When my BIL got married, his wife had a scrapbook filled with pages of the two of them at various events. My husband and I decided to take a look at her scrapbook. Her scrapbook pages were collages from events - photos were cut out and then pasted [seemingly] atop each other. There didn’t seem to be an order to them, nothing was labeled, and we couldn’t make head or tails of what we were looking at. We looked at about three pages before giving up - it was too much “randomness” for both my husband and me to process.

While my former SIL’s scrapping style works for her, it doesn’t for me. I’ve always been one of those people who was forever asking questions about photos - who’s in the photo, how old are you, where are we, etc. With the collage pages, I didn’t know who I was looking at [are these friends, family, neighbours, co-workers?], what they were doing [a wine party? a book signing? an after-work gathering?], or when the events were [New Year’s Party - which year? Final Exams - college, which one?].

Maybe that’s why with my pages I try so hard to cover the “basic” questions. I feel that if one answers these questions, anyone can look at your pages and understand what’s happening - and to whom:

Who: Identify who’s in the photo. In scrapping a photo of myself on my first day of school, I figured everyone would know it was me - especially from the year. My husband didn’t - he thought it was my sister - so my name was added to the page.

What: What’s taking place in the photo? What’s the occasion? Why do you want to remember it? If you weren’t around when the photo was taken [such as a heritage photo], then why are you scrapping it? Make someone interested in reading the page. My son will never meet his relatives who fought in the Civil War, but he’ll know which side they fought on, if they died during fighting, and any interesting additional information that I can find.

When: Including the date and year is helpful. You may think you’ll remember which New Year’s Day is which, but will your audience or you in a few years? I’ve found the date helps when I visit the same place multiple times over a year. Sometimes my son’s worn the same clothing so I really have difficulties keeping track of which visit was when.

Where: I used to think that “where” was only for holiday snaps - such as visiting abroad or different states. I’ve come to realize that sometimes labeling a photo “Chrissy Field” or “The Great Beach” helps jog my memory on the day’s events. I’ve found the “where” to be helpful in different sections of museums and can add more to the photo - such as when my son visited a semiconductor clean room, “built” a computer online, or created his own web page all at a local museum.

Why: What else can you add to the page to bring the story to life for the readers? Why did you take the photo and decide to scrap it? Was it because it was your daughter’s first hit of the baseball season? Because your son made dinner the first time? Because your husband remembered your anniversary without prompting?

Don’t forget that journaling gives you an opportunity to record both facts and feelings that might otherwise be forgotten. If you don’t have time to record all the details of an event, just covering these basics help give the reader enough information to get an idea of what happened - besides the fact that you took a great photo.

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