Tips for Scrapbooking Baby’s First Milestones

Oct.02, 2008 by Natalie Batkis
Scrapbooking

Zoe’s First Spaghetti Experience

There is probably nothing more amazing to a parent than seeing their precious baby doing something for the first time. Whether it’s a first haircut, first bath, or first step, watching the wonderment through their eyes is something indescribable. These big “firsts” also create opportunities for you to grab your camera and start snapping pictures. But once you have all these magnificent shots, what can you do to show them off? You could put them in an album on your coffee table, or you could get creative! I sense a scrapbooking opportunity here!

Before we go any further, you should probably recognize some great “first” opportunities. Here is a little list of some magic moments to capture with your camera:

first smiles
first ride in car seat
first meeting of siblings or other family members
first crawl
first steps
first haircut
first solid foods
first drink from a cup
first holidays: Easter, Christmas, Valentine’s Day, Halloween
first stroller ride
first trip to the park
first time on a swing
fist time in the snow
first time in the pool

Alright, I think you get the picture (no pun intended). Now that you have the perfect moments to work with, here are some ideas on how to present them in your “firsts” scrapbook.

Baby’s First "Spaghetti Face"

If this is your first attempt at scrapbooking, there are fabulous scrapbooking kits available for purchase at craft stores, scrapbooking stores and online. These kits come in different themes and can be specific to boys or girls. The kit used for “spaghetti face” is called veggie garden by Atomic Cupcake. For this specific template and many others, The Shabby Shoppe is a great web resource. If you’ve been scrapbooking for awhile, you probably have all the supplies you need and may choose to create a very personalized book instead.

Although you can organize your book any way you’d like, organizing your pictures chronologically is a fun way to do it. Don’t forget to include the date on your page as you won’t want to forget that special day. Certain moments like a first bath or first spaghetti meal may provide you with too many pictures to choose from, in which case you may decide to do a two-page spread. This type of layout is great because it gives you that extra page to add more pictures, more journaling and more embellishments.

Jake's First Spaghetti

Each milestone/page can stand alone and have a completely different look, or you could choose to bring each event together with a common thread like a specific color palette, font or a series of embellishments that work well together. You could also include “first” quotes on each page from different people in history. Here’s an example from Martin Luther King, Jr.: “Take the first step in faith. You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.” Here’s a website of great “first” quotes: Brainy Quote.

What makes a scrapbooking project a special keepsake is the personal details you include on each page. I personally love journalingby hand because it adds not only my perspective on the events but my own hand-written notes which makes it so much more intimate.

As a beautiful way to end your book, why not write a love letter to your baby telling him or her about the “first” time you met and what that meant to you? It’s a great way to complete the book and it’s a special message your child will cherish forever.

Once this keepsake book is completed, it will not only serve as a reminder of the big events from your child’s life but it will be an heirloom that will be in your family for generations. How cool is that?