Creative Memories offers packaged sets of products called Additions Packs.
Above is an example of an additons pack - the SOCCER additons pack
An additions pack consists of 4 pieces of 12X12 double sided paper. One side is a big design. The other side is a coordinating patterned paper. The four papers are made up of two each of identical two-sided papers.
There are also 8 photo mats. A photo mat is 4.25”X6.25” in size. It is also double sided. One side is usually a pattern, the other a solid. The eight photo mats are made up of 4 sets of 2 identical pieces. A photo mat can be used as a paper backing frame for a 4X6 photo. It can also be cut up and used other ways.
Next, there are stickers. Often, the stickers are the weight of a light piece of card stock so they are easy to peel off and control when you stick them. The number and size of stickers vary. Finally, there are titles, sayings, quotes and headings. These are also stickers.
An additions pack either coordinates with a power palette (aka power palette [PP] additions pack) or it is a stand-alone additions pack such as a season, a sport, a holiday, etc…
All of the parts of the Additions Pack COORDINATE with one another – I tend to prefer things that coordinate rather than match… and yes, I do see a difference between those two things.
There is usually a color theme which includes 4 – 6 colors. Within those colors there are patterns and solids. Typically you can mix and match the products within a pack pretty easily to create very cohesive designs. If the additions pack is a PP additions pack, it will fall into the same color scheme used with that PP – again, same color scheme means it will coordinate, not MATCH…
Additions packs can be traditional or digital. Digital additions packs have all of the same elements of a traditional pack, but the digital items do not run out. For instance, you can cut hundreds of squares from the same digital paper without ever running out.
Also unique to a digital additions pack is that you can alter it. By using it with SB+ software, you can change the colors of the existing pack to create many, many additions themes of your own.
In a traditional additions pack you usually have one of each sticker. Digitally, you can use a sticker over and over again and multiple times on the same page or element.
See my post about Reflections Spring and Summer Additions for a sample of very simple Old School traditional uses for the pack.
An additions pack can be used to create “old school” designs or “new school” designs. With “old school” traditional scrapbooking, you often cut apart the bits of your pack to create borders and journaling boxes and other little bits and bobs. In the newer methods of scrapbooking, paper is more often used whole – as a background paper and photo mats are used whole to back photos. You use more supplies on fewer pages when you use an additions pack in a “new school” way. New school scrapbooking can be simpler in some ways because you aren’t spending a lot of time cutting apart and re-creating.
The designs can be simpler like this one below (from the cm project center)
or can use big elements but me more involved. There is a lot of product used on the one page below.
With digital additions, the new school method is similar to its traditional counterpart where an entire paper is made into a background and whole items are added to it. With old school scrapbooking, a lot more of the “white page” shows and it usually contains more photos and often journaling done right on the page itself. In the new school method, one or maybe two photos are featured on the page and the supplies themselves capture a lot of attention. There is typically less journaling and it’s usually done on a journaling box or the page contains only a title.
The page above is a digital page - from the cm project center.
Some scrapbookers are very tied to one method of scrapbooking or another - I tend to do a bit of both. The ease of putting a very pretty paper on the page as a background, adding a photo-matted picture and a journaling box with a few sentences can be quite appealing and satisfying in its simplicity. However, I do love cutting apart, taping up, playing with tools, etc… so I like the old school method as well. I think there is room for both methods in your life AND your albums. But whatever makes you a happy scrapbooker with loads of completed albums is definitely the right way!
Additions packs cost about $9 (US) – so they aren’t too pricey. If you can’t afford an entire power palette, you can buy just a few PP elements and add an additions pack as you see fit.
If you’re a Creative Memories consultant – you probably understand all this about additions packs, but your customers may not. Give them a little lesson on what’s included in an additions pack. Show them different methods for how to use them – old school and new school. They’ll appreciate you for doing so!
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