What I've Learned So Far

It’s day 16 of the LOAD 212 challenge, and I have to say this experience has taught me a lot about scrapbooking.  I’ve been using the challenge as an opportunity to experiment with different techniques and styles.  I’m also learning a lot about myself and my creative process along the way.

For instance, I find it very difficult to work in a cluttered area.  If everything is strung out all over my worktable, I can’t find anything and I wind up making a bigger mess (or worse yet, break or tear something) trying to find it.  It also takes me longer to get stuff done.

I’ve also learned that my photo filing system isn’t as foolproof as I thought it was.  I spent several hours today hunting frantically for pictures for today’s layout, and they were scattered in multiple locations – all very logical locations, of course, but scattered, nonetheless.

Learning to just “go with it” has been a real challenge for me.  As I mentioned previously, I hate making decisions, so sometimes I have been know to shuffle the elements of a page around for hours hoping that any minute the pieces will just all fall into place and a wonderful page layout will develop.  When I’m not doing a challenge, this can sometimes hold a layout up for days.  I’ll work on other things and periodically look at the offending page, and eventually I’ll come up with something.  Doing the LOAD challenge, I don’t have that luxury.  Some of my layouts have been completed just under the wire, and if I had dallied any longer with it, I would have failed to get it done on time. 

To overcome this shortcoming, I’ve tried to make myself just start slapping the pictures down.  My first instinct would tell me that this technique would make for a terrible, sloppy page, but I’ve actually found that even though I “just slap” the pictures down to start with, the layouts have all developed into some pretty cute ideas (if I do say so myself).  I’ll let you be the judge…

So I’m still hanging in there, and I’m still getting the challenges done on time.  My next big challenge is going to be how to complete a layout while I’m on the road.  I actually have a business trip this weekend, and will have to complete and upload my layout from my hotel room.  I plan to bring some limited tools, but almost no supplies, and I will have to visit a local scrapbook store to get whatever I will need to complete the project for the day.  It’s a scary thought, but I’m up for the challenge.  I can’t wait to see how it turns out!