by Shelleyrae Cusbert

Buzz words have become part of our everyday internet experience – Ebay, Google, Yahoo. Get ready for the next one – Blog, blogger, blogging.

The term ‘blog' is an abbreviation of ‘web log', a term that refers to personal journals created, stored and viewed online. The writers of these web logs call themselves ‘bloggers' and their diary style entries are taking the internet by storm. Everyone, it seems, is doing it. It makes sense that blogs would be popular with scrapbookers; they provide the ideal outlet for us to record our thoughts, our comments and feelings – documenting our lives and sharing our stories with others.

Blogging became mainstream in 2004 and recently Bloglines announced that 500 million blog and news feed articles were stored in the service's database. Blog entries are being created by individuals, companies, politicians, celebrities and even television characters.

For scrapbookers, keeping an online blog serves a multiple purpose.

The blog can serve as a personal diary of daily events. The tone of a blog is usually conversational, as if talking to a friend. Keeping the reader in mind can help define the writing style and provide purpose. Much like scribbling notes on a calendar, upcoming appointments, and things the children have said can all be preserved by logging onto the internet to write up the day's happenings and thoughts. The blog entry may be initiated by an event, discussion or observation. By recording the details and responses, an idea for a layout maybe generated for the blogger and quite possibly for the reader as well. Each entry is archived creating a permanent record to refer back to when looking for journaling for a layout.

The connection between a blog and creating layouts is evident with the popularity of memes. Memes are questions posed by a blogger that generate lists. An example would be - What are your top five favourite songs?” The meme itself is often passed between several blogs as others take the challenge and in many cases both the blogger and the reader become involved in creating a layout based on the meme. These can be a useful source of journaling prompts.

Blogs can be updated as frequently or seldom as desired, however a blog is an ideal tool for encouraging the habit of journaling regularly. Most scrapbookers admit to struggling with journaling and forgetting to record the details that could later be used to create a layout. Starting a blog leads to an expectation by the reader, especially if the viewers are family and friends, that there will be regular input and this expectation can in turn encourage more frequent contribution. The life of a scrap-at-home mum by New Zealander, Nic Howard http://nichoward.blogspot.com/ is a good example of this type of blog. A blog is an excellent means to keep distant relatives and friends in daily contact with your life through text and images.

Photographs and layouts can be included in a blog. This enables scrapbookers to create a more personal online gallery, where layouts are not lost within a group. Family members can have more immediate and less complicated access to your latest layouts with the ability to provide more personal background information about the layout that could not ordinarily be shared in public galleries. Images can be attached either by remote hosting or direct upload where image storage is provided by the host.

Scrapbookers also use their blog to share their latest work, tips and hints, sources of inspiration, opinions or ideas. The Scrapbooking Blog http://aboutweblogs.com/scrapbooking/ is one such blog that offers personal views, tips, news, reviews and other resources. The author includes scrapbooking timesaving techniques, information on sales and new release products, interviews with other scrappers and page calls. Scrapbook Sketches http://scrapbook-sketches.blogspot.com/ is a blog where the writer shares scrapbook and card sketches for scrapbookers.

Angie Pedersen, the author of ‘The Book of Me' and ‘Growing Up Me' uses her blog The Blog of Me http://angiepedersen.typepad.com/blogofme/ to share her book tour experiences and to support and encourage scrapbookers creating their own Book of Me projects, as well as sharing her own.

Many ‘celebrity' scrappers have started their own blogs. Ali Edwards http://aliedwards.typepad.com/_a_/ and Cathy Zielske http://www.cathyzielske.typepad.com/ are two well known US scrapbookers who have a loyal following of readers. They each include a smattering of personal detail, industry news, personal scrapbooking projects and ideas. Ali even posts regular scrapping challenges to her readers. Founder and owner of twopeasinabucket.com, Ali says her blog http://twopeas.blogs.com/ is - …meant to be an avenue for me to maintain a public presence and to show a small slice of life of Two Peas.”

Starting your own blog is a simple process and you do not generally require any html or computer programming knowledge. After choosing a host, many of which are free, such as http://www.blogger.com/start; http://myscrapblog.com/newmain.php or http://www.typepad.com/, it only generally requires signing up, choosing a template and you can start blogging almost immediately.

A blog can become a valuable journaling tool and an extension of everyday scrapbooking, since essentially it is simply a different form of recording memories. As many scrapbookers spend some portion of time online perusing online galleries and other resources, making entries into a blog is very convenient. A blog can provide a central reservoir of memories and thoughts that can be used to spark new ideas for layouts.