Buying the materials you need for scrapbooks is perfectly fine; one of the great things about scrapbooks is that they're so affordable.  However you can also easily make scrapbook album kits with a bit of imagination and some materials you may already have on hand.  After all, scrapbook album kits are really just pages bound together with some type of covering.  Many scrappers find that for covers they can use fabric, wrapping paper, poster board paper, and so on.  The material you use for covers should be twice as wide as the album itself so that it can wrap around the pages easily.

To make some of your own scrapbook album kits, you need to start with your pages and trim them so that they're all the same size.  Many find that 8x8 or even 5x7 is a good size to work with, but you can make your pages whatever size you want.  The material you use for a cover should be cut to fit as well.  Before you bind the pages, you may want to add your photos and embellishments so that you're binding finished pages; once they're bound they're a bit more difficult to finish.  With smaller scrapbook album kits, use smaller photographs and mementos.  They're perfect for things like concert tickets, leaves from an outdoor walk, or baby's first loose tooth.  Make sure your embellishments are in proportion as well; smaller scrapbook album kits get cluttered and crowded very easily, so use some discretion as to how many decorative elements you put on each page.

You can bind the kit by punching three holes in one side and tying them all together with ribbon, or you can put one hole in a corner and tie them that way or use a circular loop of some sort.  If you don't want to bind them this way, you can simply fold your pages over each other so that they're like a booklet with a crease in the spine.  Your scrapbook album kits are then ready to be enjoyed.

Making your own scrapbook album kits might take some practice at first but once you start you may find that this is your favorite way to put scrapbooks together!  You have the freedom to trim your pages down to a size that's workable for you and if you make them smaller you may find that they're easier to store or to display.