Free Humor Therapy

My blog here, has been mostly about what journaling and scrapping can do for your mind and spirit. Well, they often say that laughter is the best medicine. I have been looking at scrapbooking videos on youtube.com and I came across this guy who made a video about being a guy and scrapping. It is set to the theme song for the "Fresh Prince of Belleaire", and is hilarious.

If your family doesn't understand your obsession with scrapbooking, this guy does. Here is the link.

Faux Stitching

When it comes to the internet, I am an idiot savant. Some things I know a good deal about and others, I am hopelessly behind the rest of the world.

Today I discovered that you can watch videos about scrapbooking and digi-scrapping on YouTube.

I watched all afternoon. I found a neat tutorial on adding "stitches" to your digital layout. I also found a few of Hummie's tutorials. That I will post on my other blog for template freebies.

My Altered Journal

I made an altered journal. I decided to rededicate myself to journaling. So, I wanted my journal to be special. I downloaded the papers from www.scrapbookscrapbook.com, then I printed the black and white pages and colored them with watercolor pencils and gel pens. The dragonfly and butterflies are made from craft foam and I added glitter glue to them. The flowers are foam too.

My Dad

My Dad recently passed away on April 12th. I am still working through it. I decided to make a scrapbook about him and here is my first layout. These photos are from about 1944.

Organizing My Scrapbooking Stuff

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Now playing: Great White - Once Bitten Twice Shy
via FoxyTunes ----------------
Awhile back I added a post about my new scrapbooking area. I took photos of the first arrangement and then tried it out for a bit and made some necessary changes.



I started with a desk I got from my neighbor and it was already pre-scrapped, as you can see by the painted flowers on it. I added a few stacking shelf-trays for things in progress. And a cork bulletin board to stick notes and important stuff on, and of course the occasional scraplift.

Then I had to figure out what to do with things I wanted accessible but not down low enough to be in my way or within my grandson's reach. Some of the articles I read suggested using shared space. I have a large set of shelves in my living room catty-corner to my desk. So, I cleaned of some of the lower shelves and put the space to use. I didn't need the shelf up next to the ceiling. I have books up there that are antique. No kidding. Some of them are 100-150 years old; another of my weird hobbies. I have a Coca-Cola pencil box and a desk organizer with the Coke logo on it. I have a few other plastic containers up there and a photo storage box, where I made a half hearted attempt to sort my photos. I have my scrapbooks themselves here too.

If you look close, on the left of the bottom shelf, there is a white box that has large photos in it. Just to make sure nobody messed it up, I wrote "Fragile is not an Italian word" on the outside of the box.












Then I put my tool organizer on top of my file cabinet below it. It originally had a lower half to it and was on wheels. That worked pretty well in my other room, but not in the living room, so I separated it. I bought it for less than $25.00 in the tool department at Walmart. For some reason the craft industry thinks if they paint the same plastic things for men pink or purple, that women will all be willing to pay 3 times as much for it. Go, figure. My old printer and my new one are next to it. Because around the corner, I have my computer desk.










Then I had to figure out where to put my paper. I originally bought a big storage tub that was deep enough for my 12 x 12 paper and sat it in between my desk and filing cabinet. It didn't work too well, because the paper wasn't at eye level and was hard to keep categorized. So, I moved my old printer to the other side of my computer monitor and turned the storage container up on it's side and put it up on the cabinet and sorted the paper into categories. I made my own file dividers out of card stock and some of those things you can buy to mark files with. Granted, my plastic container may not look great, but I intend to have my DH to build me some wooden cubes when it warms up, in the Spring.

Original

Reincarnation












The cabinet the paper is sitting on is where all of my genealogy stuff is stored. I have books and binders for a gazillion different surnames and family lines. I decorated my tool box and my little scrap trash can, on a whim, just to make them mine.

Now for the fun pictures. The reason I had to organize things differently, besides needing to put my important papers in the file cabinet, was because of my cat. Nermal, (we named her after the cat in the Garfield comic strip) has to be in the middle of anything that is going on. Scrapbooking paper rattles and makes it even more enticing. Every time I got up for a minute, she would knock tiny things down and then I couldn't find them. Usually they fell into that big container of paper, which might as well have been a black hole in space.

Then she had kittens. She taught them that rattling paper was fun. And they began taking naps in my stuff.










Then a couple of days ago, I left for a few minutes and when I came back. She was nursing one of the little boogers on my layouts. Never mind that they are eating cat food now and don't need to be nursed.











And then of course, it had to have a bath.












I am not saying the scrap area in finished, but it IS being an adventure. I need to paint some of the furniture, because the white is yellowing in some places more than others. And I may add some shelves above the desk.
But in a small area, I now have places for all of my scrapping stuff. I have my computer and printer, scanner right there for digital scrapping and I have a place for my genealogy stuff and my bills and important papers. My Bible is on top of my monitor, cause it is the ultimate source of inspiration. I've got altered clipboards on both sides of the area and photos to inspire me and make the atmosphere more pleasant. Just 'cuse I'm a multimedia girl, I got a wireless mouse and keyboard and new speakers. Wireless means I can hide them in the drawer away from kitty and puppy varmints.


Anybody want a free kitten?

Music

I posted an entry on my other blog about music. So, I thought I'd upload a layout to go with it, here.

This is a layout of my grandson enjoying music with my DH.

You can see the blog post here.

My Parents

I have been worrying about my parents, so I did a layout of them in 1961. I used papers from a kit I got called Sarah's Secret Garden by Rina Kroes scrapbook-elements.com.

My New Scrapping Area

Have you ever started a small project only to become snowed under a big one? I haven't been being able to get much scrapping done for a while now. So, I decided to move my area into the living room. The main reason is, when I was in the other room, I couldn't supervise my grandson very well, and couldn't scrap very well, with all of the getting up and down. I do a lot of traditional scrapping. Well, once my husband and I decided where to move me to, we decided it needed painted there.

This ended up with a total living room repainting. Then when my grandson came back, I have discovered some areas that were not quite as child proof as I thought they were.

I have been doing a lot of web searches on organization of your supplies. I liked some of the ideas and some had to be adapted to my needs. I forgot to mention that in the middle of this brilliant(not) idea, Home Shopping Network and the QVC both had scrapbooking sales. This was difficult to pass up. Of course I had to buy some things. My son teases me mercilessly when he catches me watching one or the other of them.

When the first box from QVC came, there was a program listing for their upcoming shows. He said, "Mom, you know you are buying too much when they send you your own TV guide!"

Anyway, the extra supplies have to be orgaized now also. I found a good site about how to separate die cuts and stickers. I had to add a few of my own to the list. Holidays and masculine and feminine and memorabilia were not on the list, but here is the link anyway.

I am going to take some pictures of the process and then scrap them.