Two Decades in the Making

Sometimes there are no easy answers, or no fast answers. At least not with me. ;-) Lisa Echerd invited me to participate in The Scrapbooker's Blog Tour and I was thrilled to be asked to join the blog hopping. Thanks for stopping by today if you are new to my corner of the world. 

This past week I marked my twentieth year of scrapbooking as an adult. Two decades of paper and photos. {#bliss} Yes, I was one of the hundreds of thousands of scrapbookers who attended a Creative Memories class in the '90's. I fell in love hard and fast and decided the September Saturday of the class that I was a scrapbooker in the making - and the only way as a new stay at home mom that I could really afford it was to sell it. I sent in my contract the following day, and became active the first week of October 1994. While I waited for my consultant kit, I sat at the kitchen table and carved Christmas photos into circles and ovals, and taped them into the Holly Berry album that I splurged on at the class.

Fast forward twenty years. So, so, so many changes. Creative Memories is gone. Thank goodness I moved to Dallas in 2005 and discovered the world of supplies outside of the CM corridor. Thank goodness my love of scrapbooking surpasses the bounds of one company. Thank goodness my passion for photography is timeless. Thank goodness my desire to lay out a story is innate and, thus far, unquenchable.

Of course, not only have I changed, and CM folded, but the very tow-headed little blonde boys that supplied me with unending photos, warm hugs, and sweet anecdotes have also grown up and moved on to college, leaving empty rooms and uncluttered kitchen countertops in their wake. Thank goodness I have my memories and my stories to tell. And then, when and if I am ever out of fresh photos, I can retell those fifteen years that are trapped in book cloth coversets, ensconced in Mrs. Grossman sticker patterns.

Yes, this blog post is literally twenty years in the making. And I have the photos to prove it. ;-) That is a little glimpse of my evolution. But, to the point at hand...the blog hop!

Right now, I am working on learning to scrap as an empty nester. I am working on living out of my heart to tell stories across time and space. I am working on remembering. And telling. The layout on my desk is in primitive stages. It is a Christmas layout. Having pulled out my Christmas supplies for one layout, I decided to stay in that genre and make the most of the mess I have everywhere. I always struggle with Christmas layouts. How much is too much? How can you put down on paper the joy and sentiment of a holiday that is really 25 days long?

That is also sort of the conundrum of the layout. When do you know it's time to stop?  I can spend 30 minutes or 30 hours on a layout. I love to hand stitch. I love to use border punches. I love to work in the journaling. I could write much more than I usually do on the page. I think that is how I birthed the idea for my blog - to tell more of the story behind the photos....

I think of myself as a slow scrapper by definition, and I think of myself as a methodical scrapper in my mind. I work to achieve balance and symmetry, to move the eye across the page, to convey the story through photos and paper and words. My signature style, if you will, is a double page layout. 99% of the time I am working on two pages. That goes back to my yearbook staff training, where we were always to work through and across the gutter, to bring about cohesion even if the topics on the accompanying pages were unrelated. I could not tell you how long it takes me to make any specific page. I will tell you that I go until I am mentally done with it and I feel a sense of deep satisfaction with it. 

Since discovering Basic Grey in 2005, I have to admit that my deep love is patterned paper. I like to hold it, to buy it, to smell it, to cut it, to see it, to keep it. I love colors that play together and I love finding just the perfect paper to use on a layout. It can take me a long while to find the right paper for a layout. I start with my photos and usually gather the sampling of them that I think can fit on a layout together to weave the plot of what I want my words and story to convey.

Somewhere in between picking the photos and taping them down, I pull the paper and I also pick my sketch. I found sketches in 2005, too. Of course, CM had layout pages, but I loved going beyond the "creative copy this page" book to discover the sketch and work with the bones of a layout that could be interchangeable. Creating Keepsakes had two sketch books that I used over and over, and then I found Becky Fleck's Page Maps...and then in 2010, I hit the motherlode of sketches. Through Two Peas in a Bucket, also now gone, I found out about Scrapbook Generations' sketch books. I placed an order totaling $42 on January 23, 2010, and went on my merry way of actually finding a sketch tool that worked like I actually wanted to work. I believe I have every one of their sketch books, and now that they do downloads also, I have many electronic sketches on my iPad and printed out and added into my binder. {Which has grown from 1 binder now to 4.}

There are very few pages that I have made since that point where I have NOT used an SG sketch. I love the clean lines, the symmetry, the focus on using double page layouts, and, for the most part, featuring 4 x 6 photos. I love starting with a sketch (shown in the 3-ring binder on the layout below) and watching the page morph and develop into a layout that marries photos with story, creating a layout that I love.

Aside from pretty paper, fun photos and smart sketches, I love to use my Silhouette Cameo on layouts. I love to design layout elements and cut them out and know that what I am doing is unique in all the world. I love fonts. I love seeing it all come together. I have been up and down in my scrappy journey over the twenty years, but I will tell you that when I am not feeling the layout love, I can usually be lured back into the creative process by spending some time with my jpegs, finding something in the pixels that compels me to pull out the paper and begin again. 

I don't think I'll ever stop creating layouts. I hope not. I love the sheer creative fun in the process of it, and I love seeing an album fill up, and I love going back through my layouts, each almost like a child, and remembering what they say to me about when I made that layout, in addition to the story the photos set forth. This layout that I made in 2013 catalogs that I have scrapped every year for every National Scrapbook Day that has ever been held, going back to CM's inaugural NSD crop in May 1995. {How well I remember that first NSD, as I was 6 months pregnant with my youngest son.} 

I think the sticker I put on the layout sums up perfectly my affair with my paper and my photos that has been two decades in the making. "Do what you love and do it often." Scrap every chance you can. As I approach 50, I bear to heart the sentiment "You only live once." Of course, maybe as a scrapper, though, we can leave behind a little bit of ourselves, and our very own chapter of the scrapbook evolution.

Sketch Credit: Scrapbook Generation

Paper: Lily Bee

Font: Pharmacy

I have three scrappy friends to share with you today. As Lisa tagged me, I am tagging them! Next Monday, they will have their blog post up for their turn on The Scrapbooker's Blog Tour. I would love for you to check them out!

Laurie Danielle is something I'll never be - the mother to a little darling girl! I've never scrapped "girl pages" and I just love her bright use of colors and the fun layouts she does of her little one! I am always inspired by her artistic bend. Check out her work on her blog, http://lauriedanielle.com. I think you'll love it!

Stephanie Feltus is a sweetie that I have had the pleasure of scrapping with more than once. I am always envious of her having started scrapbooking so young, before being married. She will have her whole life scrapped! Her blog address is  http://craftyholidaygirl.blogspot.com and I would love for you to check our her work!

TinaGale Husong is another friend that I have had the pleasure of scrapping with. Not in my home state, and not in hers, but up in St. Louis! Tina is a Mickey fanatic, too, and so not only can we dish die cuts, but we can dish Disney. Her blog is  http://tiggersscrapplace.blogspot.com and it is another great blog to check out! 

Thanks for stopping by on my turn at the Scrapbooker's Blog Tour! I'll be back next Monday with another story and layout, and a reminder to check out Laurie, Stephanie, and Tina Gale.

These Smiling Faces

I am a hopeless patriot. I'll never apologize for it. I can cry every time I watch Mel Gibson and Heath Ledger battle in The Patriot. I get goosebumps on the high note of America, The Beautiful. I loved singing, "This land is my land, this land is your land....this land was made for you and me," along with Mrs. Collins and her ukelele in elementary school. When I watch Les Miserables, I can lay the solemnity of that redemptive revolution over the grid of American history, and weep on both behalf's. 

I love America the Beautiful. Old Glory waves from my porch column more days out of the year than not. I can see her flapping in the north Texas breeze from the chair in which I sit and type. I have a tiny bound copy of the Declaration of Independence - in love with it's little book form as much as the words it proffers. I sing along with the national anthem any chance I can, and probably often when I'm not supposed to. I can watch the National Treasure movies over and over, enthralled by the history thrust into the plot.

It was chance that landed us with an anniversary on the birthday of our country. A chain of events involving more than ourselves led us to that day. And I'll tell you - it does not offer much in the way of romantic interludes and recollections of courtship. We have been teased relentlessly about giving UP our independence ON independence day. No matter. We did what we could, and picked the date in the summer of 1987 that worked for so many of our family, and we married on an incredibly hot, humid, summer Saturday afternoon in July. And it happened to be the fourth.

The upsides: we are off together every year on our anniversary, and if we are lucky, there are fireworks. We usually conspire some getaway, or even an extended vacation, during our anniversary. It is special in that we are always together as a family, and we are usually doing something fun together, and we also get to embrace the celebration of the land that I love.

When we contemplated celebrating our 25th, cruising with the boys, and our lifelong friend, Mark, that introduced Steve and I way back in January 1984,  aboard the Disney Magic seemed so appropriate. After all, anyone knows that hitting the 25 year mark of a marriage comes with plenty of fireworks, requires a fair bit of magic, needs the ability to stay afloat in any kind of weather, and has the goal of sailing in smooth waters. ;-) 

Steve and I have been extremely blessed. I always say that every marriage that stays together is one that consciously decides to stay together. Exit doors will pop up all along the way. We have seen those doors. We have pushed past them. We have reached the phase in our life together where we are deep friends and gentle companions. We miss each other when not together - not in the earnest sorrow of an eighteen year old, but in the sincere affection of wanting to share a moment, a memory, a word, a thought, with your most prolific friend, with one whom has seen all of your life events spanning, as of this writing, three decades.

I loved celebrating our 25th anniversary on July 4 in the waters off Alaska. I loved seeing the boys get excited over the dinner that night in Animators' Palate. I loved that Mark was with us to experience his first Disney cruise. I loved that all five of us embraced adventure and were equally mesmerized by the wildly extravagant beauty of Alaska. I loved that we ran into Americana Mickey. I loved that those silly shipboard photographers captured some of all of it for me. 

I can sit here and remember each moment in these photographs below - and I can remember a lifetime of moments spent together across our country. We have pieced together a story that is as rich as the colors in our flag. We have been blessed with a bountiful tale - a tale I love - our life, our liberty, and the pursuit of our happiness. You have only to look at the faces below. You can see it plain as day. I love all these smiles, and the stories that go with them.

It's always my joy to hear Happy Anniversary...and say Happy Birthday America. "This land is my land, this land is your land...this land was made for you and me." Chasing life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness freely in the land that I love is a rich gift, one for which I am forever grateful. Just as much as I am grateful for the life I have with these smiling faces.

Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness - Disney AK Cruise, Fourth of July - July 2012

Sketch Credit: Scrapbook Generation http://scrapbookgeneration.com/index.php?route=product/category&path=213 This is actually a Generations Kit by Debbie Sanders. She is an amazing talent and I only add a few trinkets here and there to complement her incredible layout.

Paper: We R Memory Keepers

My Very Own MVP

I grew up in a conservative household where my sisters and I were not allowed to play sports. You know - the whole shorts thing. Yes, I am old. Yes, I was raised in the south. Yes, it's called The Bible Belt. {And I have another story that could be titled that, but it's for another day.} My sisters and I rocked along in a world full of music and fashion and TV shows, because, frankly, sports were off limits. I like to conveniently use that to this day to explain my loathing of all things exercise and fitness related. ;-)

But, when I 3 years and 5 days old, the Lord finally answered my father's fervent prayers and delivered a boy to our family. And the world shook and long-held mandates for us 3 girls slowly and silently shifted to make way for the boy. Now, the boy had all kinds of different rules. I think of all the distinctions, the one that got my goat the most was the fact that he was excused from KP. Why bring him into the loop, after all, when there were three of us girls and the rotation from washer to rinser to dryer was completed by our triune sisterhood? 

Dishes aside, there was one more thing that really set me off. The boy could play sports. Because he could wear shorts. I remember one heated discussion with the prevailing parental unit and then I gave up. Buried my beloved dreams of volleyball and relegated myself to the band unit, long polyester pants and all. Now, mind you, before I worked myself up to the discussion, I had watched the boy play several seasons of football and basketball with the Y.M.C.A. Should I have known by the M that I didn't stand a chance?

Thankfully, junior high and high school offered me many different outlets and I busied myself with part-time jobs, school newspaper and yearbook, and getting all A's in my accounting classes. Lord, I loved completing those ledger green worksheets. And band. Yes, five years of band. Meanwhile, the boy played sports all through elementary, junior high and most of high school. I was okay with missing his games for my activities and might have been known to pick up a shift or two at Ronnie's Supermarket if it helped my silent gender-biased athletic boycott. I graduated and went on to college and promptly purchased store-bought shorts and never looked back at the volleyball court. 

With our own children, we offered them the opportunity to try everything. I mean anything and everything they had an interest in. Art lessons. Gymnastics. Boy Scouts. Soccer. T-ball. Baseball. Awanas. Choir. Football. Guitar lessons. Drum lessons. Lacrosse. More art. And, like the Renaissance men that they are, they tried all of it, and pursued none of it for very long. I learned to live in the season they were in. I learned to not push my desires into their hearts. I learned to encourage. I learned to guide their interests, but not direct their interests. And I learned to take pictures when I could, because there was no guarantee for the next semester, the next season, the next set.

I will confess, though, the utter elation - and yes, shock! - in my heart when, in the very same year, both boys tried out for football. My boys are 16 months apart, so they were only ever one grade away in school. And football happened their 7th/8th grade year. For one glorious short season, I had the joy of going to two football games a week and cheering for my sons. They both did fantastic, considering that they had never truly played before that season. We were never one of those families that got up a flag football game at Thanksgiving, even though I secretly always yearned to be.

My youngest son is truly an athlete. He is quick to grasp a new sport and has always quickly and easily done well in any sport. My oldest does well in sports, too, but his learning and adaptability curve is slightly longer. He makes up for it, though, with his heart and drive. I enjoyed watching them both learn football in their shared inaugural year, seeing how their skill sets and their personalities crafted them to become different players. And, I was not surprised when my youngest signed up to play football again in 8th grade. Imagine my giddiness over back-to-back seasons of being a football mom!

He enjoyed being part of a team. He was quick to listen to the coaches. He caught on to the plays. He was a determined little guy, set on tackling his opponent and getting his assigned point man on the other team. He truly had an authentic, all out hustle. I loved sitting in the stands. I could always easily spot both of my boys - this may sound silly - by their legs and shoes. There was just a look to this mom about their legs and shoes that made me easily recognize them on the field when helmets blurred and jersey numbers weren't visible.

I had two glorious years as a football mom. I took in all the games, sitting in the September heat and the October wind and the November chill. I bought the stadium popcorn. Steve picked us up stadium seats. I relegated a blanket to the cargo bay of my SUV for the unexpected - or expected -  chilly evenings. I cheered. I memorized the jersey numbers of friends' children. I supported the halftime programs and smiled at the cheerleader moms. I invited grandparents up to watch games. I bought a good zoom lens and took tons of photos. I was living large in the land of Friday night lights. I didn't mind at all that my football mom games were on Tuesdays or Thursdays. I was just happy to have a real reason to sit in the stands.

And what a thrill to watch my boy go in play after play for two seasons and do his best. His team wasn't a winning team either year - not in 7th, or in 8th. He wasn't on the A team either. No matter. We held our B team chins up proudly and enjoyed the equality of the B team. No child prodigies out there to steal the show. They were all in it to win it. 

I still remember that little number 55, standing on the sidelines as close to coach as he could get, ready to go in when called. And no matter what the scoreboard said, he was always a winner to me. And I was happy with the secret in my heart that he was my very own MVP.

Authentic All Out Hustle ~ Andrew 8th Grade Football ~ Fall 2009

Sketch Credit: Scrapbook Generation http://scrapbookgeneration.com/index.php?route=product/category&path=213

Paper: We R Memory Keepers