Join the Discussion Scrapbooking the Tragedy: Discuss it on the Forum Join Discussions

Related Resources • Story Starter Journaling Inspiration for Some of the Toughest Writing You Will Ever Do: Journaling the Horrific Events in America

From Other Guides • Documenting the History and the Tragedy

Elsewhere on the Web • Patriotic FREE Fonts

The question that I need to ask you on this anniversary of the horrific events of September 11, 2001, is "Have you included these historical events in your scrapbook?" Many of you told me many months ago that you wanted to wait to work on these pages until the pain and the shock were not quite so near the surface, when you could look at it from a perspective that was slightly more distant. Now is the time to begin work on this project if you have not been able to so far. Here are a couple suggestions to get you started.

1. Sit down now and journal your thoughts and feelings about 9-11. Write how your children responded, where you and your family members were when you heard the news, how the events affected your life either in huge ways that you will never forget or in small ways that you feel you need to remember.
2. Collect material that you will need to put these pages together when you are able to do them. This month, as people honor the anniversary, there will be ample opportunity to glean quotes, poems, photographs, and stories from the print media and the internet to save for your personal view of history when you compile it.

Even if you do not actually complete album pages, you will be grateful many years from now that you took the time to gather this information while it was readily available.

I also suggest that when you do work on the actual scrapbook pages that you plan to complete that you be selective of the photos you choose to include on the page itself. Think about where this page (or pages) will be kept. Will they be in your 2001 family album? Or, will they make up a separate "Year In Review" scrapbook? I determined for my family that many of the photos in newspapers and on web sites were simply too graphic to include in the album that our children look through on a regular basis. Rather than focusing the pages I created completely on the acts of terrorism that took place, I chose to look at how our nation responded. As I mentioned in the article I wrote that shows my 9-11 pages, I am also storing in a photo safe page protector the entire special issue of Time magazine that covered September 11th. However, I will be storing this behind the actual scrapbook pages, so that a reader may choose to take it out and look at it, but will not casually come across those difficult photos while flipping through the pages of my scrapbook.

Click here to find that article which also includes my own layouts, links to instructions on preserving newspaper clippings, and a link to the discussion on the About Scrapbooking Forum with many, many ideas from scrapbookers about how they were going to complete 9-11 pages.

September 11th Resources For Scrapbookers:

Articles

America Unites: Scrapbooking A Tragedy That United a Nation - My article as mentioned above.

Journaling the Horrific Events in America - Joannna Campbell Slan offers words of wisdom about how to tell this difficult story in your own words.

Documenting the History and Tragedy of September 11th - This article from About's Guide to Genealogy is all about the mammoth effort that is taking place to document these events. It includes links to many helpful resources.

How Has 9/11 Changed Our Lives: Scrapbooking the Moments that Truly Matter - This article that I wrote in the Spring of 2002 focuses on the tragedy changed the way that I personally scrapbook.

Fonts, Graphics, and Patterns

Never Forget Artwork Collection - Absolutely beautiful graphics free to download from a special pcHugClub site set-up to honor the heroes of 9-11.

pcCrafter Patriotic Graphics - Americana graphics are available here as a free download.

PC Create It! Show Your Patriotism - High resolution images of flags and other patriotic graphics available here as free downloads.

Patriotic Scrapbooking Collection - A collection of links to free patriotic paper piecing patterns, clip art, and fonts.

Historical Information and Quotes

Presidential Speech Transcripts - Direct quotes from our President make excellent additions to September 11th scrapbook pages. This collection of links to the speeches in chronological order is a great resource.

A Comprehensive Timeline of Events - Moment by moment history preserved that you may want to include in your scrapbook.

September 11th Archive - This site was commissioned by the Library of Congress and may be the most comprehensive collection of sites on the topic.

We Are One - The poem that I used on my layout is posted here at One Scrappy Site.

Photo Galleries and Images

The Nando Times September 11th Photo Gallery - Here you will find a photo collection of more than 350 images.

Seeing the Horror: Bill Biggart's Final Photographs - This collection of photos from Ground Zero is especially moving when you read that this photographer was killed when the second Tower fell.

World Trade Center Attack Archive - Here you will find an extensive collection of images and articles.

Rebecca