I have a sort of love-hate relationship with journaling. It's the hardest part of a scrapbook page for me, but recently it's getting easier thanks to a couple of developments in my personal scrappy life.
First off, I credit journaling spots for my sudden interest in adding more writing to my pages. Journaling spots are nothing new, but they're something that I decided to allow myself to stockpile as design elements about a year or so ago. Since then the collection has grown, just a little. In fact, it's grown even more since I took these photos in January as part of my scrap room tour.
At first, I had no intention of actually adding much writing at all to the spots. They were simply smaller bits of patterned paper, perhaps a frame for an embellishment cluster or some simple text declaring the place, date, and time.
But, let's face it, journaling spots are one of the greatest scrapping inventions ever, and they're sneaky little guys, too!
Because once I had added one to a page, all those little lines started quietly whispering "fill us, fill us," and strange things began to happen.
This layout, scrapped and blogged earlier this summer, is one of those strange things. I had intended to just focus on the photos, play with embellishments, and just make something pretty. The journaling lines might get partially filled with the place, date, and the fact that I like to look at and take pictures of pretty marine creatures, but that was it.
But then I started writing, and this is what came out:
"We used to go to the aquarium in Chattanooga quite often- we even had a membership. I'm not quite sure why we stopped visiting. I guess life just got to busy. I want to focus on making it un-busy again. I want to have time again for things like spending hours taking photos of fish..."
I remember adding the date, putting my pen down, and just staring at the page, wondering where in the world that had come from! Every word of it was honest, but it was far from the simple blurb about pretty fish that I had meant to write.
Since then, this has happened with me a few more times- not on every page, of course, but I've learned to just roll with it when it does. It occurred to me recently that I'm finally telling my story. Because you do realize that's what you're doing when you scrapbook, right? Telling your story. Not the story, not a story.
Your story.
Now, go tell it!