I’m ready to scrapbook. But wait! What do I need?

When you walk into the craft store (my favorites are AC Moore and Michael’s) it can be completely overwhelming! If you are like me, you want it all and you want it now! It has taken me awhile to amass the supplies that I really want. When you are starting off, you may buy things that you are either unsure of what you can do with them or feel like you are unsure if you are buying the necessities. Hopefully this blog will help you!

For starters, I would say the basics would be a paper cutter, a self healing mat, an exacto knife, a ruler, a craft mat, paper, an album and some glue. For a paper cutter, you have to consider a couple of things. Are you going to take it with you to do scrap nights elsewhere? Or is it going to be staying in your crafting room or area? I have seen some small ones by Fiskers, but I use one by The Purple Cow. Not only is one end a paper cutter (with very convenient markings of popular paper sizes), but it also has an arm on the other end that you can change the blade. It comes with three blades – a straight cut, a scoring blade and a wavy cut blade. This was one of my happy accident purchases!

Even though I have a paper cutter, I use my self healing mat, knife and a ruler to make small cuts. When a picture needs to be cropped or I have an image that I cut out from my cricut that needs some trimming, these tools are important. You can also use the knife to lift images off the cricut mat! (Don’t worry if you have no idea what a Cricut is – I will devote a lot of blogs to them!)The self-healing mat does exactly what its name says. You can make cut after cut and you won’t damage the mat!
The last things you need before you can start assembling your scrapbook are some paper and adhesive. I prefer to use Scotchtape glue in a squeeze bottle. It has two tips, one a thin tip to make lines and the other side is a roller. I also use a tape runner, but that is usually for glitter paper. As far as paper is concerned, in the beginning I bought packs of paper. Beware of glitter paper. While it is pretty, sometimes it is difficult to stick pictures or embellishments on to because it’s tough for the glue to adhere to. I also stuck to a monochromatic theme so that I knew all my papers would work together. I now buy single pieces when they are on sale (usually two of each piece of paper) so that I know I will use them all. When you buy the packs, inevitably there is always going to be one or two pieces that you don’t like or can’t use with any of your themes.

I hope these tips that I have learned over time will help you when you are getting started buying your scrap booking supplies. Check back soon for some projects that I have been working on and some new ideas!