Category Archives: Memory Keeping

Anything related to keeping our memories…from our personal memories, family memories to extended family albums, projects, writing and info. Keeping it alive and passing it on!

2020: Complete

Posted in Creative Practice, Memory Keeping, One Little Word 2020: Complete, Scrapbooking by

No, I haven’t finished the year (because it’s only February and I could potentially be missing out on all sorts of cool stuff). Off and on for the last 9 years I’ve picked a word to contemplate for the year. Ali Edwards has kind of formalized this idea and even leads a year long workshop . My prior words have been Prosper, Brave, Passion and Forward and for 2020 “Complete”. I think that complete has a good flow from forward last year and I like that it has several meanings. Plus, I got a lot a stuff I want to get done!

This year, as last I am participating in Ali’s workshop and I thought I’d share my first two months of the album here…I have to say this is the first time that I have been this far ahead LOL we’ll see how long that lasts!

January

January is traditionally the set up month where you kind of think about all the different aspects of your word (or, some people use phrases) and make some notes about what you’d like to let in, leave behind and how you’d like things to go. I did purchase Ali’s kit this year in addition to the digital kits that come with the class so I wrote everything out on the included small cards and printed out the larger pages from the digital kit. The little instax photos of me were taken by the girls while we were in Florida in January while they were doing photo shoots around the pool (which I found endearing and hysterical at the same time). I pulled out some black and white washi tape and papers to add in to the pockets. Looking through this again…I think I actually skipped a photo of some of the cards but you get the idea.

February

February’s prompt was to make a collage exploring your word. I have done this in the past, I have two large ones hanging in my studio and honestly no more wall space so I decided to keep the collage to 6×8 to fit in this book and then when I started cutting out images, I decided to simplify even further and just add in a few images of things that make me feel “complete” and a quick photo I snapped of myself (trying to remember to include a photo of myself each month) Yes, I looked thrilled as I was running late to meet a friend for breakfast! I also realized looking at this again that i meant to attach the “February” word art piece at the bottom of my photo. At first I thought I was maybe just phoning it in because I didn’t do a big collage again but I like the simple aspect of the photos…these are by no means all the things that make me feel complete but a representative smattering.

Organizing

Last year, I found that having all of my OLW Album supplies in one place made things much quicker and easier. This bin which I repurposed from the bathroom project, has product from this years kit as well as leftovers from last year and a few things from my stash… I am keeping this tucked into my shelving unit until it’s time to work on the album so it’s out of the way yet accessible. My bin of washi tape and other embellishments are right there if I want to pull something from my stash to add to the book! I’m also really glad this year that the album fits in the bin with the supplies (last years arrangement I had to go hunting for the album which I stored separately) So I’m very happy everything is in one place!

Thanks for taking a look at my project! Have you participated in Ali’s workshops? Have you picked a word for the year?

2019 Memorykeeping

Posted in Creative Practice, Digital Scrapbooking, Make Stuff, Memory Keeping, Project Gal- Memorykeeping, Scrapbooking by

I have mentioned before that I am not so great at tracking things (I’m looking at you MyFitnessPal app) Last year I did however keep track of layouts that I made by month. As with the fiber portion of my life, I didn’t think that I really got that much accomplished. My plan to document in photos and words monthly pretty much did not happen (even though I had everything I needed all ready in an album … AND that is not to say that I won’t get around to that project this year). When I looked at my list at the end of the year boy was I shocked…

Yep… 328 pages… I had pretty much forgotten that I had made collage layouts for the girls school albums which were 100 layouts alone! Yeah, not sure I can keep up with that this year but maybe just doing my thing and not worrying about page counts is the key to success!

In addition to layouts, I made these super cute houses/village buildings on my silhouette die cutting machine out of plain yardstick. The girls did help me fold some of them and they were really easy to do! Now that the Christmas decorations are put away, I need to put the little houses back up!

And that is a wrap! I’m going to try and insert a “gallery” here with a selection of layouts from 2019!

Thank you for stopping by ! Let me know what your crafty plans are!! I have decided to plan by the quarter so as not to get too overwhelmed planning things out for the whole year!

Stash Bashing

Posted in Creative Practice, In the Studio, Memory Keeping, Scrapbooking by

One of the ways I engage with my hobby of memory keeping (and also prime the creative pump for my business and my other creative endeavors) is with a membership at Simple Scrapper which is a community of like minded memory keepers from all over the world (which is so totally cool) that offers classes, challenges, online crops, book clubs, a monthly magazine, templates and loads of fun and support. This past week has been their semi-annual “Stash Bash” week, a challenge for members to work on reducing or organizing their creative stash with an eye to making more projects and getting more stories told.

I’m currently working on my girls school albums with a completion date of June 7th (conveniently, their graduation date!) so I am making plenty of layouts and recording lots of memories right now. I do have one particular area of stash that needed a little love so I thought I’d share my Stash bash Project here with you (I’ve already shared it with the Simple Scrapper Community)

My lovingly acquired selection of Story Kits!

 I am the proud owner of many many Story Kits and Story Stamps from Ali Edwards.  I also amassed a years worth of Stories by the Month and, I’m embarrassed to say I have hardly used any of them.  When I thought about why (other than the usual reasons) I realized that they are all still in the original envelopes, so I can’t see or flip thru anything.  So how to get them out of envelopes and deal with different sorts of stuff:  cards, stamp sheet, sheets of cardstock and stickers and then loads of types of embellishments.  my first impetus was to go to Target and buy more plastic fridge bins to house the collection.  I really am not thrilled with the purple bin from the girls old toy room where they now reside.  Then I checked myself and thought a) too much plastic already and we are trying to make a conscious effort as a household to cut back and b) don’t feel like spending the $$.  I looked around the house and thought shoeboxes!  Totally can do that!  Except didn’t have quite the right size/shape etc….   I realized I can just keep them in the purple bin and get over it because it fits perfectly in the bookcase.  In taking apart a few kits and spreading them out… I hit up on the solution to the problem:  1-Take (almost) everything OUT OF THE PLASTIC stamp sets, chip board, everything except some tiny stars and other embellishments that must be contained.  2- All the loose embellishments go back in the big plastic envelope that the kit gets shipped in.  3-Envelope is labeled w kit name 4-  Envelope goes in back and stamp, chipboard, stickers, paper-ish kinds of things and finally the journal cards all stacked on top, then stood up in the bin.  It’s a little catty-wampus, it’s not perfect but quite frankly I was pretty giddy with how FUNCTIONAL it’s going to be for me!!  

the new home for the smaller embellishments! Easy to see and access!
Everything out of the plastic, ready to be stacked up and filed! Easy flip through access now!

I then took all my story by the month sets, which I’m using to document 2018 monthly, found a binder and some page protectors and slotted all the cards, chipboard and stamps into the page protectors so NOW when I’m ready to work on January, I can just add more page protectors and the cards and stamps are all in one place.

Monthly themed cards and embellishments ready to use to document 2018!

All of this was accomplished while still in my pajamas yesterday afternoon!  I’m so excited how everything turned out!!  I’ll try and post more photos in the comments, I wanted to share here because I know many of us probably have piles of these kits and hopefully some idea will help you to work with your kits!!  

Happy Dance over here!!

How do you organize your materials to make your projects flow more efficiently and leave you more time for actually making things??!

Some January projects…

Posted in Creative Practice, Documenting Life, Memory Keeping, Project Gal- Memorykeeping by

Well, we’ve made it 1/12th of the way through the year…doesn’t it sound like a lot when you put it that way?!  The month has been pretty busy as usual and I’ve been at work on several projects over here.

On and off for the last several years, I’ve set an intention for the year through choosing a word as kind of a touchstone of sorts.  I have never been one for resolutions, recognizing many of them never make it past mid-month but a word has been something I could get behind… My words have been:  Prosper, Brave,  Passion (twice) and Complete, and this year

Forward

A few of the years I have participated in Ali Edwards workshop called One Little Word. Ali didn’t come up with the idea of a guiding word but she has developed a year long workshop with monthly prompts to help remind you of your word and to Make It Visible. You can learn more about her take on the project here on her site. I’ve signed on the the fun this year as it’s going to be a big year around here and I’m excited to see what the next season moving FORWARD is going to look like. I am also participating in a year long workshop called Fit which is an offering from Cathy Zielske who keeps it very very real, you can read more about that here. Seriously, sometimes I feel like Cathy and I could be best buds…we have sooooo much in common right now. I am formulating a number of goals around what Fit means, and I find the community around this workshop very helpful and inspiring.

Of course there is documenting off all this involved and this year I’m combining both efforts into one 6×8 album that I am going to just dip in and out of during the month as I work on various prompts and ideas. I’ve finished up my work for January (go me!) so I thought I’d share a very crummy video overview of my book so far… definitely can put learn better videography skills on the list ha ha…just keeping it real!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hyzmGrMKJgQ&feature=youtu.be

So for some reason, I can’t embed a video here but if you click on the link above, it will take you to the You Tube Channel where I posted my video… WordPress changed up some things so it’s all about learning the new editor! Thanks for stopping by and let me know what you’re working on!

December Daily 2018 – Days 20-25 !

Posted in December Daily, December Daily 2018, Memory Keeping, Project Gal- Memorykeeping, Scrapbooking, Writing by

I am thrilled that I am done with my December Daily project!!  My goal was to have all of the digital pages finished by 12/31 and I’m one day and 4 hours early.  I’m very happy and can’t wait to see everything printed up!   I’ll be printing 6×8 photos from Persnickety Prints, love their quality and their service.  Other years I have printed my photos at home on my photo printers but since these pages have such broad swathes of color, I thought I’d  send them out.

A few things made this project very workable for me.   1- I stuck to one story a day 2- I stuck to (generally) one photo a day.  3-I took all the photos on my iPhone and edited them in Pic-Tap-Go and uploaded them to dropbox named for each day so they fell into order in the file.  Then I could just access them from my desktop when it was time to pull the layout together in Photoshop.  I edited 12 photos in one sitting while I was waiting for a dr appointment one day, v. good use of time.  4-I chose three kits and put them in one folder, I sorted everything and put all the papers in a folder, all the elements, templates etc…so when I needed a paper or a template, I didn’t have to hunt through each folder from the designer.  about 2/3 of the way through I did purchase another kit that worked in with the colors just because I was starting to feel restrictive and a little repetitive because the kits I was using were quite small.  I also had a good chunk of time this past week to work on the project, so that helps immensely!

Days 20-25 !!

 

…and to all a good night!!