Size really does matter!

As I've said in previous posts, most of my scrapping is 8x8 in size, as I scrap family photos for each year in 8x8 albums.  When I first started scrapping, this size suited me but I am now increasingly finding it limiting and even frustrating at times.  As I want to display a number of photos in each album, I am forced to use more than one photo on most pages, which can leave pages feeling cluttered and can leave less space for creativity.  It means that I generally stick to a simpler style and am not always able to use new techniques or embellishments.

On a positive note, scrapping on a smaller scale means that I almost always crop photos and this means that I can concentrate on the good part of the photo and get rid of unwanted bits - especially good when you are not the world's best photographer ;-)  Sometimes, taking small parts out of several photos can help to tell a story in a way one photo could not.  For example, a set of photos taken one grey and windy day were a little dull and frankly not very good and would not have made it into a photo album as they were, but cropped and arranged on a page they told the story of our kite-flying on the beach -

Okay, so it's not the most sophisticated LO in the world, but in our family album, it tells the story.

So, to the point of today's post ... I posted a while back about a 12x12 LO I'd done and said that it would have turned out very differently if I'd scrapped the same set of photos at 8x8 size -  here  Well, I have now scrapped photos from the same set at 8x8 size.  I did a double 8x8 LO about the same event, so here is the original 12x12 followed by the new 8x8 double LO

I'm going to continue with my yearly 8x8 family albums as they serve their purpose and certainly make more attractive and informative family records than do our old-style standard photo albums.  But I'm also going to be doing more 12x12 scrapping so that I can explore new ideas and indulge my creativity.  I've got some ideas for some themed albums, and I'm also planning to try more of the UKScrappers weekly challenges - they are greta for making me think in new ways and taking me out of my comfort zone.