The Momoir Project

By Lizabeth Pirstl

Like many new moms, the allure of textured papers and delicate adornments tempted me. Friends showed me their elaborate and stunning scrapbook pages. For months I resisted – until the day a friend casually mentioned how much her five-year-old daughter loved looking at her baby scrapbook.

That’s when it hit: mommy guilt.

A week later, I crossed the line – from non-scrapbooker to scrapbooker – but I was determined to go on my own terms. My daughter’s book would be simple and inexpensive. A complimentary background here, a butterfly sticker there, maybe a caption or two.

With a plain scrapbook and some simple paper, I went to my first crop night – an evening for moms to get together to eat, drink, gossip and work on their scrapbooks. Overwhelmed by a sea of papers and tools, and intimidated by the foreign lingo, I panicked. I cropped until I had sliced each photo to within an inch of its life. Back home, I stashed my supplies away.

A few months later, Monique was nine months old and finally, got her first tooth. I asked a friend about her four-year-old daughter’s first teeth. She had no idea when they popped up. I couldn’t imagine forgetting these details, but I knew they would eventually become foggy. I decided to try crop that night again. At the end of the evening, I had mounted one picture and had a headache. That night, I decided to become a solo scrapbooker.

But when my daughter turned one, I still hadn’t gone beyond the first page.

To scrapbook or not to scrapbook – moms face this decision alone. Dads just don’t go there. They don’t lose sleep over which background papers and embellishments to use on the zoo trip page.

My daughter turned two, and I still hadn’t gone past the first page.

My husband suggested I just put the pictures in albums. A friend offered to buy my supplies. But I wasn’t ready to throw in the paper trimmer and admit defeat quite yet.

My daughter turned three, and I still hadn’t gone past the first page.

Today, Monique is five. Her sister, Claire, just turned one. A week before Christmas, Monique announced, “We should make a scrapbook with lots of pictures in it. When I’m at school and you miss me, you can look at my scrapbook. And when you go out, I can look at the pictures of you.”

“That’s a great idea,” my husband said, not suppressing the sarcasm. “I bet Mommy would love to help you make one.”

We gave her a scrapbook kit for Christmas. Before breakfast on Christmas morning, she had everything spread across the kitchen table. I tried to guide her, but she had her own design ideas.

Theme pages? Uh-uh. Chonological order? No thanks. Complimentary page spreads? Too dull. The first page has a photo of a local high school student she doesn’t know running in the Olympic torch relay. There are pictures drawn on post-it notes, Halloween stickers next to birthday party photos and a picture of her with a parrot at her old daycare is on the same page as a professional photo of her when she was three weeks old.

She diligently worked on her scrapbook over the Christmas holidays and had it filled by the time school started up in January. It has a prominent place in the family room, on a shelf low enough that she can reach it, but high enough that her baby sister can’t get to it.

And she was right. Once in awhile she takes it down and looks through it. And occasionally, when the girls are out and the house is quiet, I take a quick peek at the random family moments and my older daughter’s unique take on capturing our memories.

Writing Start: Scrapbooks