10A • COTTAGE GROVE SENTINEL • JANUARY 10, 2019
Scrapbooks can help document your year
Many interesting and special events take
place during the course of a typical year. While
the trend is to share photos and anecdotes via
social media, these memories tend to be forgot-
ten soon aft er they are posted. Rather than rele-
gate birthdays, holidays, school milestones, and
other such yearly events to the black hole of cy-
berspace, craft y men, women and children may
want to display them in more prominent ways.
Scrapbooking is a popular hobby that can
help people document various events over the
course of the year. But scrapbooking can be
much more than that as well. Scrapbooks can
serve as valuable resources that speak to the way
life once was.
Such traditions are not new. Books highlight-
ing family memorabilia, such as recipes, poems,
letters, and illustrations, were popular in En-
gland as early as the 15th century. Even school
yearbooks are a type of scrapbook, highlighting
students and events in a single convenient book.
Th e reasons for scrapbooking are the same
today as they once were. Scrapbooks preserve
memories, record family stories and pass down
information through generations. Scrapbooks
can even be customized in any manner their
creators desire.
For those who have resolved to devote more
time to documenting happy times and special
events in the year ahead, scrapbooking is a great
way to do just that. Here’s how to make the pro-
cess creative and successful.
• Devote a box to “scraps.” At the beginning of
the year, set aside a medium-sized box, such as
a shoebox, that can store various items you want
to include in your scrapbook. Th ese may include
ticket stubs, receipts, brochures from trips, or
any other items you deem worth saving.
• Make time to scrapbook. Set aside a few
days each month to go through collected items
and organize them so you have an idea of what
will be included on your pages. Every event may
not make the fi nal cut, but that’s up to you.
• Indulge in some craft -store shopping. Not
everyone has the time to design each scrapbook
page from scratch. Fortunately, there are numer-
ous pre-designed templates or slip-in pages that
require little work on the part of scrapbookers.
• Use your own handwriting. Handwritten
sentiments can make the scrapbook even more
meaningful.
• Don’t overload with photos. Let one or two
photos on a page best convey the emotions and
stories. Create balance with white space, text and
other accents.
• Categorize your photos. Disorganized pho-
tos can make scrapbook creation more challeng-
ing and ultimately frustrating. Organize your
photos by month and rely on cloud-based photo
storage systems to keep them safe. Th en, when
you need them, you can print only those images
you want to include in your book.
• Have fun with the process. You have the en-
tire year to create a beautiful scrapbook. Take
your time and experiment with diff erent ideas.
Hidden ways you can benefi t from having hobbies
Finding time for hobbies can be diffi cult. Commitments to
work and family take up the bulk of many people’s free time, mak-
ing it hard to squeeze in a favorite hobby. But hobbies can bene-
fi t people in some interesting ways. Understanding those hidden
benefi ts may compel some people to make more time for their
favorite downtime activities.
• Hobbies can improve your effi ciency. Penciling more activities
into your day planner may not seem like something that will help
you create more time for hobbies, but it just might. For example, if
you know you have a soft ball game or choir practice at night, then
you might waste less time surfi ng the internet or talking around
the water cooler during the workday. In a 2017 study conducted
for the staffi ng fi rm Offi ceTeam, researchers found that the aver-
age offi ce employee spends about fi ve hours per week on his or her
mobile phone doing things that have nothing to do with the job.
Th at’s fi ve hours you could be working, opening up more time for
hobbies before or aft er work.
• Hobbies can foster social connections. In his 2000 book,
“Bowling Alone,” political scientist Robert Put-
nam described a reduction in in-person social
intercourse that once enriched Americans’ so-
cial lives. By making more time for hobbies,
particularly those that promote interaction
with other adults, men and women can foster
social connections that otherwise might never
blossom.
• Hobbies can provide health benefi ts. Th e
American Institute of Stress notes that some
hobbies can help people reduce their stress. Th e
AIS notes that some 56 million women in the
United States now knit or crochet. Th at marks
a 51 percent increase over the last decade.
Th at revival is attributed to the stress-reducing
properties of knitting and crocheting. Men and
women coping with stress need not learn how
to wield a sewing needle to alleviate their stress.
Activities that promote slowing down and in-
duce a relaxation response similar to knitting
and crocheting can be equally benefi cial.
• Hobbies can increase quality time with
your children. Parents with hobbies can double
dip, using the time they would ordinarily spend
with their children to teach them some of their
favorite hobbies. Take kids along when you go
fi shing or teach them how to plant fl owers and
tend to a garden. Th is is a great way to increase
quality time with your children while also af-
fording you a chance to continue engaging in
your favorite hobbies.
Hobbies can benefi t people in ways they nev-
er imagined, making them worthwhile pursuits
no matter how much or how little time you may
have. TF18C535
Baker Bay Bead Co.
541-942-3941
www.bakerbay.com
35655 Shoreview Drive Dorena, Oregon 97434