I've always needed to have a creative outlet in my life. My favorite is writing. I love to write letters (actual hand-written letter sent by snail-mail!), journals for my children (I plan to give the journals to them for graduation someday), short stories, and even one fictionalized biography of my dad and his family (which I may never choose to publish). I've been a contributor to our state's largest newspaper, and I've written for an online magazine in the past. Many people have asked in recent years why I don't blog... I guess I didn't feel like I had anything to blog about until now.
There are other "artsier" ways that I like to be creative. Painting and drawing used to be passions of mine. I've been known to give my paintings as wedding and Christmas gifts. When I was a senior in high school, I was commissioned by my hometown librarian to paint a scene of her husband's childhood farm. She then had it framed in boards that had been salvaged from the century old barn on that farm. I'd still love to paint, but it's difficult to find time or space to do that with three children. I have also done calligraphy on the invitations for several graduations and weddings. With all of the fancy fonts out there, this is not a talent that is requested very often anymore.
So, the creative outlet I use the most nowadays is scrapbooking. My sister invited me to a Close to My Heart party about 8 years ago, and I've been hooked ever since. I'm nowhere near as talented at it as many others (including my sister), but I really enjoy it. My point in all of this creativity blather is that I highly recommend documenting your ABC summers in one way or another. My method of choice is to scrapbook our adventures for each child.
You will not see many photos of my children on this blog. I'm not only anal, but also paranoid about having my children's pictures online. You also will not see my children's given names on here. I'll likely refer to them by their initials or as #1, #2, and #3. That said, I am posting the scrapbook pages that I created for our first blowout ABC summer in 2009. I used the same layout for both children, but changed the look somewhat.
I have yet to do layouts for last summer's big ABC extravaganza. First of all, I haven't found another layout that will hold 26 photos and journaling. Secondly, it took me a lot of hours to make the 2009 pages and I know I have three layouts to do this time. And thirdly, I just haven't frankly found the time to scrapbook at all since July! But, I will get there. I've never been more than a year behind in my scrapbooking and I don't plan to start now. That said, if any of you have seen layout ideas that will hold that many photos, I'd be ever-so-grateful if you would share those with me.
Maybe you are a crafty person. You can probably come up with a Pinterest-worthy craft to record your ABC summer. More power to you! I love seeing everyone else's crafts. I'll post our 2012 ABC summer scrapbook pages when I finally get to them. Being the anal mom that I am, I insist on scrapbooking my pages in chronological order, and I'm up to my daughter's 5th birthday last March. I still have a few more to do before I get to the summer months. ;)
Crafty or creative... I look forward to seeing and hearing how others will document their ABC summers! (And I promise only one more post is coming before I start with the letter "A!")
*For those new to my blog, check out the beginnings of ABC Summers here.*
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