Essential Tools

Last week-end I attended my first two-day scrap booking session. Women of all ages and varied church backgrounds made their way to a local House of Worship located in Mt. Pleasant to take part in this phenomenon of creativity. I didn't quite understand, until I walked through the doors, how serious this undertaking was to each lady involved. In order to fully explain, let me liken it to a pregnancy. While some women just take the nine months in stride, having no distractions while "growing their baby", others agonize over every little hiccup the baby in her womb may have.

There are many, many decisions to make. The colors, the embellishments, the title, the journaling - those were the easy decisions. However, it was the equipment; the brands, the elaborateness, wheels or no wheels, drawers, pockets, slots - - just suffice it to say, "a place for everything and everything in its place", that really got my attention.

Knowing there are many varieties of storage bags and caddies for this particular craft, I decided to not worry about owning one until I had a chance to "observe" some in action. Thus, I walked into this activity with a couple of very humble-looking bags and baskets, all loaded with my own store of supplies. What I soon learned was that my bags and baskets, although filled to capacity, were NOTHING compared to some of the "loot" these ladies came armed with. Several of these ladies could have put up an "open for business" sign and probably never missed anything they would have sold. In other words, they brought the store with them~!

My first order of business, after securing a place to sit for the week-end, was to go around and check out each gal's equipment; having her explain the "perks" of her bag to me. I think, after spending hours and hours with these Goddesses of Creativity, I now know what "will and will not" work for me. I have the confidence to shop for the bag and storage container(s) that will become home-base for me as I pare my large tote of photographs down to a selection of photo albums.

One of the things I have learned in life, is that in order to do a job well, one must have the proper tools to do the job. That goes for scrap booking as well as building a house. I did add one small tool to my toolbox during this week-end. What amazes me is that a tool so small and in-expensive can do so many things to help move or re-move pictures, stickers, letters, etc. from where they were to where they need to be! I cannot imagine how I did without it before. I don't even know the proper name of this new tool, but it is sold by Creative Memories for $6.50. It has the look of a Mail Opener on one end and has a "point" at the opposite end. It can move anything that is glued or stuck down in an amazing way.

Now that I am so much more enlightened in the area of scrap booking tools, I am even more excited to make "order out of chaos" with my photos. Let the games begin~~!!