Thursday, March 24, 2011

What I've Been Up To...

First things first. I had my 6-week follow-up with my surgeon yesterday and the splint is now history! It seems sort of strange to have it gone and I'm still a little sore, but man, am I so happy to be done with that part! Now on to physical therapy...

There weren't a lot of things on my to-do list that I could do with just one arm. But there was one thing that I had been avoiding for some time. So I decided during the six weeks of recovery after my surgery, it would be my goal. I needed to get control of our family photos, memorabilia and scrapbooks.

Since I started blogging, I have pretty much stopped doing scrapbook pages. As much as I love to do it, in reality, I don't have time. And I know that the best pictures and highlights of our life are captured and preserved each year in our family blog books.

But that still left a whole bin of scrapbook pages that were already completed or pulled out for lessons that were never put in sheet protectors or even placed into actual books. So the first step was re-organizing our actual scrapbooks. Putting them all into sheet protectors and back in the correct order. The kids helped me (they became my second arm) and we loaded them into black binders and labeled each one for easy reference. They loved seeing pictures of themselves and remember fun things we have done as a family. But the best game was guessing if a boy baby page was Sam or Josh. Tough even for me...

And because my dream was to scrapbook all our photos and memorabilia someday, I had boxes and boxes of photos from pre-digital days and an entire bin of memorabilia. So while my mom was here, we went through and organized all the photos by year, got rid of multiple prints, threw away bad, blurry shots and loaded them into generic black two-up photo albums. I LOVE these things because they have a little pocket on each page in the middle of the two pictures. I used that space to journal the pictures and add any pressed pennies we had gathered from that particular time (we live for pressed pennies!). Then any other memorabilia that would fit into the photo albums was three hole punched or laminated and three hole punched (like wedding announcements, National Park pamphlets, baby portraits and copies of our family Christmas card letter) and put into the album in the right place. I started in 1995, my third year at BYU and the year I met Tony. All previous photos I organized and put into one photo box. I ended up with nine volumes, but that gets us from 1995 until and a little past the time I started blogging and our blog books take over. It was a HUGE project and one that I have been dreading.
But now that it is done, I feel like I have done something huge. When we move, I always make Tony pack our scrapbooks, videos, pictures that I don't dare have the movers move into our truck so we can make sure they weather the move okay. By completing this projects, all our memories and family history is practically and simply organized and will fit into one bin. Amazing.

I'm not sure what I'm more happy about...my arm or finishing this damn project.

6 comments:

Sharlyn said...

I LOVE the idea of laminating and three hole punching the keepsake items you can't fit into the 4x6 pocket. You just solved one of my problems! You have the best ideas! :) Thanks for sharing.

MooreInterest said...

Let's make a deal....you come organize our last 14 years....and I will take care of your kids and cook you dinner?!!!! Deal?!

Way to go! That's impressive!

Melissa said...

A-MAZING. 'Nuff said. :)

Anonymous said...

oh man. i have several projects like this, that i so dread getting started on (and never feel like i have enough time to really even get started on), but i know once i do them, i will feel oh so good!
nice work!
courtney

Sarah said...

wow, wow, wow and more wow, wow, wow!!! I love you so much! I am so impressed (as always) with your impeccable organization and ideas. You always help me so much, even from afar, with all of your ideas (I need to send you a picture of what I did this weekend because I got the idea from your blog....watch for my email). I am SO IMPRESSED with the scrapbooks. I, too, have had little time to keep up on my scrapbooks since Paige was born. I am thinking this Summer, when it's hot and we're stuck inside for a couple months, that I will once again, copy your ideas and follow suit with the books. Thank you my dear, dear friend! Glad you are recovering!
love...Sare

Michie said...

I love your albums...I also scrapbook but don't always have time. I like that you've been able to save the momentos and journal too, in a somewhat more laid back fashion. I really like those albums...where did you get those?