Scrapbooking and other "hobbies"

Hmm, what is a hobby anyway? Well, here we go:

hobby
A	noun
	1	avocation, by-line, hobby, sideline, spare-time activity
				an auxiliary activity

By all rights, I have no business having any hobbies because I am seriously lacking in the "spare-time" that is apparently a requirement to having one!

Strangely enough I have a lot of things that I like to do when I have a few moments of spare-time, which is what presents a problem! I don't just have one hobby. So, when I have a few moments, it's always a big decision as to which hobby I'm going to work on at that time.

Well, a few years ago I decided I wanted to have a scrapbook for each of the children. At the time, we only had 3. This still seemed a daunting task, as our eldest was already 4 at the time. I decided, nevertheless, to proceed. I waited for the Sunday paper and headed off to Michael's with my ad (amazingly, scrapbooks were on sale that week - go figure!) and picked up 3 albums.

Now what.

I decided that instead of trying to go back in time and start with each of their baby pics, etc. that I would just start w/the present and since each of the children had just had their birthdays, that seemed a logical place to start. I spent a few days (when I had a spare moment, ha ha) picking out pictures that I wanted to use for each of the children's books, uploaded them to my favorite picture place and put in my order. Then, I waited.

While I was waiting, I picked up a package of scrapbook papers at Wal-mart or somewhere, maybe I got them at Michael's the day I got the books...I don't remember. I also looked around for some suitable stickers to match their birthday themes and resumed waiting for the pictures to arrive in the mail.

A few days later they arrived and looked fine. Now, for some of that "spare time" to come along again. On a quiet Sunday afternoon while the children all took a nap after services, I commenced working on their books. Somehow, I got all 3 done. Miss A's was my favorite when it was all said and done. Why, you ask? Well, for some reason I'd taken the time w/her pics to add borders on all of them that had a complimentary color to a part of the picture and it just gave her pages a much more "polished" look.

So...what did I do today? I've been thinking about those scrapbooks off and on lately. Thinking about the fact that not only have I not touched them since that quiet Sunday afternoon a few years back, but I've never even gotten a book for our 4th little one, Mr. A. Ack! And now, baby #5 is on his/her way and I'll need yet another book. So, my eyes are open for another sale at Michael's and/or their 40% off coupons so I can procure 2 more books. And, today, I've been spending part of "quiet time/nap time" preparing pics to be ordered. I'd like to at the very least catch up on birthdays from the ones I did a few years ago until this year.

Today, so far, I have selected and added borders to pics from Miss E's 4th birthday. Mr. E came in a few mn. ago to see what I was up to and proclaimed that they all looked funny - he was a wee little man then and chuckled when I showed him a pic of himself w/cake all over his chubby little cheeks. Time has flown the past 7 years since we had our first and I'm sure will continue to do so as the years roll on.

Here's a shot of little Miss E at 4 years old with her first pair of glasses -


The scrapbooks are pretty simple, background paper at times and a few stickers here and there w/some journaling about the pics that have been included, but that's about it. I honestly don't have the time to figure out all the other do-dads that are available and I really don't think we need all of that in the long run. Sure, it looks nice, but sometimes it just seems a bit too much - for now, we'll just keep it simple around here.

Now, to just get Miss E's 5th, 6th and 7th birthdays...and Miss A's and Mr. E's and Mr. A's and ....well, this might take me awhile!