TIMBERVILLE
"I’m finally getting them into an album," Saunders said, laughing as she explained her wedding was eight years ago.
It’s an all too familiar story, said Saunders, 55, of Paw Paw, W.Va. "Life just goes by fast sometimes."
Photos piled up, she explained, and slipped to the back of her mind.
Until, that is, she started scrapbooking.
Saunders and her daughter, Michelle Foltz, embraced the new craft together about four years ago.
The two took their passion public when Foltz decided the area needed its own scrapbooking club. She signed up on a popular networking site, Meetup.com, three months ago and is now meeting with a group every month in Timberville.
Collective Cropping
Through Meetup.com, a dozen members joined and several meet every month for hours-long scrapbooking sessions, said Foltz, 36, of Timberville.
"It goes by really fast," said Foltz, who made four pages for her scrapbook during their four-hour meeting on Sunday.
It was the group’s third meeting so far. They plan to meet the fourth Sunday of every month in a meeting room of the Plains District Community Center. It’s a spacious place, with room to fan out stockpiles of supplies, without worrying about the roaming hands of little ones, Foltz said.
"When you have children, you can’t leave it out at home," Foltz said, pointing to her collection of funky scissors, inkpads and a paper cutter.
That’s part of why she started the group earlier this year.
"It’s a way to get out of the house and meet people," Foltz said. "It’s just more fun to do together."
Member Olivia Conley agreed. While she’s been scrapbooking for about five years, "because of the group, I’ve gotten into it," said Conley, 54, of Dayton.
But the benefits of collective scrapping hardly stop there, they said.
Advice For Newbies
"One of the biggest advantages is sharing tools," Foltz said. "Like today, I learned to emboss for the first time," borrowing the heating gun of veteran scrapbooker Anne See, a Broadway resident.
Sharing is just perfect for "newbies" who want to try the craft out before committing, Foltz added.
"It can get very expensive, but a lot of discount stores are starting to sell supplies," Foltz said.
Emma Norton, of Harrisonburg, is new to the craft, but she’s already learned that resourcefulness can cut costs. "You can use trash, anything, if you’re creative enough," she said.
Inspiring each other’s creativity is another reason group members said they didn’t want to just scrap from home.
"You just walk around and look at their stuff," Saunders said. And they often do, comparing notes, techniques and supplies, as well as the memories behind the photos they so creatively want to preserve.
That desire to preserve the past drives scrapbookers like Foltz. "It’s for my kids," she said. "I want something they can have and look back on."
Saunders says most people have a similar desire — it’s why they keep shoeboxes of photos in the first place. But now, more than ever, scrapbooking is made more accessible with so many resources, and the support of groups like this one, she said.
"Anybody can do it," Saunders said. "You don’t even know how creative you are until you get started."
Jenny Foltz, of Timberville, who crafted Halloween-themed pages on Sunday, agreed.
"It’s for the artist who can’t draw or paint," she said as she packed up bags of supplies.
Their four hours went by quick, Foltz said. But, "there are always more photos to take." They’ll be back next month, she said, armed with another shoebox of photos to preserve.
— Maria Saunders smiled as she thumbed through wedding photos, pausing to glue her favorites to a sheet of dark crimson pap
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