I spent most of my 4th of July weekend and the proceeding week catching up on scrapbooking. While I tediously layed out pages, cut photos into circle shapes and tried to remember the dates of photos taken, I honestly couldn't decide if I was in scrapbooking heaven or hell. A part of me was asking 'why did I get into this' and another part of me was saying 'oh this looks so pretty, I'm glad I'm doing this.'

About three years ago, a friend of mine invited me to her scrapbooking party. I had heard about this phenomenon that was sweeping the country so I thought I'd check it out for myself. I found that I was ill-prepared for all the pretty colors, the beautiful paper, the way you could cut your pictures into different shapes, the assortment of stickers and stamps - I was drawn to it like a bird finding a new shiny object. And for someone who thought of herself as being creative, this was far better than just sticking photos into a photo album and writing a few captions underneath. This was going to be a perfect way to capture my daughter's first year, which was very eventful with her premature birth and all we had gone through with her.

I walked out of my friend's house with $200 worth of scrapbooking supplies. I couldn't wait to get started.

In the next few days, a reality I hadn't considered hit me smack in the face. How was I going to find the time to put this thing together? I worked full time, had a special needs daughter, and was exhausted from lack of sleep.

My opportunity finally came in October when we traveled to Canada for their Thanksgiving. My husband and daughter extended their stay to have more time to visit family. I was home alone and had all the time in the world do get this scrapbook put together.

The first thing I did was get organized, sorting all of my photos chronologically. Next, I had to decide a layout including which kind and color of paper to use and if I was going to use borders or not? It took about an hour to do my first page. Then it was onto the next page and making the same decisions all over again. It was painstaking. My determination to do this whole scrapbook while I was home by myself began to fade. I began to think I should also be using this time to catch up with friends and family and also to catch up on some much needed sleep. Needless to say, I only got four pages done during that time.

Initially, I wanted to get my daughter's scrapbook done in time for her first birthday. October 25th came and went with no progress made on the scrapbook so I decided to shoot for Christmas.

My scrapbook lied dormant for much longer than I intended. As the photos accumulated, so did my guilt for not getting this scrapbook done. Since first beginning the scrapbook we had moved twice. The scrapbook, all of my supplies, and photos made the moves along with us and each time after we got settled everything would be shoved away in boxes and drawers not seeing the light of day. Until the 4th of July weekend, which is about three years since I first began.

It wasn't my intention to get it together and finally finish my daughter's first year scrapbook (my daughter by the way who was now 5 1/2 years old.) It just sort of happened. While my daughter occupied herself by pretending to wash dishes, I took over the kitchen table and got out my all of my supplies. Each time I got an opportunity to put a page or two together, I took it. As I cut out photos, turning some into ovals and circles, tried to come up with different borders and backgrounds for each page, I honestly didn't know if I was enjoying myself or not. I was constantly looking at the never-ending pile of pictures waiting to be pasted in. Was I ever going to see the light at the end of the tunnel?

With fierce determination, I worked on my project every moment I could. Panic set in as I realized I was running out of pages and I still had about five months of photos to go. I frantically rushed to my drawer of extra supplies and found extra pages and page protectors. Thank goodness!

Finally, I was down to Christmas 2004 which included our trip to Niagra Falls. This was it, down to the end. I began to think how nice it would be if I included a little poem at the end that would wrap up Faith's first year. After struggling for hours, I finally came up with a little four-liner. That would have to do because I needed to end this before I went crazy.

The next day, I looked over the final project and was very satisfied, if not a little proud of myself. It turned out great. And now the question remains, do I continue to do a scrapbook for each year of photos I have lying around or do I go back to the good old standby of shoving them into a photo album? Thank goodness a few years ago my husband bought me a digital camera - and by the time I get to those digital photos, I might just pay Shutterfly to do them for me.