Scrappin' the"Stash" Challenge: Day 8

I have completed Week 1 of my 6-Week Scrappin' Challenge. My goal is to minimize the "overwhelming" and bring back the "fun," so I set up some very limiting parameters for myself in the areas of photos, products, inspiration and time. I am happy to report that after scrappin' within my parameters for one week, I found myself much less overwhelmed, much more organized and having fun! Here's the breakdown and my layout photos scattered below. NOTE: My photos are not good today. I am not sure why, but I am not going to take the time to retake them, upload them, optimize them, etc. The idea here is just to show you that I am, indeed, scrappin'! (I do still need to journal, which will be part of today's "Stash Stint.")

PHOTOS:
I decided to start working my way through my 1999 photos, which are the oldest set of photos that I have organized chronologically into photo-sleeve protectors. I can easily sift through them and decide which photos to scrapbook, which to put into my category drawers and which to throw away. I generally start most of my scrapbooking layouts with the kits (scrappin' for the website), but for this challenge, I will primarily be starting each layout with the photos, which seems more natural. This week, I started with the first set of photos from 1999, and they just happened to be cruise photos from the only cruise we have ever taken.

INSPIRATION:
After seeing how many photos I had to work with and deciding to tackle these cruise photos as a set, I looked at the two 2-page sketches that are on my approved sketch list for this challenge. It took me about 2.5 seconds to decide on Sketch #8. I grouped my photos into (4) groups of 8 photos and knew I would be creating (4) 2-page layouts. (Tomorrow's blog post breaks down the sketch below with sizes of paper and photos so that if you are using the same (7) sketches that I'm using this month, you won't have to spend your precious 70-minutes figuring out paper and photo sizes!)

PRODUCTS:
I'm a kit-girl, baby, so layout kits are my easy-go-to. I have all of my kits in vertical storage, so it is easy to flip through the kits and see the color/style combos. For 8 pages, I knew I would need a kit with some extra coordinating papers, and it took me about 5 minutes to find the Prima Alla-Prima kit and some extra coordinating cardstock for the bases. I changed up the paper combos on the layouts, but I used the same cardstock for all 8 pages.

TIME:
I did find that I didn't immediately put everything down and walk away after 70 minutes, as I was generally in the middle of something I wanted to finish. So, I typically spent an extra 10-15 minutes or so after the timer went off. This was alright though, because I was only able to get in (4) stints instead of (5), so the extra minutes at the end of every stint probably made up for the stint I missed.

NOTES:
The most time-consuming part of the process was actually working through the sketch - measuring the papers and photos and cutting everything so it would fit the way I wanted it to. I found that once I had worked out all of the measurements for the first layout, the other three layouts came together much more quickly because I had everything written down and I could refer back. This made me realize just how smart it is to re-use the sketches that I like over and over again because I only have to spend the time to "figure the layout out" once.

I struggled with embellishing the layouts, and I didn't end up doing much. I always struggle with this step, and I'm not sure how to make this easier yet...

I find I also have a hard time telling myself that I am done creating with a particular kit. I want to keep getting more layouts and cards out of it even when I'm totally bored with it or I'm down to paper nubs and the weird stickers. I find I spend way too much time and energy trying to figure out how to use the leftovers elsewhere. I have to figure out how to strike a balance between using it up and letting it go!  Any suggestions??

Okay, there you have it. My layouts are simple, and I'm choosing to be okay with that and feel good about "done!" How did your first week go?