it would be remiss not to include two or three of the best photos from the professional set. 

Third, pick an overall theme for the layout and presentation. If it is to be traditional, select your wedding scrapbook cover and pages with a lacy or flowery theme. If a more modern look is what you want, go with materials with strong colors and clean shapes and designs. 

Page layout is important. A wedding scrapbook is more than just a collection of photos. It should tell a story or at least convey the moods, feelings and sentiments of a very important occasion. 

Don't cram photos in just because you have them. Worried about offending someone? Set up additional photo albums. 

Each photo on each page should relate to each other and express the theme of the wedding scrapbook. 

Arrange the photos or documents to direct the attention of the viewer from one point to the next. Using lines, ribbons or other visual queues can help guide the view through the page. 

Select your page background carefully. If your page is very material intensive (lots of photos or text), go with a very simple, even plain background. Too many conflicting images distress the brain and can counter the effect that you are trying to create. 

Solid colors are not a bad choice, if the content is itself visually interesting. 

Patterns, textures and image backgrounds, on the other hand, can enhance a page with very few or even one photo. 

Looking for unique backgrounds or feature pieces to include in your wedding scrapbook?

Try one of these:

• For the page with pictures of the gift table, make a special background effect. Cover the page with a montage of cuttings from the actual gift wrap before you apply the pictures. That way you can include the 'givers' in the visual layout without an exhaustive inventory of gift photos.
• Cover the page featuring the Bridal Party with samples of the Bridal lace and swatches from the Brides Maid's gown material. 
• Frame some of the pages using the same ribbons found in the Bride and Brides Maids flower arrangements. 
• Paste up a page of sheet music from a song sung at the wedding as a background for pictures of the ceremony. 
• If your snapshots are digital, you can create montages of many people during various stages of the wedding process. That way, more people are included without too many additional pages. 
  
  Don't forget mementos like: 
  
• Boarding Passes for the Honeymoon Trip. 
• Hotel fliers, tour pamphlets, and other mountable souvenirs.  
• The menu from the wedding dinner. 
• The place card for a special guest. 
•   A nicely printed copy of the wedding vows, especially if they were written by the bride and groom. Here is where a PC can help a lot. By using a good quality parchment paper and a nice calligraphy font, you can make a very stunning presentation. 

Don't forget the cover. How you bind your wedding scrapbook is important as well.  The color and texture of the binding needs to match your overall theme. 

It should be sturdy and able to take lots of use.  After all, if you put this much work into your scrapbook, you'll want to share it often. 

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