Creativity for Kids It's My Life Scrapbook Kit

...produced by a company called Creativity for Kids' and at the moment it is selling on Amzon for £10.99. This is fairly reasonable value, but when I bought it in Hobbycraft it was on a half price offer!

Overall, this is a lovely kit to give to a child and to start their interest in a wonderful hobby!  ... more

I have been interested in scrapbooking for quite a while now and enjoy sorting out all my photos, mounting them on different bckgrounds and adding various captions and embellishments. Ever since we gave our four year old her Fisher Price digital camera for her birthday, I have been hoping that I can encourage her to get interested in the same thing. Therefore, I was delighted when, in Hobbycaraft just before Christmas, I spotted the 'It's My Life' scrapbook kit.

This is a starter scrapbook kit which contains everything you would need to get started. On the box it says that it is from age 7 to 97, and although my daughter is a bit younger than this, I felt it was something which we could do together (and as it turns out she loves it). Also, although it is aimed at children, you can see from the age range given that it would be entirely suitable for an adult who wanted to start up this absorbing hobby.

The box itself is very colourful and exciting, and the moment my daughter saw it she couldn't wait to see what was inside. Also on the box there are some examples of how some people have organised their scrapbook pages and these are quite useful if you are lacking inspiration.

When you open the box you discover that the kit contains quite a lot of exciting things. There is a hard cover spiral bound album, with twelve pages measuring 21.5 cm square. The cover is pink which is so suitable for my pink loving daughter - but I'm not sure whether there is the option to choose other colours as pink probably isn't quite so good for boys! There are ten different patterned background sheets. These come in all different colours and have a variety of patterns. Also some are shiny and sparkly which my daughter loves. They also feel very good quality so they are not likely to rip accidentally!

There is a sheet with fifty very colourful stickers. There are butterflies, flowers, hearts and snowflakes as well as little captions such as 'Girly Girl', 'Pretty Awesome' and 'Happy Birthday'. My daughter loves looking at these and deciding which ones to add to her pages.

Also, there is a photo cropping stencil. This means that instead of always having squarish type photos you can mke them variety of shapes. The stencil includes a large heart, a flower nd a speech caption all of which you can use to shape your photos or backgrounds!

Other equipment includes a glue stick, a journal pen, 2 tiny treasure envelopes and some scallop edged scissors. Out of everything, the only thing I am slightly disappointed with are the scissors as they really do not seem to cut very well.

As well as all these there is an instructions and ideas sheet. I am loathe to call them instructions as this implies that there is a correct way to use this kit which there is not. The joy is allowing your child to experiment and to come up with their own ideas about how they want to display their photos. I love watching my daughter try things out in her own way, and however she organises her pages it is always delightful. However, I do enjoy helping her as well, and she is happy for me to guide her and make suggestions. It really is a lovely activity to work on with your child, especially if you are interested in this type of thing yourself!

The greatest thing about this kit though, is that once they have finished they will hve their own little album which they can keep or treasure, or maybe give it as a present to the grandparents. As all the contents are acid free, everything should last a long time and this apparently protects the photos too.

The kit is produced by a company called Creativity for Kids' and at the moment it is selling on Amzon for £10.99. This is fairly reasonable value, but when I bought it in Hobbycraft it was on a half price offer!

Overall, this is a lovely kit to give to a child and to start their interest in a wonderful hobby! 

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