Two very important features of scrapbooking are layouts and journaling. These are necessary in what your page looks like and what you are trying to convey to your audience. If the page is improperly organized and you have not taken the time to journal, then both you and the viewer lose out.

Layouts for scrapbooking are very important, you have to know where and how to place your material to make your page pop out. By following some simple steps you will find that your page turns out every time.

Layout steps:

1. Pick photos for layout  (example: snowman building with your child)

2. Choose your theme  (winter)

3. Focus your story  (first snowman built with child)

4. Match embellishments to your photo  (snowflakes, gloves, snowmen)

5. Pick a focal point  (child with finished snowman)

6. Use shapes  (snowman stencil for journaling)

7. Double page your layout  (side by side page)  If you don’t have enough material to cover both pages, use a similar style and/or color scheme to blend the two pages together.

8. Negative/empty space is a good thing - you don’t have to fill in every blank space.

Doing layouts has never been easier, if you have trouble developing your own layouts, you can purchase a scrapbook layout book or find free scrapbooking layouts online.

Next:  Journaling

Journaling is important because it answers the Who? What? When? Where? and Why? of your page.