And we’re back…

Hello! Thank you all for your comments and encouragement. I have to apologize for the 2 weeks that have gone by since my last post. The first week was taken up by an impromptu but happy trip to see my in-laws. The second was usurped by a somewhat less impromptu, but more necessary,  surgery.

To be honest, the surgery itself was an outpatient affair, and I was home in less than 6 hours. The greatest lingering after effect, aside from severe paranoia about bumping my stitches, has been a case of vertigo. A little dizziness isn’t that rare for me (thanks allergies!) but right now there are moments when I’m sitting completely still and the room spins around me.  In the grand scheme of problems this is minor, and I’m grateful for that. It’s getting better every day, but for the last week I’ve tried to spend as much time as possible sitting still in one place.

This is a crafting liability, however. It’s hard to knit or crochet when the stitches appear to be moving. My scrapbooking supplies are all over the house. I have a hard enough time keeping my sewing even when things are normal. And soap, candle, and cooking crafts all mean standing up for a while and risking spilling hot liquids on me (once again, already a problem on the most steady of days.) With these silly, but slightly hazardous conditions, I find myself turning more to a great craft for staying in one place, digital scrapbooking.

When I originally heard about digital scrapbooking I was skeptical. The fun of scrapbooking (and paper crafts in general) is the fun of playing with paper, right? Well, I quickly learned that digital scrapbooking allowed me to reproduce some of the most complex paper scrapbooking concepts more quickly, more affordably, and more precisely personalized for my tastes. There are also forms of digital papercrafting that let you create practical everyday items, but we’ll talk more about that tomorrow.

If you’re interested in learning more about digital scrapbooking, my friend Jennifer at Simple Scrapper has written the book blog on the subject.

Two Peas in a Bucket also has a brief overview of creating your first layout.

When I started I needed about 15 minutes to download a trial version of the Photoshop Elements and a few free kits and get started. Compared to the common startup costs for paper scrapbooking, this felt instantaneous. As an example for how easy it can be to get started, I created this page in about 15 minutes I was able to use one of the free templates from SimpleScrapper.com and the free Crazy Beautiful Kit by Fei Fei’s Stuff.

The And we’re back… by FasterCraft, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.