Scrapbooking has quickly become a popular hobby for countless reasons. It's such a rewarding and important activity to become involved with. Preserving your memories and recording important family events and milestones is not only enjoyable, but it's also beneficial for your children and for future generations. Here are some reasons to scrapbook:

Preserve your memories. First and foremost, the purpose of scrapbooking is of course to preserve your memories, and tell your family's story through photos and journaling. If you're like many people, you probably find it frustrating to ask your parents what you were like when you were a baby, how old you were when you took your first step, and what your first word was…and they can't remember! Scrapbooking provides a way for you to record those important moments and milestones in your child's life, while incorporating photos of the special moments to show their growth and development over the years.

Display your photos. How often do we take rolls and rolls of photographs only to have them shoved into drawers and boxes and never looked at? By scrapbooking your photos and putting them into albums, it's a treat for all of your family to look through them and remember different events and moments in their lives. Having the photos and the stories together in one book brings additional meaning and significance to each photo.

Enjoy a creative outlet. Scrapbooking more than putting photos into a photo album. It's also a wonderful opportunity to bring your personality as an artist into your scrapbook albums. Whether your passion is in photography, journaling, or cutting and pasting decorations for your page, you're able to bring a piece of yourself into every page. It doesn't matter what your creative talents are (or aren't), because the scrapbook represents something more than just a collection of pretty pages with photos on them. Not only is your album a precious record of special memories, but the album itself becomes a family treasure and an extension of you-something your children will treasure, because it was made by you.

It's a social activity. Scrapbooking has quickly become the "quilting bee" of the 21st century. Women often gather in churches, community classes, scrapbook stores and in homes to scrapbook together. It's an opportunity to socialize and for everyone to accomplish a common goal of preserving their families' memories. Some fantastic friendships have been formed through this common hobby!

With a new baby in your family (or on the way), now is a fantastic time to get started with scrapbooking, and beginning to record these once-in-a-lifetime moments so that you can remember them forever.