Lessons Learned

I purchased, at 50% off from Memorable Seasons, a new AC Album. It arrived on Saturday, and I spent Sat. evening sorting J's pages and putting them into page protectors. It was a humbling experience in so many ways.

Here is what I learned:

1. I should have bought an album a long time ago. Then I would have known all this stuff months ago. I'll chalk that up to learning the hard way. Plus, we could have enjoyed the pages by flipping through them, instead of them collecting dust on my shelf.

2. I'm a fairly "flat" scrapper, thank goodness. Only time in my life I've ever been grateful to be flat.

3. I have 55 pages from J's first year, only 35 from his second. Hmm?

4. Even as much as I scrap, I don't feel like I have all the memories down I want to get down. I want to do some pages where I show the progression of time, compare months. Really show the ages. I wish I had documented the date/age more on my first pages.

5. I didn't regret anything I actually scrapbooked, only the things I didn't. But I didn't know what those things were until I saw the pages in the album and realized that's all I had.

6. Looking at the finished pages in the album, sorted by month for J's age, I didn't notice the "product" at all. I only noticed the journaling/photo. I guess in the end it doesn't matter what paper/products you use, so long as you love them. And when you see just how much scrapbooking stuff you have compared to how few finished pages you have, ouch.

7. I didn't really notice the design of the pages much either. It's something I'm not going to stress about quite so much in the future.

8. I want even more photos! It's not that I want to put 10 photos on a page just for the sake of it, I just want more of the story, any way I can get it. I'll try to add more photos in the future. J wants more photos of me and dh, those are his favorite pages.

9. I thought I was a pretty good journaler, but I could do better.

10. I have 90 layouts total, mostly 8.5 x 11. Even though I did a bunch of layouts for CHA, they aren't returned so they don't count. Otherwise we would be real close to celebrating 100 pages here in the next few weeks.

I have another album coming for J's second year. And I'm thinking that once I hit 100 pages, a RAK might be in order. So stay tuned for that. I'll leave you with a page I did for a challenge at SC, a bow challenge by Steph H. I wasn't going to do it, but then I saw that Susan Beth blew my excuse out of the water ( I only have boys to scrap darn it!). So, being the punk that I am, I had to make good even though it is like a week late. Cosmo Cricket Mr. Campy everything except cardstock and AC thickers. Do you love that ribbon or what? Regardless of whether you feel these papers are your style, the ribbon is just awesome.



So dh says to me as I finished this page last week, what are those? (pointing to the butterflies).
Me: Oh, those are moths.
Dh: Moths?
Me: Yep, hottest thing at CHA. Moths, mustaches and marshmallows.
Dh: (Gives me a look like what kind of adhesive are you sniffing in there?)
Me: Smiling weakly, knowing I am busted with ribbon and butterflies on a boy page.

Oh well, 10 more pages to go!