The Collection

 

I am working on my next custom order!  A friendly fellow Canadian happened upon my Etsy shop and asked if I could make her an album like this Summer Nights one with more pages.  I have to admit, everytime I get a custom order inquiry, I approach it with both hope and hesitance.  What if I can't stick to the deadline?  What if I don't have the right materials?  What if ... what if... what if...

Somehow, I have been lucky enough to attract people with reasonable forethought.  They always make their inquiry well in advance of their needs.  Hooray!  So, I responded to the inquiry and before I knew it, it blew up in to FOUR custom albums!  These albums will be holding a pared down ACEO/ATC collection.  My my, what an honour!  My albums are going to hold only the best of the collection!  Only those that survive the culling!

So, I RAN in to my studio and rifled through my papers to see what combinations I could come up with.  I have said before that participating in challenges has inspired me to create.  Well, this custom order inspired me to look at my stash with new eyes.  The album featured here is my favourite of the bunch.  I could tell just from looking at the paper.  I love the comforting natural tones of this paper, especially paired with the satin brown ribbon and earthy dark button.  I named it "Vintage Garden" because the inside pages are a faint, faded, floral type design.

Here's the story of these albums. I made these envelope albums because, as I trolled around the scrapbooking world, I saw all kinds of albums made of envelopes.  Most are made of coin envelopes and some are made with junk mail envelopes!  I think that is a very clever wait to recycle - just cover up the ugly outsides.  I APPLAUD the repurposing movement - BUT- I have to admit I'm a bit of an archival snob.  Coin envelopes and junkmail are not made of acid and lignin free papers.  If I'm going to make a lasting album out of it, I want the colours and writing to remain as true as possible for as long as possible.  Ever wonder why the old static-cling pages from your family album are a little yellowy? I always thought that it was from many fingers handling them for many years but it's not.  It's the lignin in the paper that makes those stains.

So, I decided I would make my own envelopes to assemble in to an album.  The only thing is, I didn't anticipate how precise everything had to be!  My envelopes are not EXACTLY the same - they can be a few millimetres off in size.  (Hey, I'm not a machine press that makes those coin envelopes!)  When I stack my envelopes, they have a bit of a "rugged" edge.  At first, I was a little disappointed (you know how I love CLEAN lines) but, the more I looked at them, the more it felt like they had an "old world charm": something from back in the days when everything was handmade.  My aunt once told me, it's the little imperfections that mark an item as made by human hands.  It's like leaving a little artistic fingerprint on each creation.  (Thank-you Auntie Jean!  You have a beautiful mind!)

I've got two albums done and two more to go.  You can see the makings of the third one in the background of this next picture.  It's the Summer Nights (expanded) album.

I am tickled that my albums will showcase a collection!
- Scrapninny