Lessons

Lesson Info

Write a Love Letter

Okay so you will have your mission statements handy as we go forward I'm and ask you to refer back to them over the next two days because again we can easily get lost because we have so many stories right now you might be thinking I don't have anything to talk about but we want those floodgates open you will realize how many stories you actually do have to tell so we can get overwhelmed by that we can get overwhelmed by the shoe boxes of photos that we have we can get overwhelmed by the product nobody has too much product today I think it's harder for digital because you never use it up it's just always barely taken use up a letter sticker seat or something like that but uh anyway I admire your your your ability with the dj stuff because uh tracy's working at me with that okay so what we're going to do a little exercise now so if you can pull out your groove books and I'm going to do a little explanation on what these are for our friends at home so a group book it is a book of up to on...

e hundred photos that are down there actually thie app it's an app for android as well as for iphone and they grab the photos from your social media streams from your phone basically and then they print them out for you and they come in these little books and they come with a date at the top of when the photo was taken, they get grabbed that I guess out of the meta data and then then they ship them to you on a monthly basis. So it's sort of like a netflix type of model where you you get something on a monthly basis and they're really inexpensive their two dollars in ninety nine cents for up to one hundred photos and you can choose which photos you want to include in your group book you khun have multiples if you want to because you know you want to share them and group book has been kind enough to offer us a coupon in the pre reg materials in the start with story pdf that we've we've made available to people who register and you can get a free group book but other than that two dollars, ninety nine cents per month for one hundred photos that a pretty darn good deal because a lot of people the barrier is getting the photos off their phone because that's where most people take most photos these days. So anyway, our friends here in our audience with the exception of tracy because she building a seat for me ugo okay, okay, you have voted yet, okay, great, so we're going to go through our photos and what I would love for you to d'oh going here is just go through here, find a photo that you love of a person place thing it could be, you know, your your daughter, your son could be your starbucks coffee mug in the morning. It could be a view that you love whatever you love, pull it out, and then we're going to spend just about five to seven minutes with a piece of card stock in this car stuck on the table here in front of you can choose whatever color you want, you're just going to write a love letter to that thing person, whatever it might be so it might be, oh, starbucks, how I love you, you wake me up in the morning, you always do. You never let me down. I mean, it could be as phileas you like as deep and meaningful as you like, it could just be just something from your heart and don't overthink it to stick. If I were talking to this person right now and I had a chance to just speak to them from my heart and say, this is what I want to share with you, then that's what you would do, so we're gonna go and do that if you're at home, you can definitely do this, describe your photos, flip through them on your phone don't get hung up and choosing just go with the first one that you see and don't worry also about the pen or anything right now, all we're doing is getting down to the basics here that this is a story we want to tell or emotions we want to share and just make it easy on yourself, and I want to remind people out there who are watching. If you're just watching this and you're not in the chat rooms, you are missing out. This is a collaborative experience, so if you're watching right now, click on that live chat but jump into the chat rooms and as lane is telling our studio audience what they're gonna be doing here, hands on, you can do the same things at home. You know, you may not have a partner at your table here, but everyone in the chat room is helping each other out all of your partner's air in there, you can make some new friends who are also in a scrap booking already we see people in there who are connecting love this, chris. So, you know, there are a couple of people coming on saying, oh, you know, I scrapped with my friend over here of issues in the check. And then all the people saying, I don't have scrap of friends that, like, you know, yeah, actually there in the chat room, yeah, it's a big part of this and I know that our students here, a bunch of them said, oh, I do it for the social action on you right now don't have that social aspect in real time, right next to you, you have it online in the chat room, so jump in there if you're not already in there, grab over here happening don't worry about grammar spelling none of that you have penmanship? No, none of that counts. This is just practice. I love a j and genetic beer on the chat says lady, you're the reason I'm on my third group book awesome, I noticed believing that you're a color uh yeah different is it every month different? You know, for me they've come every month, but these are just the ones I've received, so I don't know if if you get a different one every month like everybody gets the same one or if they on a monthly basis yes and that's quote, very hand isn't you can go in may or stick stickers on this is made right, you know how many stickers d'oh? I know you can almost hear them we just don't understand why we didn't get a great book and some cod stocks I know about how do you know? How do you tell your story? With a desk and a computer way? We're connecting our stories with people in the chat room? They're all sharing, and I think it's great now that a lot of people in the chat are sharing their location and so does anyone else live in my city? Is anyone else nearby so they could actually in real time in real life, people in your life that, you know, we've seen a huge drop in the number of scrap book store's specialty stores talk about craft stores, but the specialty stores that used to provide a place for that quilting bee aspect that jane was talking about earlier, and with them going away, it could be harder to connect with scrap pickers in your area. So I love that people online are connecting up that way that's wonderful because there's something about doing it all together, it can be a main being now I'm always curious to hear sort of the thought process of you guys when you are you're focused, you're quiet, you're writing, but what's going on in your mind right now as you're kind of piecing this together. And so you find it harder. You well, I have the pencil on purpose. I want your focus, you know? You don't let me interfere, but I'm just curious and a lot of people out there that prompt helps like a love letter that that helps like to just look at a picture and to start writing to me that, like that's, just anxiety like my heart, just like what the promise health and that just pencil is interesting because line on you a fan of the felt tip pen isolated community like get that thing down and don't think twice, yeah, if I have to go back, and if I give myself permission to go back and edit, then it opens up a whole new that's a good point, a whole new level of of refinement, I guess, and some people prefer that and again, it's a personal, personal choice, but I'm all about getting that done and getting getting it on. Yeah, you're right, that is a personal choice, and I know that in our starter kit we have some, you know, some different supplies people could get started with everyone's going to have their own unique supplies that they like right there they're gonna have their own writing utensils that they they perceive to be better than others, so everyone out there is unique yeah it's definitely personally contained over time teo and for different stories if I have a story and I'm gonna share page later on that might be a little bit longer and I'm I want to be very specific about the words I might do it on the computer and prints that out and add that in whereas other pages that I dio are just you know, quick stories that I know I've got my brain and I don't have to agonize over the choice um I would say eighty to ninety percent of my pages are hand written and then just a very few hansel are computer generated journaling but again it's it's some people they get held up by their handwriting that's may I'm indecipherable weii it's almost become painful the rain because I'm not used tio so do what's easy for you do what's comfortable and forget about this is what I should be doing here this is what everybody else does or anything like that and you might find yourself setting a new trend way do have a segment on social made here and that that that we were well snapchat or whatever is also part of rice story, right? Exactly exactly yeah and it could be done that's pre done and you just added in from my social media a lot for my especially for my pocket pages uh I pull I'll just copy and paste journaling and put it right on the photo and printed out good to go right yeah if you're spending the time doing it already why replicated and yeah I agree we'll go a couple more minutes here and yeah no I saw the camera come out grab ok that's very curious maybe there are other people online that are doing similar things but what are you specifically taking photos of just right now I just want to take this environment right here what I'm doing now so tomorrow is going to be a new day I won't remember that this was our first exercise yeah I will look here it is a group that way it's like one of those years with miers because then you could scrapbook your group syrian I think reason tio pictures that sometimes it goes from the physical world into the digital world is it's all the same that something yeah I mean the barriers between everything they're coming down becoming more permeable whether whether you're talking about getting them the materials online and putting them off line and vice versa there's a whole move towards hybrid scrapbooking which is a combination of the two where you might print out digital elements or print out a digital page and add physical elements there's so many options these days so wherever you are whatever you enjoy doing there's a way to scrapbook that will meet you where you are even if you're just too simple you know photo book person we're going to talk about that but there's no excuse not describe look and we're actually going to be talking a little bit later about what everybody scrapbook this is like awesome, so furious with the group book, will you all when you choose your photos, will you rip it out of the gold or do you keep the group book as a group book and then do you go find the photo and printed again? So how do you I actually use the group book as is I pull the photos out there perforated and so you if they've got the date in the time of the top so I just hold it and then I usually trim off the perforation because my oh ct shows there get a little hanging chads off, but you definitely could use it as a sort of catalog and say, ok, well, I want a scrapbook about this and I want a photo because a lot of people print photos at home, I would like the photo to be four by six or a wallet size or that and use it as as more of a catalog, but I actually use them right out of the group book yeah, and they're very lightweight so they don't add a lot of bulk to your page and for the price they're they're very well I think it's a good quality definitely for the price you can spend up to two dollars plus per print some places to get like a professional quality photo that's not really what I'm trying to do although there are some certain photos that I might want to invest a little bit more and so this is perfect because the barrier again getting the photos off the phone into my hands because if I sit down and then you replace the cartridge and then it prints wrong you get the stripes and I just love having these so easy and it's grabbing grow a grab and go oh I love that filters and stuff and have three copies of the same picture come out that's great I haven't tried that but yeah yeah and you could order when for your mom to get shipped to her so she's getting photos every month of the family and or just border doubles and so you have them on hand so it's great for that as well get the students is one quick check in with chat room now we've been seeing so much engagement with everybody the chat room we love this people sharing where they're from they're connecting with the fellow scrap bookers in the chat room and it's fantastic keep it up we love to have that we want to get more interaction from all of you as we proved progress with this course and just one quick comment I want to read from barb in a k they say this is why I come the lanes events this interactions she truly makes me feel welcome and like on really there so a lot of you online we hope you do feel like you're here we'd love to have you but you know we can't fit all of you in the studio but wait could have been in some of them wait here yeah weighing you guys but yeah so we appreciate the interaction keep it going it's a big part of this court great. Thank you, barb. You might another alaska scrapbook er alas it is not a big state. You probably know each other that's okay, so does anybody have one that they would like to share? You want to read it to it? It's a steer baseball I want to tell you how much I love you. I can't say when this obsession started but it was something that has been a that has had a special place in my heart for a long time. One of my favorite things is the first day of the season like christmas new year on my birthday all rolled into one oh, I love it and what a sweet page I mean, who would have thought to write a love letter to baseball but it comes across it's cute but it's so it's authentic as well and I love that thank you who's your baseball team now everybody is going way ticket for my scrapbook times oh that's great you know you're bringing the two together I love that great and so would you like to share yours? Sure um I had a picture here that my aunt sent me of my grandfather so it just says gramps, I love this picture of you for so many reasons that smile the fact that there's a pot of flowers sitting next to you the sunshine as I grow older I realized so much of who we are as a family and the stamp that we've all made on the world is because of you I can only hope that we've lived in a way that makes you proud because to know all that you've gone through to get us to the place that we are here and now was worth it I love how you found a story within the photo like about the part of the flowers and you know and it's very touching and bringing that together it makes a nice bridge between the words in the photo and it was going to make people look at the photo more closely because you pull those details out of love that I love that you willing to share in it and if anybody's uncomfortable sharing please to stay past tracey c oh yeah there's a picture of my parents with my son and their other grandchild on my nephew my mom's not scrap bookers not memory keeper but she is obsessed with having pictures of grandma grandpa and the two grandsons and now we have a granddaughter she has a granddaughter as well every time we see them which is about once a month we have to stage a photo of them together always such as this one my sons about a year and I wrote I love this photo of mom dad timothy and trevor the shares such a special bond I'm so glad that we're able to spend so much time together there's nothing more important to me than family I feel so grateful to my parents for teaching me through example the family's everything oh I love that and what a special album that would be just to have all those photos through the year and I offered to make her one but no she wanted one of the big photos you ugo all right e I chose my middle son and uh because he he often feels like he's not being chosen because he's the middle child yeah so that's actually what I wrote about um I said your dear just sia I hope you never forget how much I love you I know that sometimes it's hard being the middle child you are always getting yelled at or bossed around it feels like do not forget that you are special unique and wonderful just the way you are you are funny smart, creative, loving happy social and vibrant oh he's gonna love that when he finally looks at your school books I want actually does well that's great you know he'll read it all that's sweet thank you makes europe or is in the water oh that's a beautiful photo thank you every monday wednesday and friday I rolled the sun up with my fellow rowers getting it but don many people stare at me with a right why don't I do it the reflections of the war in the water the shadows from the gliding boat the camaraderie growing the senate makes me feel alive three and happy this is my or me waking up uh that's beautiful and I like that you chose the blue paper too lovely lovely well mine is a picture of my best friend from growing up in my three children and she passed away several years ago so I had the book's there the hurt photos all shoved into a shoe box a little scared to pull them out and that this the memories with her are amazing and my rhoda scott stevens sean and bath what a wonderful day beth came to visit her family for the week glazing mornings busy days fun times on this particular day we went to sterling winery beth was petrified of the tram ride to the top of the winery so we laughed at her terror on the ride she was a great sport kids loved having her with us for the week they were very comfortable and happy with her. It was such a hot day, we arrived to the tasting room and were given snapple's for the kids and wine for beth and me, we were so thirsty that we hope the wind down immediately and people looked at it's, a maze that were so includes we didn't care, we laughed about it throughout the wine, all throughout the wine tour. Well, so it's, nice being able to pull out one picture of her and disconcerting one picture in all the other ones that went with right, less overwhelmed, right? Right? And I my life really is a series of stories and the photos, conservative pumps we're going to talking about that that could take us in different directions, and we're never going to be able to scrap book all the stories justus we're never going to be able to scrap book all the photos and picking one at a time is really what it's about it's just wanted a time. Whatever comes up first for you and that's something I talk a lot about when I teach some of my other classes and challenges is I might give you a prompt that that encourages you to do x, y and z, but you choose to go in a different direction because that's, the story you wanted to tell, go there. Whatever story it is, and sometimes, especially when you're dealing with something that that is painful or has some, some satur, heavier emotions attached. One at a time is all. You know, the idea of sitting down and doing a scrapbook about her could be just too too overwhelming. But you've done one story, and it tells a lot about her. Just from that. So thank you for sharing. Thank you very much.