Scrapbookers don’t buy into the old adage that a photograph alone is worth a thousand words. 

But with decorative papers, photo adhesive, stickers, brads and other embellishments, these cults of crafters arrange and bind their memories for safekeeping, making them priceless. 

DRC/Barron Ludlum

Kim Alambar of Krum recently opened Kim's Scrap and Crop, a scrapbooking supply store and meeting place for scrapbookers. The shop is at 1100 Dallas Drive, Suite 110, in Denton.

Scrapbooking not only ties generations together but also creates communities.

Krum resident and scrapbooker Kim Alambar took her business plan, all of her extra scrapbooking supplies and some faith and opened Kim’s Scrap and Crop, tapping into the niche market.

Open since January and located in Woodhill Square, Kim’s Scrap and Crop uses half its space for material display and sales and the other half for workspace. Four tables surrounded by 22 chairs create a cutting-and-gluing arena for individuals or groups.

Scrapbooking is now the biggest chunk of the craft and hobby industry in North America, according to the Craft and Hobby Association, with estimated annual sales of $2.44 billion in 2006, up 2.4 percent from 2005.

Alambar discovered the hobby, like many other scrapbookers, through Cre­a­tive Memories, a home-marketing business launched in the late ’80s. She began compiling her son’s baby memories.

“I did his first-year book,” she said. “But then he became mobile, and I had to quit because he was getting into my stuff.”

By the time her daughter came along four years later, Alambar said she felt guilty for not working on a book for her and began attending “girls night out” at different friends’ homes one weekend night a month with her sister-in-law Ninfa Brown and other women.

“I ended up with so much stuff that I needed to open a store,” Alambar said.

Alambar realized the need for not only a supply store in Denton, but also a workspace for scrapbookers.

With her husband’s support, Alambar, who was working as an auto claims adjuster for State Farm, began consulting with the Small Business Association last year to take steps to make her plan a reality. “When you’re at a crop, there are no strangers,” she said.

Fellow scrapbookers exchange ideas, sharing tips and comments on the latest papers, picture-cropping devices and the best glues.

“Just ask and someone will show you,” Alambar said. “That’s part of the scrapbooker’s mentality.”

Brown, who works for Property Solutions of Texas, also located in Wood­hill Square, conveniently drops in Kim’s Scrap and Crop on her lunch hour.
”It’s encouraging to come in here,” she said.

Brown said the benefit to scrapbooking in the store versus at home is that any supply she needs is right at her fingertips, and she buys only what she needs for current projects.

“I had stuff at home, but I didn’t always use it,” Brown said. “But being here, I use what I need and I don’t have any leftovers.”

Kim’s Scrap and Crop hosts crop nights Fridays and Saturdays from 8 p.m. to midnight and provides workshops from visiting teachers to present new ideas for page layouts, greeting cards, gift tags and gift holders.

Alambar said scrapbooking provides a forum for creativity despite one’s particular talents.

“I’m not that artistic, but with scrapbooking, there’s not a wrong way,” Alambar said. “You don’t need an art degree, you just cut and paste.”