Taming the Closet Monster Part Four

Here's part four of my closet monster posts. Please scroll down to see parts 1-3.

I went through all of my finished 12 x 12 layouts and put them in albums that still had spaces. Remember that I scrapbook by theme so the pages can go anywhere in the theme album, I do not scrap chronologically. I then labeled the outside of all the albums with the theme they contained. I was hoping that I could fill the upstairs closet with albums that were completely filled but I ended up with too many full albums so some are still downstairs in my craft room.

Now I am not a person who likes to have to unscrew, unbuckle or take out straps to add more pages, I find it to be a big pain. I could actually fit some more of the pages into some of these albums but am truly too lazy to have to open them up at this point but it is my goal down the line. In the meantime I will be purchasing one to two albums a month to put in the rest of these pages. You can see them on the top of these white albums (which also need to be replaced). The level of pages has definitely gone down and half of these are actually insert pages and page protectors for the albums so I really have less than 25 pages that need a place to go.

For the stack of 8 1/2 by 11 Christmas pages that I had to remove from an album that was beginning to mold I had to take more desperate measures. I have these file folder portable crates and stuck them in there until I can find albums in this size that I like. I have two full crates of these already, not good.

Finally I looked through all of the mini albums that were finished but didn't include photos and chose these four to sell at the Shipshewana crop my team is throwing at the end of the month. The mini albums that were personalized or are unfinished went into my bookshelves in my craft room, ready for use.

My box of digital dvds is much more organized now. I have started uploading some of them into my photo files. I have already starting scrapbooking some of them with Studio J too. The negatives still need work but I've run out of time so they will sit for another time.

I have one more stack to go through, it's finished pages without photos. I have to look through them, decide which to keep and which to sell. I plan on taking the ones I want to keep with me to the crop and actually USE THEM!! I hope that you've been inspired to take on one of your closets or any scrapbooking or stamping "monster" that you've been putting off. I do feel a lot better about my closet now. I know that albums are a necessity for me, if they are for you too, check them out HERE!

Remember that getting albums is a lot cheaper when you are a Close to my Heart consultant. If I buy 6 albums from myself I will get a free stamp of the month and $25 in free products PLUS 22% back in commission. That's about $81 in free products that I didn't have to spend. Wouldn't you like to get in on this type of buying? You can right HERE!

I have three new card tutorials coming up. My favorite will be in my newsletter only on Tuesday, January 17th, so make sure you've signed up at the upper right of my blog. The other will be up tomorrow.

Taming the Closet Monster Part Three

I'm still working on my closet. Today I picked up the stack of finished pages and divided them by themes. I scrapbook by theme now and never feel like I'm behind anymore. These pages are divided as follows:

Left to right - Hall & Oates (concert photos and such), the brothers (my two boys), Me, school, birthday, friends, places far away (vacations), "just us" (pictures of my family around the house), holidays, other celebrities (I tend to meet a few), places nearby, Alex, and finally, Sam. Now I'm going to go upstairs and see if I can find albums with spaces for all these stacks. If not, I will put them away in a 2 gallon ziploc bag while I'm waiting to purchase new albums for them. On Sunday I will continue taming this monster so stay tuned!

Taming the Closet Monster Part Two

So, for these past few days, as I suffered from a flu/cold mixture, I worked on my closet. See the before pictures a couple of posts back. I took out one album at a time and stayed on the couch looking through each page, sometimes cringing, other times thinking that I might be an okay scrapbooker! I then tried to organize the albums by size to make them fit into the cupboard better. Even though it looks much nicer, these albums still need work. I want each one labeled as to what's in it, in general. I now scrapbook by theme but many of these are by year so they need to be labeled as such even if it's just a post it on the side. Also a lot of these albums have missing pages...more on that later.

I truly regret starting out as an 8 1/2 by 11 scrapbooker. It's not easy to find 8 1/2 by 11 albums anymore to replace these junkie notebooks. Even Close to my Heart doesn't sell them which means I'll be limited as to which albums I eventually switch them to in the future.

These are my 12 x 12 albums, there is quite a variety and if I were to do it all over again I would have chosen one album and stuck with it but, that's life. Under the 12 x 12 albums are albums in various sizes including accordian albums and 6 x 6 sizes. I actually remember a time when I thought I wouldn't make mini-albums but now I love them.

Now this is my collection of negatives and cds which contain tons of photos. A lot of them have already been scrapbooked but I don't which ones so this is definitely another monster I have to take care of.

These are the leftovers. The stack on the left are album page protectors and inserts that go with various brands of albums. I will need to figure out which albums they go to and decide whether to use them or sell them. The stack on the right is over 100 12 x 12 layouts that have no place to go currently. Guess I'd better start buying new albums from myself.

This is a stack of Christmas 8 1/2 by 11 pages that were all in an album together. Unfortunately there was actually mold starting to grow on this album so I had to throw it out. On Friday I'll show you where these are going to end up for now.

This is the stack of pages that I made without adding photos. I'll be taking them with me to my 3 day Shipshewana crop and trying to find photos to fit into them. There's also some empty albums and a few pages that need to be completed or fixed in some way.

This is a bunch of mini albums that have no photos. I need to find pictures to go into them or sell them. I love the Easter album and am thinking about putting it in our silent auction for Operation Smile at our Shipshewana crop. All of these items are in my living room and need to be taken care of in some way or another. Stay tuned for my next steps.

Taming the Closet Monster

Now this is scary. After spending a lot of time on the couch due to the flu this weekend I have found a lot time to really look around at the house.

This closet is supposed to be a linen closet but instead has been taken over by my finished and a few unfinished scrapbooks. You can see that after 13 years of scrapbooking I have had to use desperate means to store all the layouts including putting them in school binders. I don't have intentions for them to remain in those, of course, but out of sight out of mind unfortunately.

Since it is a new year I've decided to tackle some things I've been putting off. This is the first. Following the advice about resolutions I'm going to tackle this a little bit at a time. I will let you know of my progress. In the meantime, do you have a closet monster at your house too? I'd love to hear about it. Post a comment and let me know!