Week 3 Project

Squeaked by on this one too.  Hmmm…  I am definitely not engaging quickly with my projects, which is probably WHY they have been sitting in the dust for so long.  I am tired before I start them.  This past week I finished my second week of teaching dance for a local Christian High School and started a new supplement schedule which has started a detox reaction.  To say that I have lost my get up and go is an understatement.  With that in mind, it is what it is.

My project this week was scrapbooking the pieces from our gratitude board and creating new ones for 2018.  This is an ongoing opportunity for Sir T and I to record things that we are grateful for so we can look back and be reminded of all the blessings we have received.

Title page journaling

The idea is that I have a theme for each month with a corresponding shape to go along with it.  I file all the shapes in envelopes marked with the month.  At the beginning of each month I scrapbook the previous month and put out the new shapes.  Last year I made shapes on my Cricut for January through June, thinking I would make more when we needed them.  That just didn’t happen as I didn’t prioritize it as lots of wonderful things happened in June; we had the girls and it was summer and we were playing lots of volleyball.  Indoor projects weren’t high on the list.  We used June’s kites for July, but then we petered out on recording gratitudes.

I had previously scrapbooked January so I just needed to do February through July.  We had a single September outlier.  I find that a month will generally fit on a one 12 x 12 inch page so I do a two month spread at a time.

Pieces of gratitude

I don’t have a lot of instructions for scrapbooking.  I do, however, have an observation of my behavior while scraping that I want to share with you.  I have some beautiful papers that I carefully file by color in four different 12 x 12” file boxes.  I also have a large amount of 8 x 11.5” papers in their own storage files. 

Two of my boxes – the pink/purple/blue box and the red/brown/tan box.  SO MANY CHOICES!

I have a tendency to “save” my “good” papers rather than “waste” them on whatever project I am doing.  This is ridiculous.  This is saying that my project that I am putting time and energy into isn’t worth the good supplies.  That if I use it up it, it will be wasted.  I think that there are two reasons for this thought process.

First:  I grew up in a household that always had enough food, we had a warm house, we got a new pair of shoes every year and usually had warm clothes that were second hand or made by my mom.  Winter is always cold when you wear skirts and your tights are wet from the snow.  I am so grateful for all of these blessings provided by the Heavenly Father and the hard work of my parents.    However, there was not often the opportunity for extras and I think that influenced my tendency to be a slight hoarder now and I would rather save an object just in case instead of using it.

My scrapbooking rarely only has paper involved

Second:  I think this one is the real underlying cause.  I don’t see myself as valuable enough to get to use the good paper.  Let’s just step back and look at that statement....   I wouldn’t say that to another artist.  I do cut off small kids from wasting product, but to determine that another artist wasn’t valuable enough to use the good stuff… no that is just wrong.  So now I have to stop doing that to myself.  There is my lesson for the week.  A very hard habit to break, but acknowledging I am loved is the beginning.

This is my favorite of the three…  the branches are cut from a separate piece of paper. 
I was thinking of my Japanese maple when I drew the branches.

April showers bring May flowers

Kites complete with strings

My scrapbook album only had the original 10 protector sheets in it so I needed to add more.  I have many packs of protector sheets that I pick up on clearance but I had a moment of worry when it came to adding the extenders.  I know that I have them, and it was in a really good spot… just where was that?  A slow scan of my room revealed a neatly labeled tin containing several packages.  Score!

Tools!  The small cylinder is the extender which allows for the addition of pages

Realizing the issues I had last year, I determined that I need to make ALL the shapes beforehand.  By having them all ready and available, it won’t matter if I’m late in putting the pages together.  Sir T made a request for a more simple shape as he said it was hard to read the writing on the multicolored kites.  So for this week’s project I am going to make all the shapes and plan out the pages.  I was hoping to have had that all done this past week as well, but it didn’t happen.  You know what?  It is ok.  I got part of it done and that is good.

Ok, I’m going to leave you with my newest acquisition in the plant world.  Gotta have some prettiness to look at!

Primrose…. 99 cents at Aldi!