Done and Done-r

Raise your hand if you like to scrapbook.

Raise your hand if you like the idea of scrapbooking, but you don’t like the process/don’t have time/are overwhelmed by it/don’t think you’re creative enough.

Raise your hand if you have boxes of photos from the days before digital cameras.

Yeah, me too.

I actually love scrapbooking.  For the past few years, I’ve done it all digitally, in Photoshop Elements.  I much prefer it to paper scrapping, mostly because it’s neater (no piles of stuff on my dining room table) and considerably cheaper (buy supplies once; use them infinite number of times).  Not to mention, once I learned Photoshop, it became a lot faster than cutting paper, and I could make nicer-looking layouts with less effort.

Credits at the bottom of this post

Obviously, I’m happy with the switch to digital scrapbooking.  And for years, I’ve been saying, “Someday I’ll scan all those old, unscrapbooked photos in and do them, too.”

Yeah, right.

Those photos have been sitting in boxes and cheap albums for ages, as more and more memories of the events they captured have faded.

You see, that’s why I love the idea of scrapbooking, rather than just putting photos in albums.  Scrapbooking tells the whole story, beyond the visual.  It doesn’t require someone who was there, sitting next to you, saying, “Oh, and that was the time baby Joey met Aunt Martha for the first time.  He kept tugging off her earrings.  It cracked her up.”  In a scrapbook, the reason for Aunt Martha’s laughter is recorded…journaled.  The stories are kept in more than one or two people’s memories.

Which is great…if you do it.  And I haven’t been.

Somehow, a month or two ago, I ran across Becky Higgins‘ website.  I remember her from her days as an editor of Creating Keepsakes, my favorite scrapbooking magazine back in the day.  She has a new-to-me product called Project Life.  The idea behind it is to scrap-as-you-go, printing seven pictures off every week, slipping them into the album, journaling right then, and moving on.  Great idea…except that I like digital scrapbooking with my digital photos, and this would be redundant.

But.

But…these scrapbook pages, with their coordinating, sized-to-fit pieces of cardstock could be really useful for other things, couldn’t they?  Oh. Yeah.

I had to wait until they restocked (there’s been a run on the products this year), but I finally ordered some while we were on vacation in Florida, and they came last week.  Perfect project while you’re sick.

Spit, spot, I’m done.

Since I started on Friday, I have scrapbooked two entire years’ worth of photos.

Yes, those are the photos of Nicky in the NICU.  March – May of 2000.  Twelve years they’ve been sitting there, not being looked at.  Being dug out when we needed a baby photo for a school project.

(Wasn’t he a wee little thing!)

And here he is in late summer, 2001.  Just beginning to toddle.  He walked very late.

Oh, back to 2000.  His first Halloween.  See?  Journaling the story, easy-peasy.  I seriously did both albums in three days.  (Granted, I wasn’t doing much else.  I claimed the dining room table and took breaks for meals, sleep, and various Oscar moments.)

And, no, they’re not as creative or fancy as my other scrapbooks, but I am SO okay with that, because they are DONE.  These two books now live in the living room.  The kids are having a blast looking through them.  (A note: I didn’t order Becky’s albums.  I used 12×12″ post-bound albums.  One I had on hand, and I bought the other at JoAnn with a coupon.  The sheets fit perfectly in them.)

I’ve used up most of the page protectors from my order, and it looks like I’ll have to wait until April or May to get to my 2002 – 2003 albums.  (This is some popular stuff!)  That’s okay…it’s certainly a heck of a lot faster than it would have been done otherwise!

If you have a pile (or twenty) of photographs, and fading memories to go with them, I highly recommend Project Life as a way to corral them.  Heck, I quite like the idea of scrapping-as-you-go, too.

Disclosure: Becky Higgins & Project Life have no idea who on Earth I am and have neither asked nor paid for this endorsement.  I just though this was too cool not to pass along!

Credits for ’1st Day of Preschool’
Template (modified) by Jenn McCabe (Template Tuesday #28 at JessicaSprague.com)
Dark blue paper by Angie Campbell (Twilight Sky)
Light blue paper by Michelle Coleman (Color Happy)
Orange paper by Kari Q Designs (Today and Everyday)
Paisley paper by Amy Tanabe (Navy Fall)
Cutout vellum circle & word art by Brandy Buffington (Afternoon Delight)
Glitter swirls by Bohemian Art (Fresh and Fun)
Paint circles & swirls by Karah Fredricks (Splatterific 9)
Alpha (“1”) by Doohikey Designs (Summer Confessions)
Fonts: Another Typewriter, Café Rojo, DJB For Annie (by Darcy Baldwin), Bosshole