Scrapbooking

I've thought a lot about scrapbooking lately. The operative word here, unfortunately, is thought. I never seem to have time to actually do it anymore. When I used to work 12 hour shifts, I had four days off every week, and would be able to find time at least once a week. But since I've been working 5 days a week for the last almost 5 years, I never seem to have free time. Saturday is taken up with more chores than I can possibly accomplish, so I'm unable to take 3-4 hours out of that day for a hobby, while leaving more important things undone. Sunday is church, and catching up on lots of small projects. And then, before I know or am ready for it, Monday's here and the week starts all over. I never seem to have time, or more importantly, energy, on weeknights. At least not enough to do much more than the basic, essential stuff, and then fall into bed. I have tried scrapbooking on weeknights, and that does not work for me at all. Mainly because when I'm in the middle of a project I just don't get tired--I will just keep going until 1:00 or 2:00 a.m. Now that absolutely does not work, because the morning alarm does not, sadly, accommodate itself to the time I finally got to sleep. After three or four hours of sleep, I'm just not ready to face most weekdays. So, long ago I decided never to scrapbook on weeknights. That works for me as far as getting enough sleep, but it doesn't get any scrapbooking done. I really miss it, though; it was relaxing and immensely rewarding.

I've always said that the appeal of scrapbooking for me is that it lets me feel creative when I know I am not (but so want to be); I love that. I still hang on to all of my supplies (and believe me, there's a ton of them), in the hopes that when and if I ever am actually able to retire, I'll have endless free days, many of which I hope to devote to this highly addictive hobby. Lately I tell people, when they ask if I have any hobbies, "I used to scrapbook, but now I just buy and collect scrapbooking supplies!" If I never purchased another item, I could probably scrapbook for several years and not run out of supplies.

Having said all this, now comes this confession: I'm going with my friend Alice to the Scrapbook Expo in Orange County next weekend. No doubt I'll buy more stuff, because I absolutely cannot resist the clever new items they keep coming up with. My only concession to any kind of restraint is that I will take a set amount of cash (okay, amount still to be determined) and won't spend any more than that. Whenever I attend one of these events, I get excited and feel so motivated to get going again. So, I'm going to hope that it does that for me this weekend, and that I can find some way to actually get going on some projects I've been thinking about for awhile, a long while.