A Milestone Reached...

Some people might be ashamed to admit this, but I'm not. I feel proud - boastful even. Just minutes ago, I finally finished Caleb's first year scrapbook(s). The first 365 days of his life spanned 3 (bulging at the seams) books, 96 pages and 3.5 years of my life. I don't even want to think of the amount of adhesive, paper and embellishments that includes.

I know. Some of you are wondering what took me so long. Well, let me start by saying that I began behind. I didn't start scrapping until summer of 2005 - for those of you that are mathemeticians, that's 2.5 years after Caleb was born. In that time, I've also made my wedding album, a few mini-books for myself, tons of cards and "altered art", and countless albums for other people. (Give me a while, I can count that up...) My approach to my own "life-art" is very different. When I scrap for others, I have a methodical attack - planning and sketching each page, coordinating papers/embellishments, title, and picture placement out. I can whip out a full-size 20 page album in a week if I need to. (I guess payment is a good motivator.) When making my own stuff...I'm all over the place...just grabbing pictures that inspire me at the moment and digging through my stash of paper and goodies until I find what I like. I might be scrapping pictures from 2009 right after I've done something from 2004. You get the idea.

Anyway, Caleb's first year books are a mish-mash. Looking back over the pages, my style has definitely changed. I'm proud of that. Some, I even cringe when I look at the stickers or plain cardstock. I don't care. It's done and I'm leaving it. And you know what? I guess that is kind-of a chronicle of a lot of things...on the surface, a change in my scrapping style, but moreover, it's an analogy of how much my life changed that year...