When Retha asked me to write the foreword for her book, I decided to write about why I scrap, and why you should scrap. I have been thinking so much lately about time management and life, about all the choices that we constantly have to make. Wouldn’t it be fantastic if we could manage the amount of time that we have here on this earth? What if we really could decide how long we get to stay! It would make things so much more predictable, so much easier. The fact is, we don’t get to decide and this makes each minute of life so valuable.

So, why should I scrapbook when there are so many things that demand my time and so many other things that I just don’t have time for? Why should I spend the precious few hours that I have each week on scrapbooking instead of reading or shopping or a movie? Why should I choose to spend my time printing my photos and documenting my feelings? Will it really make a difference in my life or in the life of anyone else? Eleanor Roosevelt said, “We all create the person we become by our choices as we go through life. In a very real sense, by the time we are adults, we are the sum total of the choices we have made.” Why should I choose to spend my time scrapbooking, instead of doing many other things?

When I take the time to honestly examine my life, the things that are most important to me can be narrowed down to a short list … and at the top of the list are typically other people. Do these people know how I feel? Do my actions represent my feelings? If I died tomorrow, would they know that they are at the top of my list? This is one of many reasons why I should scrapbook. There are more reasons, and they are equally compelling. I should scrapbook because each time I hit a bump in the road on my personal journey, I reach for my old journals. I am amazed at how my own words have been able to help me through rough times. It’s very healing when we remember all the steps we had to take to get to where we are now – it’s even better when we can go back and read about the feelings that went along with those stories, another notch up when pictures are included to illustrate.

I should scrapbook because my grandmother’s journals and scrapbooks are healing and motivating and moving to me. I will be a grandmother some day. My daughters will never know my grandmother, and my great-granddaughters may never know me, but we all can know each other through scrapbooks
and journals. We can also know ourselves better when we recognize the ties that bind us all together. I should scrapbook because it’s therapeutic. I should get together often with friends with whom I have enjoyed spending time and creating. I know they, too, know that we should. I should encourage them to keep telling their stories. I wish I knew more about when I was a child, and that’s another reason why I should scrapbook, so that my children know what a great life they have, how much they are loved and how incredible I think they are. I should scrapbook because I’m the only mother they have. I should scrapbook because of the countless experiences I have had, watching others read through scrapbooks that I have had a part in creating – with warm smiles on their faces and sometimes tears rolling down their cheeks. There’s no denying the power of a scrapbook.

So, why don’t I scrapbook more? I really don’t have a good answer to that question. As scrapbookingevolved into a fine art form, I got overwhelmed. I fell into the trap so many others fall into – the trap that makes us all feel we aren’t ‘real’ scrapbookers unless every page is worthy of a gallery opening. This trap has left me with some beautiful pages, but not very many of them. I have continued to write diligently in my journals, and I have taken thousands of photos, but it is time for me to put them into ooks for others to enjoy and understand, and it’s okay if I do that in a basic, simple way. It will always e the stories that matter.

Once in a while, I’ll still take the time to turn a scrapbook page into a piece of fine art, because that experience has its own joys. But for now, I will give myself permission to just get it done, because I cannot hoose the length of my time on earth, and every minute is so precious – too precious to choose a movie over the artful documentation of my journey in life. It’s so important to leave every story told.

Enjoy this book of others who have found all the right reasons to make the choice to scrapbook. You will be inspired to do the same. Make it meaningful!

Melody Ross