For the love of Home Ownership

Easy to say and yes I am happy, actually I am ecstatic that I finally entered the home owner elite. Well it seems that way at the moment even though I know we are no more elite than anyone else. In actual fact nothing has really changed. I have to pay money to someone else every month for the privileged of staying in a house. I do not like where I am going with this. I love my new house, all mine now I need to make it my own. The mortgage and insurance are taken care of and I have my new carpets arriving next week so all is well.

Sunday, June 28, 2009

Digital vs. Traditional Scrapbooking

By Julie Gazaway

Lately there has been more and more attention drawn to digitally scrapbooking instead of scrapbooking the traditional way. There are many reasons why you might want to swap over, if you haven't already, here are 3.

1. Time - Time is very precious, and we all know scrapbooking takes time. So, why not maximize the time you have? If you sat down and figured out how much time it takes to scrapbook, youd be amazed! First, you need to go through all the photos you want to use and edit and print each one. Then you need to go shopping, which is actually the fun part, and pick out all the products you plan on using for the scrapbook album. Then you go home, set it all up and start creating! But, while youre creating, there's endless cutting, gluing, punching out, printing, etc. The list just keeps going. Then for the part we all hate; cleaning up! It always seemed like once I got into my creative groove, it was time to clean up! And since I dont have a room dedicated to scrapbooking, I had to clean up every single time, which used up a good chunk of the time I had for scrapbooking.

Now, let's compare that to digital scrapbooking! You hop on your computer, surf the web for products you want to use and purchase, and immediately have them in your possession through downloads! Next, you add them into your digital scrapbooking program, and you're ready to go. You add you're pictures as you need them, so no need to edit and print before hand! And when you're done, you walk away from the computer! You're clean up time goes from minutes, to a couple seconds! Now that small time slot you had to scrapbook has been used to the max!

2. Convenience - Think back to the last time you scrapbooked. Do you remember sitting at a table with your products all around you, hoping for inspiration? Not to mention all the photos and supplies! I remember feeling so overwhelmed by the mess; I had a hard time being creative!

Compare that to digital scrapbooking. The only supply you need is your computer! You can basically sit anywhere and scrapbook. It doesn't matter. You could be sitting on a plane, squished up against your neighbor and be scrapbooking! Now, that's convenience.

3. Money - This is the main reason I switched to digital scrapbooking. I have commitment issues! I would work on a page and love it! Then days later, I would pull it out, and think, "Thats horrible!" "I hate it!" "What was I thinking?" So, I would throw it out, and start over. I couldn't commit on a theme for a page, let alone an entire scrapbook. Every day I would change my mind, and more money would end up in the trash. So, I started creating my layouts on my computer to save me time and money. I found I liked it a lot better, because if I came back a couple days later and hated it, I could hit delete and be out nothing, except my time. Then I began comparing the cost of having a scrapbook published vs. creating a traditional scrapbook. Here is a brief rundown of my findings:

Traditional (20 page album) $0.60 per background page (that's really good, most cost more) $1.50 in embellishments & extra paper for framing photos (some pages more, some pages less) $15 photo album (once again, that's really good - most cost around $25-$30) $5 in sheet protectors (a box of 20 costs $10, and youd only use 10 pages) $0.50 in photo prints (that's an average of $0.17 per picture and 3 pictures per page) Average of $72 per album (glue, adhesives, scissors, cutters, punches, stamps... and mistakes not included!)

Digital (20 page album published in a hard bound 12x12 book) $7 (Optional purchase of digital scrapbooking products online) $44.00 for book publishing (Quote taken from Shutterfly.com on June 12, 2009) $11.99 Shipping & Handling Average of $62.99 per album. And remember, that album is bound in a hard bound book, where you'll never have to worry about embellishments and photos coming off the pages. And the pages aren't so thick they take a 2" binder.

Once I saw how much I could save by switching over to digital scrapbooking, I made the change, and have never looked back!

So, if you're still debating on switching to digital, give it a try! You'll never go back!

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