Scrapbooking Minimized!

Minimized Scrapbooking
Here is the "After" photo!  I successfully got all my essential scrapbooking supplies down to these items!  It consists of my working mat (very helpful when working on questionable table surfaces), a rolling tote, handled tote and a paper tote. The Die Cut machine fits down inside the rolling tote and the handled tote can sit right on top of it!  Also in the rolling tote is the notebook of die cut templates, packages of page protectors and photo album refills as well as a small paper tote that has larger scraps of paper that are still useable on my scrapbook pages.

 I also kept one 12x12x4" plastic box (not shown) of specialty papers (lovely Japanese papers, mulberry textured papers, a few ephemera items and others) that I use more for art projects and making cards than I do for scrapping.  Since I use these at home, they didn't need to fit into my portable scrap-booking supplies.

Paper Tote
All my 12"x12" paper fit into this paper tote.  (I got rid of all the 8 1/2" x 11" paper as I never seem to use it.) At first, I was going to try and fit all the paper into the rolling tote, as I've been doing.  I had it in a tyvek bag, but it was always a mess and the paper easily damaged and it was hard to find what I needed.  So I found this paper tote box, with a nice carrying handle, and it has hanging folders to keep the papers somewhat seperate.  I divided my folders by neutral basics (black, white, cream and craft), solid colors (mostly Bazill cardstock), and the printed papers, which are sorted by color families or themes.

Top Tray of Paper Tote
The top of the paper tote has a nice little tray ~ perfect for holding the rubber stamps and ink pads that I use the most!

Stamping Minimized
Here are the rubber stamps and ink pads that I kept.  It boiled down nicely to a few basics.  I rarely use rubber stamps on my scrapbook pages, but use them instead when I make cards and art projects.

Embellishing minimized
These items are mostly the convenience items that get used frequently.  I kept just a few basic punches and got rid of all of the odd things like border punches and most of the seasonal punches that I rarely use.  At our local scrapbook store, they have a great assortment of punches, so if I need something, it's a good reason to sign up for a scrapping night!  I also got rid of a huge assortment of embellishments, bling and stickers that seemed to have grown exponentially.  I almost NEVER used them. What I do use comes down to these few items that get used over and over again.  There are a couple of basic supplies in this photo that I use all the time, namely the ruler and the bottle of "Art Glitter glue", which doesn't have glitter in it at all, but is easy to use, dries clear and quickly!  With a fine tip added, I've virtually done away with using any kind of tape.

QuicKutz
I kept the QuicKutz Revolution Die Cutting machine and all the assorted templates I've gathered over the past few years.  Love being able to cut out letters and shapes as I need them!  This gets used all the time.  While I know there are newer models and different companies that are all the rage, but this does just the job I need, so why spend more money on the latest model?  I'm quite satisfied with this one!

Scrapping Tools Minimized
Last but not least, these are the basics of my hardworking tools and if I really had to cut down my supplies, with the addition of a bottle of glue, a ruler and a dark brown ink pad, I could actually get away with using just these tools!  Everything else is just there for convenience!

What a great feeling to have finished this big task!  I must admit that it took me longer and was more difficult in some ways than I thought it would be.  It has to do with all the decision making, seeing something, handling it and then having to decide.  But I went with my initial gut reactions and feel pretty good about what I've kept and what I've gotten rid of.  I seriously doubt there will be any regrets!  Now I have boxes of stuff to get rid of, all nicely sorted so people can look through and see what is there.  It should all be gone by the end of this week!

Next up, I'm going to tackle the art supplies.  While doing the scrap-booking supplies, I discovered that many of my art supplies were mixed in, so I have a bit of a head start!

With all this talk about scrapbooking stuff, if you are wondering what scrapbooking I do, I thought I'd show you a quick glimpse of my current projects.
Completed School Year Pages
I've been working on completing albums for each of my kids.  When I originally considered doing this, I thought I'd have to scrapbook every photo I had.  With 4 kids and 20 plus years worth of photos for each one, it was overwhelming!  Needless to say, everything just sat in boxes for the longest time.

Then, this past summer, Stephen asked if we still had any of his pictures from when he was growing up.  That motivated me to get going.   I did a lot of pre-organization (read: sorting through boxes of photos and papers).  I already had most of the photos organized by year.  Then I sorted all the school stuff out by child and then again by year.  I put each year's school photos and papers in a page protector in chronological order and put them in albums.  Each child has a certain color album, which makes it easy to keep track of.  Now it is all organized and easy to see, and should the unimaginable happen, they won't have to dig through boxes of stuff to find their memorabilia from growing up.  Though I sincerely hope to have these completed within the next year or so!

More pre-organization
Once I got organized, it has been easy to make progress.  I've been scrapping just one page for each of their school years and then the photos are going in photo pages chronologically with these.  In back of the grade page, I tuck any memorabilia from that school year, such as report cards, projects we kept, programs from concerts they were in and the like.  I have all of Stephen's school years completed. There are also a few other pages I want to add of special events, such as when Stephen's OM (Odyssey of the Mind) Team went to the OM World Finals!  I still need to get negatives scanned and printed in order to add photos from birth up until the time of our fire.  Though we were able to save many of our photos, most of them have some smoke or water damage.  Thankfully, we were able to save most of the negatives and are only missing about 3 years worth of photos/negatives.  Getting all our negatives scanned is an enormous project, which I'll post about one of these days.

Getting organized to scrap
I have a bit more of Zach's stuff as he was younger when our fire happened.  Such fun to see how the kids have progressed through the years!    Jessie's album is about 1/2 completed, Jonathan and Zach's are organized and ready to scrap.  When completed, I figure they'll each have about 3 or 4 albums apiece.  Once I get theirs completed, I'll work on my own.  I've got my stuff sorted, but not yet placed into page protectors and scrapbooks, though I have most of my photos already in photo sleeves.  All in good time!

Comments

Daphne said…
Wow! Congratulations! I am very inspired by your paring down - we will be moving in less than 2 months and I need to start prioritizing craft supplies! And what a great idea to pre-sort pictures and memorabilia by year before 'scrapping' them! Thanks so much for sharing all this!
Anonymous said…
I admire your efforts! Do you use any of your scrapbook templates as templates for crazy quilts, or is the scale wrong for most of your stitching. I found your blog while trying to get crazy quilt ideas and found that you also inspire me in other ways too.

Sandy
thread12008@yahoo.com
JustGail said…
Great results on clearing out things that don't fit your style in the scrapbooks.

I've never gotten into scrapbooking - I'm afraid of how much stuff I'd think I need. The sewing and needlework items are quite overdone as it is.
Kathleen said…
I just found you tutorial on the CQ pin cushion. I sew with ladies in a quilt shop in Australia and would like to know if I can share your tutorial with them. If your would prefer that I didn't I understand.
Please send me a note to
cozykoza32@hotmail.com Thank You

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