How to Avoid Acid in Scrapbooking

Acid is your scrapbook's worst enemy. The acid present in many paper and adhesive products is damaging to precious photographs and other mementos that commonly get placed in scrapbooks. While the negative effects of acid may not be readily visible for some time, future generations of your family will see the damage.

Difficulty: Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Acid-free paper
• Acid-free adhesives
• Acid-free scrapbooking pens
• PH-detecting pen
• Acid-free containers
• Plastic sheet protectors
• Archival safe album

Avoid Acid in Your Scrapbooking Endeavors

1. Purchase only acid-free products from crafts and scrapbooking stores for your scrapbooking needs. This includes paper, adhesives and pens. Acid-free products will be indicated as either "acid free" or "archival safe" on their packaging.

2. Make use of a pH-detecting pen. You can purchase these in crafts stores. These pens will tell you how acidic the paper you are using is. Acidic paper will have a pH of 1 to 6.

3. Pick up photographs by their edges. This will prevent acid in the oils on your fingers from getting on your photos and damaging them. You can also make it a practice to turn your scrapbook pages by their edges so as to avoid getting acid on them.

4. Store scrapbooking supplies only in acid-free containers. Avoid cardboard boxes and most envelopes unless they are specifically labeled as being acid-free. Opt for plastic and glass containers, and use plastic sheets to keep photographs and artwork from touching each other while in the containers.

5. Protect your scrapbook pages from acid by putting them in plastic sheet protectors. You can put each scrapbook page in its own individual plastic sheet protector. To increase the effectiveness of this method, only put one page in a sheet protector (instead of putting two pages in, back-to-back, as a lot of people like to do).

Tips & Warnings

• If you currently have photographs stored in albums that are not acid-free, it is not too late to stop the damage. Remove the photos now and put them in a new, acid-free, archival safe photograph album.
• If you use computer software in making your scrapbooks, you can use acid-free computer paper for printing or use regular acid-free scrapbooking paper. Most printers will accept scrapbooking paper.
• Protect your scrapbooks from excessive temperatures, sunlight and humidity as well as acids.
• Sometimes paper will be labeled as acid-free by the manufacturer but will test as acidic when you use a pH-detecting pen. If you want to be extra-safe, test before you use any paper.