365 Week 42

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365 Week 41

 

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Tama Month 28

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Will Month 70

 

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From the archives 2008: Family

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From the archives 2007: Shampoo Mohawk

 
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365 Week 40

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365 Week 39

Tama Month 27

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Make Over and De-Stash

 Before:  

I am continually refining the systems I use to scrapbook. And not so long ago changed the way I set up my desk. Then I did a class at Big Picture Classes that taught me some more about how I scrap. And then I was looking at some of the content and videos on Jennifer Wilson's Simple Scrapper website and realised I could do more, and I needed to have less.

It all started with some adjustments to one of these Ikea media boxes designed for CD's.

 

 

 Because all the stuff in these little drawers had outgrown their spot and were hard to access. Now they are all in the box I made which I can easily access and lift onto my table if I really want to have a good look through. 

And then somehow I got it into my head to have a bit of a purge....

 

 Yeah, just a bit.

170+ items later and 145 pieces of patterned paper.... zoikes!!

This is what I now have. I moved my most and least used colour boxes from my shelves to my desk so now it's easy to get to the things I most use and I'm more likely to use the things I want to use but never do.

As a result my shelves are emptier and also better laid out for access to things like my dies. I'm hoping when we move house that I'll have my Big Shot and sewing machine permanently out and accessible.

I even cleared out the bulk of the stuff that was under my desk- which included two A3 art folders of misc papers I had chucked in there when we moved from New Zealand. Putting it where it needed to be.

 I also took the shelves I had my Washi tape on and laid them flat to use for Project Life storage that is easier to get to and use.

 

 The Washi tape is now in my drawers because I ended up freeing up some in the purge. You can see my re-purposed Media box on the left above. And on the right you can see the drawers now hold my mists.

I cleared a lot of stuff from my cupboard which meant I had a whole shelf free at the bottom to store my fabric stash and knitting gear- which was previously in a basket on the top.

Freeing up space in the drawers meant I was able to move some things that I want to use more often  closer to me like my chalk inks (above) and sort something out for easier use like my sewing cottons (below).

The biggest part of my purge was probably wood mounted rubber stamps- I did have a photo box and a drawer full of them as well as the shelves below- now I just have the shelves below and a few more larger ones on another shelf where they are also easy to access. 

My acrylic stamps were also not safe from the purge. And I made sure to move all the remaining stamps (except alphabets) to this box to ensure I can see them all when I am looking for stamps to use.

I bagged up all my foam stamps and have yet to make a decision as to if they should join the purge or if I can change my process to use them- they are so versatile and cheaper than using Alphabets- plus it'd help use up all my paints.... decisions decisions.

Also in this process I got all my personal photos into a holding album so they are easier to see and therefore scrap. And worked on clearing the backlog of old photos  that were in the pocket page post a couple of days ago.

 

I went through a couple of drawers and boxes of ephemera that I had and purged and sorted for easier access and use. 

Somethings once loved and used often I had to sadly admit were well past their prime and only good for the bin.

I'll hopefully sell most of the stuff from my purge and make a bit of cash. I did already package some up to send to some friends and also passed some on to Will's teacher- so spreading the joy.

My key mantra as I did all of this was "I don't use this!" Every time I wavered on something pretty or expensive or special- I just said it again- "I don't use this." Or sometimes "I no longer want to use this or work this way!" Mini albums especially I had a whole heap waiting to become something- I don't want to spend my time on Mini albums- they take up too much space and generally don't tell enough stories as I would if I spent the time and effort on single pages. So the vast majority of my Mini albums went in the purge box.

I've never felt so good about my stash and my room and the state of my photos- now to just sit back and scrap. (Oh and get my stuff ready to sell). Until we move house in January when I get to pack it up and rearrange all over again- even better!

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365 Week 38

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Kitted out- Studio Calico Project Life Kit

I've never brought from a kit club before. And it's not something I will be doing often but Studio Calico had a super cool deal through Big Picture Classes and so I got the September Project Life kit. It was reduced from $24 down to $10 with the deal plus postage to Australia $9.

I totally love it! The box is 7x5inches and about 2inches tall and has a magnetic closure- so plenty of potential for re-purposing when I'm done using it to stash the treasures inside.

This is how it looks when you open it up.

My only complaint is that you can't buy extras along with the kit without paying a heap of extra postage- there's a heap of space here that could have been used to add in some envelopes, sequins, clips, stars and tags that I had my eye on. Oh well....

This is the contents spread out. I love the little glassine bags the little things are packaged in and the cool little folder with the stamps by Kal Barteski in the top left corner.

There's such a sprinkling of fun in this little box that it was well worth the cost to me. I'd absolutely love to have the readies to subscribe to a full size monthly SC kit and I'd be squealing with glee if I could get my hands on Studio Calico's Daily December Kit for this year- but I know that's not going to happen any time soon- so I'm being happily content with this kit and the one for October- which you can get a deal on too if you want to using the code in Cathy Zielske's Newsletter.

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Will Month 69

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How I scrapped 170 photos in about 7 hours aka I love pocket pages

So. I've had various envelopes of photo sitting around for YEARS waiting to be scrapped into mini albums and pages. Since I set them up ready to go various things have changed. While I love a good mini album and I like having the story all in one place with a definite start, middle and end. I don't love the space that a mini album takes up or the time that it takes to put one together. On top of that some of these stories just aren't high on my priority to scrapbook now that so much time has passed since the event. Or the nature of what I was scrapping didn't merit the time effort and expense of the number of scrapbook pages it would take to scrap 250 photos. The other thing that has changed is the advent on Pocket page scrapping- and that's where a solution is born.

These 25 photos from the 5 Squadron family day in March 2003 were destined for a mini album. It probably would have taken about 6-8 hours to scrap on it's own and taken up space that is at a premium. And while it was a cool experience at the time we've now moved on and Les isn't even in the RNZAF let alone on the Squadron any more. This will go in our Things we do album.

These 11 photos from Tamati's last Spyrider in August 2007 were also destined for a mini album- we had a great time and Merenia got to be on TV- plus it was a cool experience being part of live television screening. But 6 years on.....meh.

Twenty photos from the Rugby Road Show that Les took Kieran and Jake to in 2008- at the very height of Kieran's Rugby obsession- fun photos intended for a mini album again- but really what would I do with it? I doubt Kieran will want to take it with him when he leaves home and I'm not exactly going to look back on it with fond memories- so these pages will go into the All about  Kieran album.

While I was teaching GaT at Whenuapai back in 2004-7 I took heaps of photos and scrapped them all except for these very last ones. I finished my job and had Will on the very same day so there just hasn't been the time to scrap these 115 photos and one hand print wreath. Not only that but I think of the time that would have gone into make the 12x12 pages for my Teaching album and the expense for the number of pages (20+) I would have had to do with 115 photos- totally not worth the effort especially now I can't even share them with my class some of whom five years on are almost grown up. So this was a great solution for these photos that I didn't want to scrap and didn't want to throw out.

All in all this lot- 171 photos took me  about 7 hours to stuff in pockets, choose cards and journal. 

Each slip in pocket pages costs around 60 cents and each of the (mostly) Project Life cards costs 6 cents. I used a piece of a patterned paper, some scraps of paper, some washi tape, stickers and misc embellishments I already had. Total cost= approx $22 for the equivalent of 32 pages- you couldn't even buy the cardstock for that! And the pleasure of having these photos finally in albums and NOT sitting in envelopes is fantastic!

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