Quick Party Planning Checklist

Make yourself a gorgeous party planning journal with a scrapbook or plastic three-ring binder that has a space to insert an inspirational picture. Keep cutouts from magazines of ideas you love about decorating, themes, menus, and recipes. Keep notes about your party afterwards so you remember what worked well and what to do differently next time. Your personal party scrapbook will be an invaluable assistant to help you avoid party stress.

Here's a quick party planning checklist:

<b>Party Invitations</b>

-- Create dramatic invitations. Your friends pay more attention to a written invitation than a phone call.

-- Send your invitations early and request an RSVP.

-- Tell your guests what to wear so they feel comfortable. Causal fun or dressy elegant.

-- Tell your guests what to bring so they don't have to think about it. If you say something like "We're collecting unwrapped toys for our local ...," your guests won't feel like they need to go shopping for you, too. List a specific dish type if you plan a pot luck.

<b>Food</b>

-- Check catering prices. You might be pleasantly surprised to find that you can have your feast delivered for about the same price as purchasing all the ingredients. Get your order in writing or faxed to you.

-- Make a list of all ingredients you need and shop early.

-- Prepare some of your dishes a few days before your party.

-- Plan for vegetarians and special needs diets.

<b>Flowers and Decorations</b>

Think about your home's color scheme when choosing flowers. A large poinsettia makes a big impact and costs less than florist bouquets. Add tree branch cuttings from your garden to extend grocery bouquets. Use curling ribbon as filler. Tie candy canes around a can and use for a floral arrangement.

<b>Candles</b>

Make sure that candles won't damage your surfaces. Larger candles burn longer and you don't have to worry about watching them during a long party. Keep candles high and out of the way from children and your guest's hair.

Enjoy yourself and relax. Everything doesn't have to be perfect. Your guests will have fun in a home decorated for a special event. Friends appreciate a good time and will remember your gracious efforts to ensure a good time.

Copyright © Jeanette J. Fisher

How To Make A Paper Bag Scrapbook

Paper bag scrapbooks are really popular now. Their small size makes them great for gift giving, for display on a coffee table, or even just as a “brag book”. They are made by using paper bags (you know the brown lunch kind) and are of a smaller size than the larger scrapbook albums, usually 5 x 5 inches. Since the paper bags are not acid free, it is important to only use copies of your photos. You can get duplicates made of your photos from your photo processing center or even make copies of photos on your home printer.

To get started you will need 3 paper lunch bags. You can use either the brown lunch bag kind or the white bags. I find mine in the regular grocery store aisles. For the cardstock backgrounds, you will need 3 sheets of 12 x 12 in a solid color and 3 sheets of 12 x 12 in coordinating colors. For securing the book together, you will need about 2 feet of ribbon. I use several different coordinating ribbons to add flair to the books. Finally, you will need whatever embellishments you choose such as stickers, brads, ribbons, tags, etc. to decorate the individual pages.

To begin, lay the 3 paper bags flat. Fold each bag in half so that it looks like a little “book”. Put the 3 folded books together so that you now have a 6-page book.  Hole punch 5 holes in the left side of the “book” (near the fold) . Then, to secure the book together use the ribbons and tie a small bow through each hole.

Once the book has been put together, you are ready for the next step. Cut the background cardstock pieces into 5 x 5 shapes and adhere them to each page of the album. Leave the ends of the paper bag open, as you can use that area as additional storage space for photos, tags, and other special items. Embellish each page as you choose with special stickers, photos, journal entries, brads,tags, etc.

Enjoy your completed paper bag scrapbook!

Scrapbooking Store: Things to Get Started

We want to remember and keep for posterity important experiences and events of our lives, snapshots of moments and events we consider momentous in our lives and things which are of value to us and which we feel to be treasured for revisiting in future. The hobby of preserving all kinds of such memories bearing our personal touch and creative ideas be they journals, photographs, diaries or any other objects is called ‘scrapbking’. What Is Scrapbooking The scrapbooks of earlier times used to be paper books on which we pasted clippings from newspapers. Now they are creatively organized albums of journals and photos chronologically documented for the coming generation to look at with wonder. Stores for Scrapbooking The scrapbooking activity requires certain supplies to create the album. Some of these scrapbooking stores are listed below: i) Papers: The papers used for decorating the albums and mounting photos must be acid free. Presence of acid in the paper makes it brittle and prone to early damage. The photos will get discolored and faded easily by the acid in the paper. The scrapbooking paper must be free from lignin also as it causes early yellowing of the paper if it comes in contact with ultraviolet light. The processed paper for scrapbooking found in scrapbooking store is free from both acid and lignin. ii) Plastic Sheets: Plastic sheets sized to fit the album pages protect them from dust, spills or fingerprints. Papers and page protectors are available for making the two standard sizes for scrapbooks, viz. the sizes 8.5”x11” and 12”x12”. The larger size can accommodate more information and photos and are therefore suitable as anniversary albums for weddings and the first birthday of the baby. iii) Photo album binders: The photo albums come in formats like spiral bound, three ring, strap style and post bound. Spiral bound is good as small events album like say a particular excursion but not ideal for big albums due to certain drawbacks. New pages cannot be inserted for additional sets of photos. Also the color of the pages cannot be changed and pages cannot be covered with page protectors. Three ring binders provide these flexibilities. Album pages can be turned, removed or added easily with the provisions for changing colored papers and using page protectors. From consideration of storage, strap and post bound styles are better as the pages are arranged flat in the album making storage of the album easier. iv) Glues: Only acid free glues or adhesives should be chosen. Double sided tape adhesives leave no glue on the photos and keep them clean. Glue sticks have the advantage that they take some time to dry up making it easier to move objects in albums before they get fixed on them. Since glues if not carefully used can spoil a photo, it is safer to use for albums photo splits which can be pulled off with ease if needed. v) Embellishments: They add life to the album by decorating it with eye catching fun and flare. They come in the forms of stickers, die cuts, paper punches and paper dolls. Scrapbooking Tools These tools are required to develop a scrapbook. The basic tools are acid free pens, pencils, scissors, templates and stencils.