I spent all day putting photographs, ticket stubs, brochures, postcards, whatnots, and keepsakes into an album with acid-free pages. Oh, I know what you are thinking, “Scrap-booking,” but I wasn’t, I don’t have nearly the talent for that.

I haven’t tried to pull a scrapbook together since the hobby went from pastime to art form twenty years ago. I have a couple of friends who take their scrap-booking very seriously. These women make pages I’d drool over, but I think saliva screws up the adhesive. Their sheets are so beautifully designed they could be individually framed. They’ve taken and taught classes and I’m sure they have Michael’s on speed-dial.

Over the years I’ve bought bits and pieces of material to pull something together: some scissors, some stickers, a glue stick or two. I must have started at least two-dozen projects. There was the “Dream House” scrapbook. I moved in and back out of it before I got the pictures in an album. I had a “Cozumel Dream Vacation” book planned. I would’ve finished it too, if I could just remember where I put those pictures. But the time I get around to working on them I’ve lost the scissors, my pictures have faded, and my glue has dried out.

So this time I decided I wasn’t going to do what I usually do which is start with great ideas and end up with cabinets and drawers stuffed with good intentions.

This morning I corralled the plethora of materials I brought home from Paris into one area of the house. Next I took the memory card from my phone and uploaded /unloaded 159 photos and had them printed out at Walgreen’s. I purchased a perfectly fine, albeit pedestrian, expandable, 2-post black album, a set of extra sleeves, and an assortment of patterned pages, embellishments, and adornments.

And then I put what I had into some sort of order, created 13 pages, and applauded loudly for myself.

Here’s why –

I just finished my trip this past Wednesday and three days later I have a memory piece. Remarkable!

My creative, impulsive spirit finally won over my “it’s got to be perfect” compulsive side – heaven knows the two are at war most of the time.

And while the result isn’t perfect nor entirely complete – it’s good enough. And, I have the satisfaction of knowing the evidence of one of my happiest life experiences is safely preserved in a pretty and accessible album, not spilling out of a shoebox or a cabinet or a drawer.

Besides, all of those were already full!