Five Money Savers

Below you’ll read about five money savers. Try one, some, or all and continue to use the savers that work best for you.

Use Your Scraps It is very rare for me to use all the products I purchase for my various products. I may only use half a piece of pattern paper or a foot of a yard of the ribbon I purchased. This process leaves me with tons of scraps (cardstock, paper, embellishments, ribbon etc.) at my disposal. All of the scraps that I save are futile unless I make use of them. The key to saving scraps is remembering that you have them and using them. I recommend coming up with a storage system that will encourage you to use your scraps often.

Make More Than One Card Often I make a card for a specific person or event. Usually if I’m making just one card I’ll have products leftover. Similar to using leftover scrapbook products when I scrapbook, I make several cards at the same time using the leftover products. This process actually saves money and time.

Cut Back on Embellishments I know embellishments add a lot to your layouts and cards but when you are using a lot of them they become quite expensive. A lot of times your embellishments are the bulk of your project cost. So I try to incorporate more generic (colored, non seasonal) embellishments in my projects. The generic embellishments can be used numerous project not just one. I still use seasonal embellishments, just not as frequently.

Scrap Out of Season Just like shopping for clothing, you can find some great deals when you purchase scrapbook products out of season. Usually the prices of seasonal products will be reduced shortly after the season (holiday, event, etc.) has past. This shouldn’t pose a problem for scrapbooking but it may for card making if you were planning to make cards in season. Many times I make cards for the next season with the reduced scrapbooking products I purchase. You can also just save the products for the next season. To save or use the scrapbook products is totally up to you.

Share Tools I know when you read the latest Creating Keepsakes or see a product demonstration at your local scrapbook store you just have to have the NEW tool that you saw. Let’s face it; many of the latest and greatest tools are not needed to fulfill the majority of your scrapbooking needs. A lot of times it’s not cost effective to purchase a tool that you are only going to use for a small percentage of your projects. A solution to this dilemma is sharing your tools. Get together with a friend or two that you normally scrapbook with and purchase the tool together. You could use the tool at your scrapbooking sessions and/or work out a usage schedule. This option would get you the NEW tool but not hurt your checking account as bad.