Guest Post | Make Everyday A Scrapbooking Adventure | Shimelle Laine
I’m going to start this entire post with a bit of a risky statement: I love grammar. It’s a risk for two reasons. First, you may have just written off the rest of this entire post because it’s going to be roughly as exciting as a junior high English lesson. And second, if I make a single grammar mistake in this post, I’m going to look like a total idiot. But I’m going to go with it anyway: I love grammar.
I love grammar because something really small can make a big difference. Like how including or excluding a space between two words can totally change their meanings. For example, everyday means ordinary, commonplace and nothing special. Add that space and every day means the days themselves, like each and every day. So the big question: do we let every day be everyday?
Ali’s Week in the Life project is all about finding something far more exciting than everyday in every day of your week. I love this project and have documented a week each year since 2006. It makes you look at each day that week in detail and long after that particular week, you may find you want to include more of your day to day life in your scrapbooks. But, you know, without it feeling ordinary, commonplace or everyday at all.
There are so many ways you can make every day much more than everyday, but all I can really focus on is the scrapbooking aspect. I don’t just love grammar. I also love scrapbooking, and specifically how it can give back to your life. I love how scrapbooking can make every day a bit of an adventure. Not the type of adventure that requires sunscreen and bug spray and rock-climbing equipment, but the kind that puts a little something exciting in each and every day. So I turned on the camera at the table where I scrapbook and tried to put that into words and concrete ideas to share with you.
And I probably made some grammatical errors along the way.
Whether you’re scrapbooking your day to day life specifically for Week in the Life or for more general pages in your albums, I hope the scrapbooking adventure is something that’s still alive for you. There are plenty more ways to keep the fun in this hobby and I’d love for you to share your favourites. But more than anything, I’d love for each of us to remember that this hobby that we enjoy also gives a lot back to us, to our families and our friends. I’d love for us to be proud to say we are scrapbookers.
Even though spellcheck doesn’t want to accept scrapbookers as grammatically correct.
Shimelle Laine was the first instructor to bring online classes to the scrapbooking community, and teaches a variety of classes throughout the year at her website, shimelle.com. She is a Garden Girl at Two Peas in a Bucket, designs for Jenni Bowlin Studio and served as an editor for the UK’s Scrapbook Inspirations books and magazines. You can read more of her work on her blog, Pretty Paper. True Stories.
Shimelle’s latest class, Explore, focuses on making every day a scrapbooking adventure. It starts Monday the 18th of July, but you can join at any time, and it’s designed so you can use it right alongside Week in the Life, should you wish. Sign up here.
Why does this post make me cry? Is that Shimelle gets so to the heart of something that's so important to me? Is the sweet music at the beginning and the end? Is it that I haven't been scrapping nearly NEARLY as much as my heart and soul cries out to and I just MISS IT so much?
Yeah. Probably.
Thanks so much for this post... :)
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Thank you Ali for having this guest post. Shimelle is in my top 5 of scrapbookers that I love! Her classes are amazing! I loved the video - thank you for reminding me why I love this craft.
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awesome post! thank you. i'm feeling very inspired right now. i used to love just writing in a variety of colours in my uni notebooks and stuff. i went to a work training course once where the instructor didn't provide everybody with a pen but with a packet of connector pens. i'm bringing back some more hand-written colour to my life.
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Thank you for the down-to-earth reminder of the heart of scrapbooking. This was an excellent video! I laughed out loud at your expression "crafting shrapnel"! I'm going to remember that :)
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Thank you for sharing. You have some very valid points. I love how you look at everything and will be trying to look at MY everyday life differently.
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Love Shimelles classes. No pressure. Once you take a class you have access to it forever..do it at your own pace. She is awesome. Take a class and you'll be hooked.
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Oh my, this was so lovely. Shimelle and Ali, thank you, very touching!
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Thank you Ali & Shimelle for this beautiful video. I've been struggling with my scrapbooking for a few months; I've been busy with other things and then when I do have time to scrapbook, not feeling like doing so because my life seems so mundane right now. But this was a wonderful reminder about why I love this hobby so much...just what I needed to hear on this cold, wet dreary morning :)
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Wow...really loved the video and this post...I've always been proud to say I'm a scrapbooker and art journalist and I just love the message and enthusiam that Shimelle offers us all.
Just signed up for her class and I'm as excited about this one as I was with your fantastic on-line class, "Scrap Book on the Road" Ali...which is almost done and I promise to post about it real soon. We realized that we were only home 6 days in the last month...OMG!
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That was AMAZING!!!! WOW! Thank you both...I have been a big fan of Shimelle's layouts, classes, sketches, writing, well everything for a little bit now, and it is so cool to see her here. That video was really, REALLY good.
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Enjoyed the post and your art and everything you bring with it!!!
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This was great! loved the video and sentiments expressed. i am a scrapbooker and proud of it - even in this day and age i still come across lots of people who don't get it - that's ok, to each her own. i get it and that's whats important. thank you Ali for sharing.
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Thanks for this. I just love Shimelle's outlook on life. This really helped me today.
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Awesome video! So inspiring. Shimelle has such a great outlook on scrapbooking and life! I love scrapbooking but often find myself embarrassed about telling people about my favourite hobby.They look at me like I am nuts. Down with the scrapbooking embarrassment, I say. ;-)
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Beautiful and inspiring! Thank you:) Makes me happy to know others feel the way I do. Scrapbooking is so much more than just pretty papers and glue. It allows me to look for the beauty in life and document the little moments in an intentional and meaningful way.
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I so needed to hear this today; thank you!! This is such a profound outlook on why we do what we do: telling the stories associated with a coffee cup, or our commute to work, or how we came to be the who we are today. I actually got choked up a couple times.
Thank you, Shimelle!! And thank you, Ali!!
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Loved this video. I will watch it again and again. . .so inspiring :)
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LOVED THIS!
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I've watched this twice today and loved it both times! Can you really teach seamonkeys to jump over a toaster? Ha ha. Loved it! Beautiful and brilliant. Just what I needed to hear. Thanks, Ali and Shimelle.
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I`m so happy that I found this out years ago, my scrapbooking life is so much happier now. Every little thing in yor life is an adveture when you look at it in this light. You are so right, thank you for spreding the insight, Shimelle. And I love listening to your sweet voice, too!
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What an affirmation!
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Beautifully told. My kids now think that teaching Sea Monkeys to jump over toasters would be a cool hobby too.
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I love Shimelle's classes. She makes you dig a little deeper into your thoughts and feelings and that helps you get it on paper. It doesn't matter if you're a simple scrapper like me, or a fancy scrapper like my one friend, anyone can get so much more out of one of her classes. Check her site out and sign up for a class. You'll enjoy what you'll end up with.
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Ali, I was totally thrown when I started watching this. I didn't read the intro closely and I thought YOU were the one talking. I was freaked out...I thought, "this doesn't sound like the voice I've been reading your blog for years." I realize now it is Shimelle, but thought I'd share with you that YOUR VOICE really comes through in your writing. That gave me the AhHa that it is important for my journal entries to sound like it is me who is doing the talking. Less perfection, more me.
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Thank YOU Shimelle for sharing that with us!x
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