However, when I found Page Maps by Becky Fleck, all of that changed! Page Maps ($24.99) includes 60 sketches in 5 popular sizes (12″x12″ and 81/2″x11″single and double, plus 81/2″x11″ horizontal) and 140 samples of artwork by Becky and some other very talented designers. Plus — and this just might be my favorite part – the book also includes a deck of laminated cards with a thumbnail of all of the sketches in the book plus corresponding finished layouts. Perfect to grab on your way out to a crop!

I know there are a lot of sketch websites and blogs out there, and of course there is another Becky who is famous for sketches. But for me, here’s what sets Becky Fleck’s sketches – and the entire Page Maps book — aside from the rest:

A) This book includes tons of sketches using 4″x6″ pictures, and the sketches that don’t can be modified for those of us who prefer not to print a bunch of special-sized photos.

B) The sketches are so easy to follow and easy to adapt to whatever project you are working on, plus they are detailed. They don’t just show where the pictures go; they also show where patterned paper, decorative edges and embellishments might go.

C) Also, the layouts in this book are the kind that many scrapbookers today strive to create. I love the style of many (if not most) of these layouts, which makes it much easier for me to use these sketches. Every scrapbooker is different of course, but I really think this book has wide appeal.

Here’s an example for you of how Page Maps works for me — and could very well work for you too!

This is a sketch for a 2 page, 12″x12″ layout — found on page 107 of the book:

I had a couple of pictures from my aunt’s birthday party that I wanted to scrapbook, and I knew what paper and embellishments I wanted to use. But that’s where my plans ended! After flipping through the book, I settled on this sketch. (FYI – It’s easy to spend ages trying to pick between all the sketches. My advice? If you see one you like, use it! Your time is better spent creating!)

click image to see full size

Supplies: patterned paper (Little Yellow Bicycle); cardstock (Bazzill); chipboard letters (Fresh Paint); small flowers and butterflies (Jesse James & Company); paper flowers (Heidi Swapp); glitter flower and die cuts (Making Memories); acrylic stamp for journaling box (Fancy Pants); border punch (Martha Stewart Crafts)

As you can see, I did not follow every bit of the sketch exactly as laid out. I tend to scrapbook as much as possible with 4″x6″ photos, so I adapted the sketch to use 4 photos of that size instead of the 6 pictured here. I also moved the title and made a few other slight changes. The sketch was a jumping off point for me; it helped get me to the point where I could start creating my layout and then focus on the details. That’s the beauty of sketches; as Becky puts it in the book, you can follow every detail of a sketch or just draw inspiration from one specific element.

I find myself reaching for Page Maps whenever I need some inspiration, and I am sure you will do the same as soon as you add it to your collection. Heck, you might even decide to give some of your older (and dustier) idea books away because you just don’t need them anymore!

Page Maps is available from MyCraftivityShop.com for $24.99.

For more sketches and inspiration, be sure to head to Becky’s PageMaps Blog. And if you like challenges, you might want to consider taking part in the Page Maps challenge on Two Peas in a Bucket. (You can find it on the General Scrappin’ Message Board.) It’s a great motivator to both use this wonderful book and get some pages done!

Don’t forget to read our other Scrapbooking Reviews – and to bookmark Qwowi.com so you can keep coming back for more!

So you can understand why, when F+W Media was nice enough to send me a stack of scrapbooking idea books to review, the first one that caught my eye was The Busy Scrapper by Courtney Walsh ($19.99). The book’s tagline is “Making the Most of Your Scrapbooking Time.” Sound like exactly what we’re all looking for, right?

The fact of the matter is scrapbooking is only as time consuming as you want it to be; creating a layout does not have to take hours — or even days. That’s the premise of this book, which I wholeheartedly agree with, by the way.

Walsh, also the author of Scrapbooking Your Faith and a former contributing editor to Memory Makers magazine, does a nice job of breaking this book up into six chapters: “Getting Started,” “Making Art Fast,” “Preventing Madness” (always a good idea!), “Using What You’ve Got,” “Getting Tech Savvy” and “Finding Inspiration.” Within these chapters, she devotes a page to each timesaving technique and illustrates the technique with a layout created by her or several other talented designers. She also includes several boxes of “Timesaving Tools” and “Kick-Start Challenges,” which I look forward to trying.

While several of the tips in The Busy Scrapper may be familiar to many advanced scrapbookers, there is plenty to learn from here. My favorite chapter is “Preventing Madness.” Sometimes we get so into the project we are working on and the idea that we have to make it perfect, that we can’t get anything done — and things often go very wrong! This chapter offers some sanity-restoring tips that I will be sure to incorporate into my scrapbooking style.

In fact, I decided that the best way to thoroughly review this book was to follow some of this great advice myself.

On this layout, I used several tips from The Busy Scrapper: give transparencies a try (p.31), skip the journaling (p.61) and purchase product lines (p.46). I used a Hambly transparency that I’ve had for quite some time but was kind of nervous about actually using. Turns out, it’s pretty easy — and I think it adds a nice touch! I skipped the journaling – figuring the pictures, the title and the date kind of speak for themselves. And — with the exception of the transparency, a little strip of paper and two small embellishments, everything on this layout is from the Making Memories Paperie collection.

There are a lot of other great ideas in this book that I am itching to try. I found The Busy Scrapper interesting, informative and– most of all — inspiring. It made me get up from the sofa, ignore the dishes piling up in the kitchen and all the work I had to do and go scrapbook. That’s really the most important test for any scrapbooking idea book.

The Busy Scrapper is available from MyCraftivityShop.com for $19.99.