Organizing, Grouping and 2 Weeks Before the Mast

January is a time for me to regroup on the home front; I think it is the same for many of us. While I love the holidays, I also appreciate the relative calm that shuffles in with January. One of the informal resolutions I make each year concerns scrapbooking and holding onto the stories of what our life is like right now. Last year I had resolved to do the pages of the same month, but from the previous year. So, in January 2013 I did the pages for January 2012. That worked until about spring break and then it all fell apart. I ended up doing the pages in great chunks during jags of time and spurts of creativity (which often do not coincide).

I have found that getting my pictures chosen and "placed" on the digital pages allows me to work more effectively. It allows me to sit down and work for small amounts of time. The photo above is a screenshot from my Adobe Bridge software. You can see that the photos are digitally stacked and ready to go. When I am ready to do a page I will review only those files, instead of everything in the folder for that month. Sometimes I have enough photos that I actually create a two page spread. Other times I will simply not use all of the images I have chose. I have also started selecting 2 main fonts for each year. One for titles and one for storytelling. This lends a sense of continuity through out my book. I am happy to report that I have all of the pages organized for 2013. I am still working on pages for 2012, but hope to get those done soon. I am currently working on pages for November, 2012.

I've also spent some time helping Ethan do the paperwork for his application to work on a tall ship. It is very exciting, but my what a lot of paperwork.

(Grays Historical Seaport Harbor)

It is a very exciting opportunity and I really hope it works out for him. I think it will. He talked with folks from the organization and they do not see any reason why he could not go. Still, we will wait for an official word and dates for a voyage. The rather tricky thing is that you cannot rent a car until you are 25. This means that Ethan will fly to California and have to take a taxi, series of buses, etc. to get to the historical port where the ships are docked. I think he is spending today considering the new gear that he may need to purchase.

(Two Tall Ships)
This organization runs the Lady Washington and the Hawaiian Chieftan. The Lady Washington was the Black Pearl in "The Pirates of the Caribbean" movies. The other tall ship was part of the Royal Army in those movies.

(Lady Washington)
Ethan would love to be on either ship, but he seems to prefer the Lady Washington.

(Lady Washington and Hawaiian Chieftain)
I wish I had been both brave enough to do stuff like this when I was 20 years old, and had the wherewithall to even know that such opportunities existed.