Hey Scrappers!

I recently read this article by lifehacker about memory & taking photos.  As a memory keeper the title really bothered me.  The nutshell version is that they had students tour a museum where they were told to take photos of some items and just look at other items, then given a test on their memory of the items.  The students remembered details of things they’d NOT photographed better than what they had.  But the REAL gem in this article/study was near the end.  Research suggests that reviewing your photos DOES improve memory.  However, they argued that we take many, many photos that we never review again.  That is certainly true.  I often take photos for a completely different reason that to remember something.  Just last night I took a photo of my newly repaired Nikon just to share my excitement on Instagram that I’m finally able to work again.  If you look at my photo stream, amid the photos of Disney & carving jack-o-lanterns & my daughter opening her mission call; there are tons of photos I took for a reason other than memory keeping.

But I DO take photos for memory keeping.  And I KNOW it improves my memory.  The older I get the more it’s true that the ONLY things I remember are the things in the scrapbook.  Or at least the things I remember best.  LOL!  So to really remember something, you should photograph it, journal about it, scrap it, and enjoy those layouts again and again.

The past month I’ve felt like I had one of my legs in a cast…or maybe both legs at some point.  The graphics card (and thereby the whole logic board) on my Mac went out while we were on vacation (it was a working vacation for me…without being able to work!) and had to be replaced.  Then on the last day of our vacation, my Nikon accidentally crashed to the cement floor.  I limped along through the month.  I got my computer back late last weekend and my camera arrived fresh from Nikon last night.  And I’m  feeling like my cast has just been removed.  I’m able to walk, but still a bit wobbly.  I can’t WAIT to dive into kit designing.  In just a few minutes when I hit submit, I’m pulling out the clay and creating the ideas that have been swimming in mind for the past weeks.  (I need the Nikon to photograph the clay.)  SIGH!  So glad to be back.

In the meantime, I’ve pulled out a couple of items that were previous participation prizes:

NEW!

AND

It coordinates with the O Holy Night Collection which was released in December. Check your stash, it was also a participation prize for our December Scrap Twister game.

Here’s a couple of favorite layouts from our CT

So I’ll see you next week with a hot-off-the-presses new kit!