Feeling kinda Retro, baby!

So...are you a scrapbooker? What made you start scrapbooking? When did you start? As for me, I started scrapbooking because my friend Cindy scrapbooked. (I call her "My person of blame.") She didn't know that her influence was going to lead me down a dangerous path of addiction, sticker sneezing, impulse purchasing, and darn near HOARDING in my house! She thought she was helping me to journal the everyday events in my life. Thankfully, I do that too, so Cindy is off the hook for the rest.

I started scrapbooking in about 2001, but my first "official" scrapbook album was the story of how my husband and I met and our wedding. In hindsight, that might have been a bit of a big topic to undertake when I was a newbie, but it also gives me a good chuckle to see what kind of pages I made.

Now, I'm going out on a limb here, posting a pic from the FIRST page of the FIRST album I ever did...be gentle! In all honesty, the first page isn't too bad. For some reason, I won't post the really, really bad ones...

Ha! See? I'm still laughing... OK, here's a breakdown of what you see: First of all, the album is set up like a fairy tale story, so I titled my book "Once upon a time," and wrote about a prince and a princess and other bad ideas.

The green grass and title are made from CONSTRUCTION PAPER! Seriously. I think at the time my friends said things like, "You know, you should use acid-free paper." They were right, but I wasn't listening. Construction paper was cheap! The castle on the left is a very large diecut, and embellished only slightly by the dragon sticker I put in the lower right corner. As you can see, there are other, quite random, stickers sneezed across the page: a frog, Cinderella, a knight and princess, all placed wherever I thought there was a blank spot. :) I even used decorative scissors to cut the mat around Cinderella and Prince Charming! The final detail you need to know, and I discovered when I pulled the page out to take its picture, was that I used a glue stick to adhere everything to the page. Sigh...

Now that I've opened myself up, let's talk about it. Obviously, the style isn't important. I had fun, and it does set a theme, and the story is in the album, which is the goal after all. However, I probably could have listened to friends and scrapbook store employees a little better and followed their advice about acid free paper and a more permanent adhesive. Things are falling apart on this page, and it's only 8-9 years old. The construction paper hasn't faded...yet, but we all know it will.

I'd like to hear/see some of your less-than-proud moments in papercrafting. Ever send a card postage due? Ever have one fall apart upon the recipient's opening? Have a sticker sneeze page of your own? C'mon...out with it! Let's hear it!