Indicision & Jars Filled with Memories

I love playing and working with paper. But I must admit... I HATE scrapbooking! I can admire scrapbooking that others do! I love all the journaling and embellishments! I just flat-out can't do it!

I find with scrapbooking that I am unable to make a decision! Put this here? How about there? Add this charm? Add that trim? I add. I subtract. I move this. I reposition that. I am more indecisive than a chameleon walking past a rainbow striped wall!

What is it with me and scrapbooking!? I did manage to make scrap books (okay scrap booklets) for my sisters. The books are filled with memories of our one of 'sisters club holiday' in Shellman Bluff. The good thing about our holidaying in Shellman Bluff is that life moves so slow - that the same memory book remains in effect year after year after year! I have to admit...they are very cute!

I also made them an 'old fashioned' photo album. This one commemorating a sisters trip to Okoboji. No embellishments....just photos and a few running comments. AGAIN...making three identical books....NOT FUN! But knowing they enjoy them...THAT is fun!

Instead of a scrapbook I got the idea to assemble scrapbook items and throw them into a jar! The lazy-man's scrapbook method! Maybe lazy - but SMART! We can add to the jars and update the key in a flash! 

But not a plain jar! I did 'fancy it up!

This is the tag...on the back is a pocket that houses the 'key' to the jar items. (Just in case the sissies didn't understand my thought process...that is an entire blog to itself!)

Gail's Memory Jar

Memory jar contents including wee bedroom slippers (stolen from my years of Barbie doll playing - made by my mother); punched leaves (the awesome beauty of fall at The Lakes (Okoboji); a seam ripper (we quilt - therefore we rip!); a bit of netting (shrimp fishing); coffee beans (we drink ALOT of coffee and it is a reminder of a FABULOUS shop in Esterville, IA 'Cool Beans').... 

MORE! A Florida license plate with punches half punched along the side (we were in Jacksonville, FL the year of the infamous 'hanging chads'); a skull & cross bones (our nightly boat bar stop in Okoboji "Pirate Jacks"); a little cooking pan (for all the amazing homemade cooking we enjoy - cooked by sista Judy); a snippet of a dryer sheet (Jimmy told us the way to keep the dock gnats away was to rub dryer sheets on our skin....I think this southern born and bred told us this KNOWING FULL WELL THAT THE GNATS WOULD LOVE dryer sheet slathered skin!); YES that is a bra hook.... That was a random moment that will NEVER be forgotten...

Here is a photo of the moment...one that can never be explained or understood! What the heck!?! It was too far from the beach (or bar) to make any sense! I just know it was a photo op made in heaven for my little 'traveling gnome' Bobbins!

Of course this 'random act of support' had to make it into the memory jar!

Are you tired of looking yet?

I started with a small jar. Upped it to a medium size jar when the small jar was overflowing. Then moved to a LARGE jar when I realized the number of memories was abundant! Here we have some bling (there is a bling-worthy memory that was WORTHY of the memory jar); a wine charm (yes - we drank lots of wine); a sugar packet (for all the times we NORTHERNERS would forget to order tea "unsweetened"); a Hostess cupcake top that represents a laugh meltdown; a Barbie wig (to memorialize the CREEPY mannequins we encountered in an Iowa fabric shop). Also...a wee roll of toilet paper, a peanut, a crown, a very important little red truck, some sesame seeds, an ice cream cone, a palm tree, a telephone, a tree spirit, a tiny passport and more!

Making these books and jars, made me so crazy that I ended up not making either of the memory books or jars for myself. THREE of each was enough! Lucky for me the memories remain so vivid and fresh that I don't even regret not having one for myself. I had my walk down memory lane putting them together...in TRIPLICATE!

Now...on to the card! AGAIN with the indecision! I made a card using vellum then decided to make another one using drywall mesh. I'm claiming it's not really indecision if I end up with TWO cards!

 Thinking Vellum

~Base card PaperTrey Ink Kraft card stock

~Sentiment by JustRite

~Strip orange card stock

~Vellum dotted with aqua Sharpie and edge smudged with Palette Beaux Arts Blue

~Image stamped using Stampin' Up Early Espresso ink, edges smudged with orange ink - Hero Arts Dandelion Frame

~Three burlap flowers by The Paper Studio

Thinking Dry Wall Tape

~Base card PaperTrey Ink Hawaiian Shores

~Image stamped using Stampin' Up Chocolate Chip, edges smudged with SU Sahara Sand

~Dry wall mesh

~Strip orange card stock with JustRite sentiment

~Colored craft wire

~TThree burlap flowers by The Paper Studio

Challenges|Inspirations

Just Us Girls - trend week - burlap

Retro Sketches - sketch

Stamping Sensations - anything

Fusion - color inspirations

Polkadoodles - kraft

Tuesday Throw Down - use metal

Thanks for clicking by and putting up with my rambling!

How blessed am I that I needed progressively larger jars to try to contain our sisters holiday memories! 

Here's to incredible and lasting sissy memories, dissolving into giggles at the mere mention of things like Hostess cupcakes and taking cheese from strangers, and indecision...I think...maybe...I'll get back to you on that!

Nancy in Iowa