If a picture is worth a thousand words, a scrap book is a novel of a life or event. I am pleased to present Bonita Norris, scrap book enthusiast and teacher of the same. At first I thought that scrap booking was an elementary application of pasting cute things onto paper along with pictures. After thumbing through only a couple of pages with Bonita, I discovered that there is an art and craft here. The lovely books she showed me, left nothing for an orator. All was explained within each two page spread. I was impressed with Ms. Norris’ ability to eliminate the usual boredom and confusion of the normal family album and replace it with her handsomely displayed family history, event after event.

“I started out by helping a friend with her scrap book,”stated Ms. Norris, “And I didn’t want to quit.” There is an unbelievable array of techniques to use to create themes. Some examples are, eyelets with ribbon, raised figures, ripped edged colored papers, papers of every color, design and texture, strings and rubber stamping, just to name a few. “One can incorporate everything from the event with all its memorabilia or create a time line of a life or family”. Ms. Norris has gone on to make a career out of scrap booking, owning and running a scrap book store named The Memory Box and teaching classes which include beginner, rubber stamping, recipe theme, children’s, and technique classes. She has had so much success at making a living at what she loves to do, that she has had to hook both her husband and girlfriend on scrap booking and they now teach too.

In order to do the job correctly, photographs must be carefully chosen to depict the entire story of the event. Sometimes, cropping photo’s is necessary to eliminate the distracting background that will confuse the story theme. “It’s the art of looking at the pictures you have chosen and figuring out how to focus in on what is important,” said Bonita. Perhaps a note, name or date, decoratively done needs to be added. Colors of paper, pens and other accessories need to be mindfully selected to fit the theme and color scheme. These items are then carefully placed into a pleasant and complete story. You can see without explanation the story of each of these pages. Pictures of colored clip art come in all themes, sticker pages and borders are available at scrap book and variety stores to do the job of giving a topic to ones event, but the fun is in creating feelings and gaiety by adding other pieces to the page. Some of these will be easy, like a ticket stub to go along with your pictures of the trip to the Super Bowl, or the babies hospital bracelet and birth certificate to go along with your photo’s of the birth. Others can be more challenging and to some of us that much more fun.

As Bonita said, “Just get creative!” Ms. Norris was born in Alabama and made her home here with her husband and family five years ago. She said she has been to a lot of conventions and trade shows and taken classes there to enrich her knowledge of her art. You might have considered doing some scrap booking yourself and decided that you did not need to use speciality items, for instance that plain old construction paper would do fine. Well, this was news to me but the answer is definitely not! Part of the overall plan in scrap booking is to tell a story that is preserved for generations to come. So that when you are long gone, the story is still there and it tells itself. The thing is, if you use the wrong products your photo’s will fade out, loosing color and visual quality as well. Construction paper fades the photograph from the acid in it. Magnetic albums have poly vinyl chloride in them, a gas that will destroy your pictures too. Even newspaper clippings are a acid paper. Bonita suggest that since scrap book events are usually laid out in a two page spread, that a newspaper piece be placed on the opposite page from the photographs. There is a pen you can get to test unknown papers. Your inks can also fade with time if you use the wrong ones, and tape fades to an ugly yellow and looses it glue over time. Glue too will need to be acid free and of a type that can last. If done properly and the right materials are used, you can make a document of history for generations to come. Bonita Norris stated, ”I purchased some very old photographs at the flea market to use in future projects and the thought struck me, it would break my heart if these were photo’s of my great-great grandparents and here they are, lost and unnamed”.

Ronnie Jaggers has been a master crafter and fine artist for years. Her work can be seen on http://Chiseled-Features.com. She reminds other artists “Trust the beauty of your art, for if you see the beauty, others will too.” To be considered for the featured artist call Ronnie at 791-3505 or email ronnie@chiseled-features.com