A finished Paris album and other thoughts

After a long absence from this blog, I'm back to say that, although I haven't blogged about my scrapping lately, I have been scrapping. In fact, I have finished the Paris book, and once I have the chance to run over to Scrapbook Your Story for some page protectors, I'll be able to fully assemble it.

Here are two of my Eiffel Tower layouts. For some reason, I'm having trouble uploading photos to the blog, so I don't think I'll be able to add any more to this post. :-( Maybe I'll try again later.

There were so many great things to photograph in Paris that it was hard to narrow down my pictures to a reasonable number for the scrapbook. Natalie gave me a great idea to use one of the pocket pages that came with my variety pack -- a 12x12 with nine 4x4 pockets -- at the end of the book to make a couple of collages of cropped photos. As I was working on the book, I set aside photos that wouldn't fit in the main part of the book for possible use in the collages. I was able to use almost all of them that way. I would include a photo of the collages if I could get the photo feature to work! (Enter my frustration with technology!)

Now that I've finished my first hybrid album, I have to say I've measured the pros and cons. I love the ease of the 3-ring binder, but the pocket pages were a little inconvenient in the sense that they restricted me in some of my layouts. I can see myself using hybird books for future projects, though -- especially small, simple projects such as one I'm planning for a Christmas gift.

With Paris 2010 finished, I'm in between projects, trying to decide what to start next. I have a weeklong staycation starting a week from today, and I'm hoping to get in plenty of scrapping time. One project I need to do soon is a framed photo page in memory of Typo, the feral stray that adopted the SJ-R as her home more than 10 years ago and had to be put to sleep last week because she had large mammary gland tumors. I've gathered several pictures coworkers took of her over the years, and we're hoping, once I finish it, that we'll be allowed to hang it up somewhere in the building. Some other books I'm eager to dig into: the cupcake crawl, my reunion weekend at U of I with Sara, Heather and Steph this past April; a book of childhood family vacations (part of my long-term "scrapping the old, yellowing pictures" project); and a number of single layouts for my "favorite things" scrapbook, including Krispy Kreme, Einstein Bros. Bagels and meeting Boyz II Men. 

I decided to do a "favorite things" book back in March, during my last staycation, when I realized my tendency to take pictures of the things I love most in life. By "things," I mean things that are tangible (I should probably tackle people and concepts in a different book). For example, so far in my "favorite things" book, I have a lot of foods and food places -- cupcakes, Mel-O-Cream doughnuts, my mom's banana bread. I also have the old Doc Marten sandals I got just after college and wore for several summers, to the point of needing a strap repaired (after which I wore them for at least one more summer). And then I have a layout for all the Dave Matthews Band concerts I've been to. (I wore the sandals to a few of those!) It's fun to have a book dedicated to the small things that bring me joy. I'm all about taking pleasure in the little things. There just aren't enough "big" moments in life. We need to find happiness and contentment in the ordinary.

I'm sure in the coming days I'll become inspired for my next project. I have a few things to focus on before I can relax, though. I have a retreat next weekend on which I'm giving a talk, and I need to get through three more days of work. I'm more than ready for a week of leisurely scrapping, though. I know I can accomplish a lot in several wide-open days. Only seven days till then!

Eiffel pages under way!

I've reached the part of my Paris album that I've been looking forward to since I started -- the Eiffel Tower section.

I have so many pictures that it's hard to decide which ones to use and which ones to weed out so the ones that make it in the book will have the most effect. I'm notorious for stretching what should be one or two tight, double-page layouts into four or five bloated ones -- I have a tendency to be repetitive. So I need to go through my tower photos and make some painful decisions about what stays and what goes in the interest of making the book as a whole the best it can be. Possible options for those leftover photos: framing, using on greeting cards or cropping for use on a collage page at the end of the book (this is an idea I got from my friend and fellow scrapper, Natalie). Or a trick I learned from my college best friend, Sara -- reducing photos to a smaller size, by way of Walgreen's collage prints (wwww.walgreens.com) so you can squeeze them in -- creatively and artistically, of course. ;-)

I'm close to finishing this album -- after the Eiffel Tower, I have one more small section and one single-photo page. Then I can start thinking about which project I want to tackle next. I want to do the Ivory Coast before we get too far removed from the trip, but I'm also feeling pulled toward the cupcake crawl and one of my projects with old pictures. I'm thinking the Ivory Coast would be a great project for winter, when it's cold and gray outside and I'll be in the mood to work on pages with colorful, tropical photos.

I'm feeling just inspired and motivated enough to tackle them one at a time -- and I really believe, at this point, anyway, that I can get it all done. By the time I'm 80, anyway ...

Taking the hybrid album for a test drive

In my last post, I wrote about my vast goal to get all my old pictures into sparkling, new scrapbooks. I'm excited to get started, but I'm juggling them with current books I'm equally excited about completing.

My latest project is a book about our three-day stop in Paris last year on our way to visit my husband's family in Ivory Coast, West Africa. It's my first project using a "hybrid" album -- the 12x12 3-ring binders with a variety of pocket pages you can simply slide your photos into. With these books, you have the option of a page as simple as a group of photos or as elaborate as a picture here, an embellished block of cardstock there. It's a good concept, in my opinion, and no doubt the perfect solution for some scrappers. For me, it's turned out to be a mixed bag. I like the option of the pocket pages, and I LOVE the ease of popping open the binding without the hassle of taking the entire book apart, like with postbound albums, which I normally use.

What I don't like is how the pocket pages force you into layouts. I've labored to find just the right combination of horizontal and vertical photos to fill a page, only to turn the page and realize I have to do it all over again because I have to fill the back side. I've actually taped pocket pages together just to escape that frustration,which is a total waste of resources. My other pet peeve is the fact that the pages don't meet in the middle in hybrid albums. The 3-ring binding, much as I love it for its convenience in moving pages around, keeps me from being able to design a cohesive double-page spread with a photo or headline across the break in pages. That's a technique I've become rather fond of in the past couple of years, and I would hate to give it up.

I'm still open to using hybrid albums for some projects -- especially those with a lot of photos of the same thing, or for layouts for which I can't find just the right paper. And I just can't quite let go of that 3-ring binding's ease of use.

But, for the most part, I think I'll be sticking with my postbound books ... and, oh yeah, grumbling whenever it's time to add pages!