Reliving Wedding Memories

After planning the wedding for a year, searching for a fabulous dress, choosing the perfect photographer, and orchestrating a magnificent reception all to have it end after only a couple of hours, naturally your first inclination is to relive it as often as possible. There’s no better way than to create a scrapbook of memories taking you through each moment of that special day.

A wedding album is often a person’s first attempt at scrapbooking. The best advice I received when I was preparing to tackle my wedding album was: Wait. I was warned by many seasoned scrapbookers to practice on less important photos for a while to find my “style” before cutting up irreplaceable wedding portraits. That was excellent advice.

Luckily, I caught the scrapping bug about five months before all of my photos came back from the photographer, which gave me plenty of time to practice and really think about how I wanted to approach my wedding album. When I was ready to begin the album, I had a plan and followed it. The result is an album I’m pleased with.

Sort Your Photos
Begin by collecting and sorting all of your wedding photos. I used both candid photographs as well as professional portraits in our wedding album. Since I had received photographs from family members and friends, as well as over 500 professional proofs, I had over 800 prints to choose from. Organizing them was imperative. Here are some suggestions for organizing your wedding photos:

• Group photographs into people groups such as bride’s family, groomsmen, guests, etc.



• Separate ceremony, reception, and portrait photos.



• Put each group of photos in its own envelope or in a photo storage box with labeled dividers. This will help you keep track of them and safely store them while you are working on your album.

Once you have the photos divided into groups, you can begin narrowing the number of photos you will include in the final album. While every photo includes a wonderful memory, if your wedding photos are like mine, you’ll have many very similar pictures from four different angles. Choose the best photograph from a set of similar prints, rather than including five photos of a similar pose.

Develop an Outline
For any themed album, you’ll want to create an outline for the subject of the pages and a plan for the flow of the album before you get started. As you’ve been sorting photos, an outline has probably begun forming in your head as to what kind of pages you would like to include. My wedding album included the following pages:

Wedding Preparations

Engagement Photos
Bridal Shower
Decorating for the Wedding
Wedding Rehearsal
Rehearsal Dinner
Getting Dressed
Invitation

Wedding Day Portraits
The Bride
The Groom
Couple Portraits
Bridesmaids
Flower Girl
Ring Bearer
Maid of Honor
Best Man
Groomsmen
Wedding Party
Mother of the Bride
Father of the Bride
Bride’s Family
Mother of the Groom
Father of the Groom
Groom’s Family

Wedding Ceremony
Guest Book Pages
Candlelighting
Seating
Processional
Here Comes the Bride
Vows
Rings
Mr. and Mrs.
Recessional

Wedding Reception
Receiving Line
Reception Decorations
Cutting the Cake
Toasts
Reception Guests
Bouquet Toss
Garter Toss
Decorating the Car
The Getaway
Marriage Certificate

Honeymoon

Wedding Wrap Up
Newspaper Announcements

Generate a Theme
Obviously the theme for the album was our wedding. However, carrying a visual theme throughout the album helped to pull it all together. I chose to carry a “daisy” theme throughout our wedding album. Each set of pages included a different daisy design, helping distinguish between sections, yet still connecting them with a common theme. This created a casual, lighthearted design for my wedding album. If your goal is a more elegant and streamlined album, a uniform color scheme and design will help to create a more formal album. Some additional ideas for creating a theme include:

• Stick to a strict color scheme.



• Incorporate the lyrics to a song or words to a poem within the pages of the album (wedding vows work great for this).



• Include related embellishments, such as hearts, flowers, or bows on each page.



• Use a standard layout design for each page. You can change the colors and embellishments, or keep them uniform for the entire album.

Go Shopping
Once you have a plan, the next step is to collect products and papers that will work with your theme and color scheme. Since you have created the outline of your album, you should have a general idea of how many pages the album will be and therefore how much product you will need. Our wedding colors were periwinkle, white and yellow, so I chose to use a variety of black, white, silver, periwinkle, and yellow papers throughout the entire album in addition to the daisy embellishments.

Be careful of buying products that will be difficult to find again in case you need additional items later on. While it can be exciting to find products in stores all over the country, purchasing products from your local scrapbook stores can often be more cost-efficient down the road. You can more easily buy additional pages when you need them, rather than overbuying initially to be sure that you don’t run out of a certain paper or product.

Start Scrapping
Finally the preparation is complete and you can start scrapbooking your wedding photos. Here are some tips that will help you create a classic album that you’ll enjoy forever:

• Avoid excessive photo cropping. Clean, straight edges and full photographs will remain classic over time, while cropping you and your husband into a darling little heart shape may only be cute for a couple of months.



• Choose read-able fonts and lettering options. Often wedding albums include curly, elaborate and elegant fonts that are beautiful, but illegible. Script and elaborate fonts are a great addition when used at a larger font size (in a title for instance), but can be difficult to read as a journaling font.



• Keep the photos prominent. Give your photos plenty of breathing space and really let them be the focus of your pages. Embellishments and papers are there to enhance the feel of the page. If you notice them first when you look at your page, you may want to re-think the design to display the photographs more prominently.



• Include journaling. Only you and your husband can truly remember how you each felt that day. Write it down and include those thoughts and feelings in your album. The feelings you had that day are an important part of the memories and you’ll want to remember them on your 50th anniversary.

My wedding album was by far my favorite album to work on. It allowed me to extend the excitement of my wedding day an additional year. Take your time and enjoy working on your wedding album and reliving the moments of your wedding day, because once the album is finished, (assuming you’ve already written all of your thank-you cards) the wedding is really over. Fortunately, you’ll be able to relive it over and over again each time you open your completed wedding album.

Shop at the Scrapbook.com Superstore for all your Scrapbooking Supplies!
Enjoy 5-Star service, HUGE selection and LOW prices!
Click here to start shopping!

---

Related Links:  ABC Wedding Album  Wedding Layouts  Photographic Diary: A 52 Week Plan

---

Related Products from Scrapbook.com:

Purchase WeddingThemed Products at Scrapbook.com Find all your Wedding themed products such as: -> Embellishments -> Cut Outs -> Paper -> Stickers » Buy it now at Scrapbook.com