Meet Matilda Mallstomper

Cheryl Isaak wrote:

What Mirjam thinks of as "scrapbooking" is not the craft practiced by so
many today. I have several of my DMIL's scrapbooks. They are quite plain by
today's standards.

Actually, some of those old scrapbooks are truly amazing
works of art, including beautiful drawings and watercolors and
such, though you're absolutely correct that others are very plain.
Nevertheless, then and now some people come by that form of
expression easily and others don't--and just because it doesn't
come easily to them doesn't mean they don't want to document
the lives of their families. Hence the brisk business in
scrapbooking products, stores, magazines, classes, and so forth
these days ;-)

Best wishes,
Ericka

Karen C - California wrote:


I'm with Cheryl -- I don't "get" the current scrapbooking trend. Doesn't stop
me from buying their fabulous pre-printed papers and borders, to use for
writing letters, but my photos are in a box with the important information
written on the back of them. So often, in the background of old family photos,
was something of far more interest than the people in front -- an old car, a
house, etc. -- I could never bring myself to cut out just the face and discard
the historical details some future generation would find intriguing.

Really? Now, *that* I get. Haven't really been bitten
by the bug, but I understand it ;-) Part of it, of course, is
marketing driven. But part, I think, is that in our fast-paced
lives where far too little is stable, people long to record their
history and tell their stories in ways that will endure and that
allow them to reflect. I don't think that desire is new, which
is why scrapbooks and journals and such have long existed, but
I think many people find it especially salient now. A lot of people
have discovered that they have essentially lost their family
history. I think the huge upswing in genealogy is related as
well.

Best wishes,
Ericka

In article , "Dr. Brat"
writes:

I DO NOT, however, spend hours looking for just the right anything.

Which makes you a scrapbooker, not an "addict". I've been standing in front of
the sticker rack at Michael's and heard them fuss because they finally found
the perfect Elmo/Barbie/Mickey except that he/she is facing the wrong
direction. I've never been rude enough to suggest that they reverse the layout
of the page so that the sticker *is* facing the birthday child, but the thought
has certainly crossed my mind.

(At least with rubber stamps, you can buy a Reverser -- a flat piece of rubber
onto which you stamp the original image, so you can put a mirror image onto the
paper.)

Hearing my friend's comments about how anal some of her customers can get about
having to have the perfect background, not the good enough background, and how
many times they'll re-write a sentence to get their handwriting absolutely
perfect, I think I'll stick to needlework, where a slip of the hand is easily
corrected.


--
Finished 3/17/04 -- Elmo
WIP: Fireman's Prayer, Amid Amish Life, Angel of Autumn, Calif Sampler, Holiday
Snowglobe

Paralegal - Writer - Editor - Researcher
http://hometown.aol.com/kmc528/KMC.html

Karen C - California wrote:
In article , "Dr. Brat"
writes:

I DO NOT, however, spend hours looking for just the right anything.

Which makes you a scrapbooker, not an "addict". I've been standing in front of
the sticker rack at Michael's and heard them fuss because they finally found
the perfect Elmo/Barbie/Mickey except that he/she is facing the wrong
direction. I've never been rude enough to suggest that they reverse the layout
of the page so that the sticker *is* facing the birthday child, but the thought
has certainly crossed my mind.

And if the birthday child in the picture is facing such that reversing
the layout puts him or her back to back or back to face with the sticker?

(At least with rubber stamps, you can buy a Reverser -- a flat piece of rubber
onto which you stamp the original image, so you can put a mirror image onto the
paper.)

Hearing my friend's comments about how anal some of her customers can get about
having to have the perfect background, not the good enough background, and how
many times they'll re-write a sentence to get their handwriting absolutely
perfect, I think I'll stick to needlework, where a slip of the hand is easily
corrected.

You've obviously missed all the conversations about linen vs aida,
railroading, laying tools, neat backs, whether to wear gloves while
stitching, using frames and stands and any number of other things that
people in needlework get all uptight about. Or perhaps you've never had
anyone point out all her mistakes after you've commented on how lovely a
finished piece was. You missed the conversation about exactly how the
Firehouse Angel was to be stitched (it was resolved, but it did come up)?

I guess the fact that you think that a slip of the hand is easily
corrected makes you not an addict, either, eh? (Or not terribly familiar
with drawn thread) I have to agree with the other posters who have
commented that they find your condescending attitude disturbing. If it
doesn't suit you to scrapbook, that's fine, but it is rather silly of
you to dismiss it as somehow less of a pursuit than cross stitching, for
pete's sake. I mean, it's not like you do Japanese silk embroidery or
goldwork or anything particularly creative. I can sort of understand
Mirjam or Lula dismissing it (not that they have), but where do you get
off? Replicating little dots from paper to fabric is somehow more creative?

Elizabeth
--
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~living well is the best revenge~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
The most important thing one woman can do for another is to illuminate
and expand her sense of actual possibilities. --Adrienne Rich
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ *~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Dr. Brat wrote:

I guess the fact that you think that a slip of the hand is easily
corrected makes you not an addict, either, eh? (Or not terribly familiar
with drawn thread) I have to agree with the other posters who have
commented that they find your condescending attitude disturbing. If it
doesn't suit you to scrapbook, that's fine, but it is rather silly of
you to dismiss it as somehow less of a pursuit than cross stitching, for
pete's sake. I mean, it's not like you do Japanese silk embroidery or
goldwork or anything particularly creative. I can sort of understand
Mirjam or Lula dismissing it (not that they have), but where do you get
off? Replicating little dots from paper to fabric is somehow more
creative?

Elizabeth

Speaking as a scrapbooker and as a cross stitch lover, I have put more
original, creative thought into my scrapbooks then I have in my
needlework. Yes, I do use idea books in scrapbooking, and at times have
come close to duplicating an layout exactly (I had to make adjustments
because I look one large page layout and converted it to a smaller two
page layout). Other times, I've created pages entirely from my
imagination. I have not reached that point with my needlework, and may
never do so, because of a variety of reasons. That doesn't negate the
satisfaction I get from either craft, they both call to different
aspects of who I am, and if was just one-dimensional, I would be boring.

One other note about getting a 'layout' exactly right - if it's right it
will have 'rythymn' and look pleasing to the eye, and sometimes one
misplaced element can be incredibly jarring. And re-writing sentances to
get them exactly right, can be a person trying to express their
sentiment exactly right, or want to ensure there are no mistakes,
technical or otherwise. I have ignored minor mistakes scrapbooking and
stitching, but not when there is a spelling error perserved for all time!

On another almost unrelated note, my CSB doesn't get into this
scrapbooking thing. But, she does buy the albums that have the inserts
for slips of paper to write on. She also adds stickers to her pages. I
spent some time one morning earlier this month going through her albums.
I know most of her stories, so I could figure out what was happening in
most of her albums, but the one that was the must interesting was the
one was the one where she had put the captioning in.

And finally, how people record their memories and captions is important
as well. Our family's love of pictures comes from my great-grandfather
who passed away a couple of weeks ago. At the fuenral was two pictures,
one a portrait of my great-grandparents, the other a picture of my
great-grandfather plowing with a team of four horses, a very famous
picture in the community. My cousin had typed a caption for it with an
old fashioned typewriter. The reason she did that was that was the way
my great-grandfather had captioned his pictures. In fact when I made
copies of his pictures for my scrapbooks, I sometimes also copied his
captions, or used them as titles, etc. I know I'm babbling, but this is
subject is a passion of mine. :-)

Rachel

Better still, it gives people a way to justify buying a new digital
camera and high end printer and maybe even a new computer.

Scrapbooking certainly is not my thing and probably never will be. Same
thing with keeping a diary/journal. I'm still trying to figure out what
I'm supposed to do with the "Christmas Journal" which was a gift from a
friend. This particular friend does some stitching but goes nuts over
whatever happens to be the "craft du jour" in her neck of the woods.

Ericka Kammerer wrote:
Really? Now, *that* I get. Haven't really been bitten
by the bug, but I understand it ;-) Part of it, of course, is
marketing driven.

--
Brenda
"Sometimes I'd sit and gaze for days through sleepless dreams all alone
and trapped in time." Tommy Shaw

I think Karen you touched an interesting point , not about the Coffee
event ,, which has sometimes it`s own merit and use in Human society
!!!! But about the insistance of some people , that one NEEDS to have
the RIGHT paper , the RIGHT way to write or cut up photos etc,,,
This was the point i wondered about in the first place ,,,, There Is
NO wrong or right way to remember , to arrange memorial stuff . one
should do it in whatever manner one feels is right for him/her ....I
make memorial cloth , not albums ,,, but i also made an Embroidered
`album` ,,,, with doilies representing each person, Since i had those
doilies i used them , i didn`t go out to cut them out of other places
Nore did i copy anyone`s method to do it ,,,,
mirjam

Ericka
I agree with you that people now realize the importance of keeping
information for further generations , in the form of photos/ documents
/letters etc.... and that Geneology is the other side of the same
urge. But that is just my problem with an `Organized To Numbers [or
Formats] ` scrapbooking , because eventually it will loose a lot of
the individulity , as well as valuable other info about the person
doing it.
mirjam
n Sat, 27 Mar 2004 21:16:09 -0500, Ericka Kammerer
wrote:

Karen C - California wrote:


I'm with Cheryl -- I don't "get" the current scrapbooking trend. Doesn't stop
me from buying their fabulous pre-printed papers and borders, to use for
writing letters, but my photos are in a box with the important information
written on the back of them. So often, in the background of old family photos,
was something of far more interest than the people in front -- an old car, a
house, etc. -- I could never bring myself to cut out just the face and discard
the historical details some future generation would find intriguing.

Really? Now, *that* I get. Haven't really been bitten
by the bug, but I understand it ;-) Part of it, of course, is
marketing driven. But part, I think, is that in our fast-paced
lives where far too little is stable, people long to record their
history and tell their stories in ways that will endure and that
allow them to reflect. I don't think that desire is new, which
is why scrapbooks and journals and such have long existed, but
I think many people find it especially salient now. A lot of people
have discovered that they have essentially lost their family
history. I think the huge upswing in genealogy is related as
well.

Best wishes,
Ericka

Condescending?

Well, maybe because I've done calligraphy for pay, and the first thing I was
told was that I had only one chance to get it right. When someone brings you a
$50 book for an inscription, it's going to cost you (the calligrapher) $500 if
you want to re-write it 10x till you get it perfect. You can't ask the
customer to keep going back and buying another book and another book because
you made a mistake. I did several pieces where an artist had spent dozens of
hours on the hand-painted sections -- again, I didn't have the option of
re-doing it dozens of times like I'm hearing some of my friend's customers do.
And these were projects done for pay and professional reputation; not hobbies.

Rule one, you don't write and talk at the same time. If I were phobic about
getting a caption perfect, I wouldn't write it in the middle of a scrappers'
coffee klatsch ... I'd do it at home and bring it with me.

I did my first professional newspaper layout just about 30 years ago. You work
with what you've got -- you can't send the photographer back to an event that
ended six hours ago because you'd rather have the keynote speaker looking in
the other direction. Even flipping a hand-drawn graphic was a PITA in those
days. The end result may not be perfect; we learned to live with "good enough"
when photos weren't quite what Layout wanted. Now, if a
professionally-produced newspaper can handle not-quite-perfect going out into
the world, what's the big deal about a family scrapbook having Elmo in a
less-than-perfect position?

The big question has to be "who -- other than me -- would notice?" And the
odds are ... no one. Junior's going to see that you found Elmos to match his
Elmo birthday cake. He'll probably never even guess that they were supposed to
face the other direction, if you have sufficient creativity to work around the
problem. (Either move the photo to the other side of the page, or put Elmo
somewhere else. A line of dancing Elmos across the bottom of the page would
work just fine; they don't have to be pointing at Junior.)

"God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change." Do layout
with a printer breathing down your neck for the finished pages and you learn
real fast that there are things you cannot change, and just have to live with
because you don't have time to hunt down the perfect illustration.

I'm anal about my legal work. Judges "take off points" for mistakes. With my
hobbies, a misplaced stitch is no catastrophe. If I need to substitute a
slightly different shade of pink, oh well.


--
Finished 3/17/04 -- Elmo
WIP: Fireman's Prayer, Amid Amish Life, Angel of Autumn, Calif Sampler, Holiday
Snowglobe

Paralegal - Writer - Editor - Researcher
http://hometown.aol.com/kmc528/KMC.html

S (Karen C - California) wrote in
:

Condescending?

Yes.

I'm anal about my legal work. Judges "take off points" for mistakes.
With my hobbies, a misplaced stitch is no catastrophe. If I need to
substitute a slightly different shade of pink, oh well.

I personally know about a half dozen people who scrapbook. I also
personally know about a half dozen people who do needlework of some sort.
The needleworkers are much more anal about their work than the scrapbookers
are, much more likely to rip out a day's worth of work to go back and fix
one missed stitch than are the scrapbookers. And most of the people I know
who do neither hobby just don't understand the time we invest in them.

I'm sure there are anal scrapbookers out there; they are, after all, the
ones who create the beautiful layouts in the magazines. But then again,
the people who stitch the beautiful models of cross stitch have to be just
as anal abot their work.

Just because your "friend" relates to you a story or two of a scrapbooker
redoing a page to get it just right doesn't mean all scrapbookers do that,
anymore than a story or two of a cross sticher ripping out all the
lettering on a sampler because she used DMC 502 instead of 503 by mistake
makes all cross stichers anal. Sure would like to know who this friend is,
so I can make sure I never shop in her store. She seems to have such a low
regard for the people from whom she makes a living.

K