For all the stories that make Katie Holmes seem like a privileged ultra-rich shopaholic with a taste for designer high-end goods, there’s one that makes her sound like a normal mom with a crafting addiction. Holmes is said to love scrapbooking and to have devoted an entire room in her house to her hobby. As a woman of extremely above-average means, she also spends about $3,000 a month on the raw materials that help her preserve her family’s memories in style. She has also made gifts for her celebrity friends including the Beckhams, Will and Jada Pinkett Smith, her co-stars in “All My Sons,” and even her husband’s ex wife, Nicole Kidman.

Katie Holmes has become a scrapbooking addict – and she’s dedicated an entire room in her $35 million Beverly Hills mansion to her new hobby, sources say.

“Katie’s always been artistic, making homemade cards for friends, and sketching designs for clothes,” a close friend confided to The Enquirer.

“Her mom turned her on to scrapbooking, and now she spends more than $3,000 a month on scrapbook materials! Her scrapbooking room is incredibly elaborate with ribbons, labels, decals and paper meticiously organized on beams that run from one wall to another…

She put together a gift scrapbook for close pals Victoria and David Beckham to commemorate their first year in the US, said the source.

Since then she’s made books for her husband Tom Cruise’s mother and sister, their close friends Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith, and she’s already working on books for her co-stars in the upcoming Broadway play “All My Sons”…

Katie spends hours scrapbooking with her 2 year-old daughter Suri – and helped her stepdaughter Isabella, 15, make a scrapbook for her mom, Nicole Kidman… and [her] new daughter, said the source.

“Bella wanted baby Sunday to have a keepsake with pictures and mementos from her life and her brother Connor’s life,” said the source.

[From The National Enquirer, print edition, October 6, 2008]

You could see Katie doing this. On the Oprah special Tom said she was into baked goods and stocking the house with cupcakes despite the fact that she probably never even bites into one.

3k a month sounds like a lot of cash for scrapbooking, but some of the little paper stickers can run $5 and up and it really adds up if you want to make elaborate books. If this is true it’s very thoughtful of her to make handcrafts for people and it sounds like a great way to get little Suri into art at a young age.

If you’re interested in scrapbooking, there are some beautiful user-submitted galleries of scrapbooks along with the supplies used to create them, at scrapbook.com. People have also put up photos of the rooms they use to scrapbook. It looks like a very creative outlet. For once I’m not hating on Katie Holmes – what’s wrong with me?

Katie Holmes and Suri are shown outside her show in NY last night. Credit: AAR/ Fame Pictures