Some people have told me I am an organized person. I am not sure how true that is. I don't, in general, feel organized.My husband would agree that I can live quite happily in a state of organized chaos. After a while, the chaos becomes a bit too much. So this year, one of my endeavors was to have a more organized scrap room. I also wanted to use more of my own supplies. I keep seeing those cute things to make on pinterest, but have only ventured to make a few of them. I have the ideas, but they don't always see fruition. In an effort to make more of this become a reality, and hopefully to make things a little less overwhelming, I got myself the memory log book system from Log Your memories.I heard about it on an episode of Paper Clipping Roundtable. I figured it would be a great way to sort of make an all in one book.
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| 3 ring binder covered with kraft paper TH tissue tape Pink alphas- Basic grey Little yellow Bicycle Tiny type alphas Anna Griffin background stamp |
Inside are calendars, prompts for both pages to make and record keeping, day planning pages and space for my ideas. I decided it would be an all in one book for me. I usually like to write down challenges and prompts I am interested in for each month. I tend to lose that tiny notebook or miss due dates. So here, in the calendar pages, I can write down challenges and submission deadlines that I want to participate in. I have a list started of page topics I want to gather photos for. I can write down blurbs of things my son and husband say. I have begun doodling embellishment and page ideas. I have plans for my scrap space organization. So, in short, I am just a tad bit more organized.
While the rest of the house is in a relatively organized state of existence, my scrap space is not. I know it's going to sound shocking, but, I think I have too much stuff. I came to this realization during our past move. We move a lot. Not that I like that, but, it's reality. We rent because we live abroad. One never knows when the landlord will decide to raise the rent way too high or sell the place you currently reside in. So during each move, we've decided to have less in the way of material things. We are down to owning our clothes, our homeschool materials, holiday decorations,my son's toys, my husband's hobby supplies( video game related) and my scrapbook stash. We have a few other things like bed linens and pots/pans. For the most part though, living in a tourist destination means being able to find fully furnished rental units.
I know my American friends find it odd that we don't have our own furnishings. I have been lucky enough to rent places that, for the most part, I like or can tolerate the furniture. What I like most, is how we, as a family, have really discovered the things that mean the most to us. Having less stuff also means less to clean up and keep stored. This I really like since I find housework to be a necessary evil. What I find difficult about our way of living is decorating my scrap space. I can not nail things to wall. I have to choose things that are easy to move and that store my stuff in such a way that I can move it, if need be. This past year has been a definite work in progress.
Our last move brought us to a place which enabled me to have my own space. I am officially out of the dining room. This made us all happier. It made me ecstatically happy that my husband acknowledged that I need the space and that he know how important my hobby is to me. I am happy that my space is out of the line of sight when guests come to the house. My space is not the largest and it is a work in progress.
Over the past year, I have taken a long hard look at how I use my supplies and what I use/how I use the supplies I do have. Take, for example, my card stock. If you had asked me about buying cardstock when I first started scrapping, I would have told you you were crazy if you did not buy the bulk rainbow multi-pack. Now, I realize I really only use certain colours as my base for pages. So I now concentrate my purchases on buying those colours in bulk. I have also really gotten choosy over the stamps and tools I want to get. I don't have a lot of space, so I need to choose things that get a lot of mileage. Background and border stamps are a good investment. The cute kitten stamp my son tries to get me to buy every time I am in a craft store, not so much of an investment. Which leads me to the following realization...I have too much paper. Gasp! I know...none of us paper scrapbookers ever want to say such a thing. Patterned paper is such an addiction. Nonetheless, I have a lot of it. The better I become at my hobby, the less I tend to need of it on a page. I have become quite good at making a single 12x12 print of paper stretch over several pages.
So what does this mean? I think it means that 2012 should be the year without buying paper. I need to try to use up a large part of what I have. Maybe then, I can stretch my small scrap budget into buying more tools so I can try more techniques. I can maybe then get a little bit more versatile scrappy storage. We shall see. I am not sure I can resist the lure of the manufacturer mystery box sale. Either way though...I have plans and I endeavor to try.
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