Episode 53: The Scrapbooking Games

Alice: [00:00:00] Welcome to the scrap happier podcast, where we share quick tips, tricks, and techniques to help you create scrapbooks you love and be happier while doing it. I’m your host, Alice Boll.

[00:00:22] I’m so glad that you’ve joined me for this episode. I have a really fun one for us today, but don’t forget. You can catch all of the show notes at https://scraphappy.org/episode53. The Tokyo 2020 Olympics have just wrapped up and I have been obsessed with watching them. We are not a super sporty family. Yes. I played a little bit of sports in high school, but it was a pretty small town.

[00:00:45] And if you showed up, you made the team. And my youngest son was a competitive swimmer for many, many years. And now I coach the local summer swim team. But when it comes to watching sports, we are not that family. I’m a Canadian and I’ve only ever been to one professional hockey game, the Edmonton Oilers versus the Calgary flames.

[00:01:07] And that was pretty excited when the Edmonton Oilers won. However, when it comes to watching the Olympics, I am all in. I want to see all the sports and all of the competition and all of the action. There are so many different types of events going on during the Olympics. It’s really incredible. I found at least 46 different types of events.

[00:01:29] And then within each event, there are multiple different levels of categories. For example, within swimming, we have freestyle backstroke, breaststroke, butterfly, individual medley. We have those at different distances. We also have outdoor swimming. We have distance swimming there are, relays. And this doesn’t even include other sports like triathlon or the modern pentathlon that also have a swimming element.

[00:01:56] One of my goals this year was to see as many different types of sports. As I could see, check out all of what the Olympics has to offer. Now, of course I did not see all of it, but I tried to catch a glimpse into as many different sports. These athletes show so much skill athleticism, grace, artistry, and heart.

[00:02:19] Just thinking of the number of hours they’ve put into their practice, going to competitions. And it all comes down to that one exciting Olympic moment, that chance for them to show what they’re truly made of and what they’ve been working towards all this time. One of my favorite moments that I saw during the Olympics was in the women’s 200 meter breaststroke final.

[00:02:44] The winner was Tatiana skull and mocker from South Africa. She came in with a time of two 18.95. We already knew she was a very fast breaststroker as she’d won the silver medal in the 100 meter breasts. And when she finished her 200 meter breaststroke and she won, she was so excited. And then she looked up at the clock and she saw her time.

[00:03:08] She had set a world record. This was one of the first world records set at the Olympic games for Tokyo 2020 in swimming. Her surprise and delight was truly an Olympic moment to cherish. So by now you might be thinking, how does any of this relate to scrapbook? Well, I have had this idea that I just can’t shake as I’ve watched the different events of the Olympics.

[00:03:37] What if there was a scrapbooking Olympics, what would that look like? What would the events be? How would the judging work and how much fun would we all have with that? So I’m going to invite you to enjoy a little bit of make-believe with me, imagining what would happen if there was a scrapbooking Olympics and what exactly that would look.

[00:04:00] And if you have ideas of what this would include, then I would love to hear about them. So please go and check out the show notes and I’ll have a link there so that you can leave me an audio message. It’s super easy to use you. Click the button, record your message. You have about 90 seconds, and don’t forget to include your name.

[00:04:19] I’d love to do a follow-up episode about this. So please take a moment and send me your ideas. Now let’s chat about an imaginary scrapbooking Olympics and who knows a new Olympic sport might be in our creative future. I think a good starting point would be for us to look at different categories that we can use to classify different types of scrapbooking and creativity.

[00:04:45] We could have categories based around 12 by 12 layouts, digital layouts, pocket pages pages made using the project life app mini albums, travelers, notebooks, planners. Obviously some types of scrapbooking would lend themselves more to being judged, just like in diving, where you have a group of seven judges and perhaps you eliminate the high and low scores, maybe you even have a degree of difficulty based on the techniques used on the layout.

[00:05:15] We’d probably score points based on design photography, titles, journaling, and embellish. One of the new Olympic sports this year was climbing and they broke climbing into three different categories. They had speed climbing, bouldering and lead climbing speed climbing is exactly what you think. It’s trying to climb up this path as fast as you possibly can.

[00:05:40] Imagine that as a scrapbooking event, In the bouldering section of climbing, the goal is to solve a climbing problem. I could see giving scrapbookers are really difficult problem to solve. Maybe they have to try to create a layout without using a paper trimmer. Maybe they have to create a layout without using adhesive who knows it could be something really off the wall and difficult to solve.

[00:06:04] In lead climbing, climbers are navigating a difficult route up the side of their climbing wall and they have to reach the highest part under control as possible. I think in scrapbooking, this would translate really well into following a sketch or a different design. Every person will navigate a sketch in a different way.

[00:06:26] And yet you come to a similar outcome at the end, a finished layout that is generally based off of that scale. I’m sure that as scrapbookers we’d have something that related to the athletics, we could have individual competitions instead of high jump pole, vault, long jump, and all of that running, we would instead have things like fussy, cutting stitching, backing dye, cuts, stamping, and of course, color challenges.

[00:06:56] And all of these kinds of events could be individual events or they could end up becoming the scrapbooking decathlon. When I was watching some of the tracks cycling, I noticed that they did an elimination challenge so that the slowest person was eliminated off of the track with every passing succession.

[00:07:14] Until finally there was one winner that reign Supreme. Can you imagine having an electronic die cutting challenge where you have to print crazier and crazier things and cut them out with your die cut machine until you were the person that won the end of that challenge? I could totally see that it would be so fun.

[00:07:34] One of the events that I was excited to see this year was surfing as that was also a new Olympic sport. When I saw the, the surfers were rewarded for not only catching the right wave and knowing which one was the right one to catch, but also their creativity in handling that wave and the tricks that they could do on it.

[00:07:53] I thought, Hmm. This relates to another scrapbooking event. I think a mixed media challenge would allow people to use their creativity and show that they possess a ton of different skills. And honestly, I think sometimes scrapbooking actually has its own weightlifting category already. Pre-built in. Have you ever tried carrying all of that paper?

[00:08:16] It gets heavy. And of course there’s so many different categories we can still come up with in different competitions that we could have album creation could be like running a marathon and just think of all the fun that we could have with relays or team events. And I think everybody’s favorite would be this speed shopping event where you only have so much time to run into the store and get everything you need.

[00:08:41] So there you have it. I think a scrapbooking Olympics would be an absolute blast and a ton of fun. The next summer Olympics will be in 2024 in Paris. And somehow I don’t think scrapbooking is going to make the cut, but that doesn’t mean that we aren’t going to see a challenge. Similar to those sometime in the future.

[00:09:03] One of my greatest delights is hosting many different challenges in the scrap happy community. So if, and when it happens, I’ll be sure to let you know so that you can get all practiced up and ready for your gold medal. I have one more thing to remind you of before we wrap up today. But first I’d like to introduce you to my friend, Amy Meyer.

[00:09:25] Amy: [00:09:25] Hi, I’m Amy. Alice and I are teaching a class called a side B side. We’re. We’re giving you our favorite tips on how to use the ACE side or the B side of your paper. Whether you like bright and bold or soft and subtle, we can help you make the most of your favorite pattern. 

[00:09:40] Alice: [00:09:40] A side B side is just one of the classes that is included in the scrap smarter experience happening August 20th to 22nd, 2021.

[00:09:50] Our keynote speaker for the event is Schimmel, and she’ll be talking to us about scrapbooking, a colorful life. You can find out more about all of the classes and the [email protected]. Just look for the scrap smarter experience. And don’t forget when you register use code ALICE before August 15th and you’ll save $30.

[00:10:12] I’m so glad you joined me for the scrap happier podcast today. I hope you were as inspired by the Olympics as I was. I am so proud of all of the athletes, the Canadians of course, but really all of the athletes around the world. I am so proud of all of the work that they put into their sport and for sharing it with us through the Olympics.

[00:10:34] If you have an idea of something that I missed in the scrapbooking Olympics, then please be sure to leave me a voice recording or tell me what your favorite event would be for you to enter. Check out the show notes underneath this episode, or go to https://scraphappy.org/episode53. I hope that this discussion today helps you embrace the fun in scrapbooking.

[00:10:58] There are so many. For us to engage into arts sport of scrapbooking and really make pages that we love happy scrapping.

[00:11:28] Here’s some of the events that I watched at least part of during the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, archery, artistic swimming, formerly known as synchronized swimming athletics. I watched various running pole vault, high jump, long jump hammer, throw javelin. Badminton basketball beach volleyball, boxing, canoe, sprints, cycling, BMX freestyle cycling, track diving, equestrian fencing, handball, modern pentathlon, rhythmic gymnastics rowing, shooting, pistol shooting.

[00:12:00] Actually, it was cool. Sport climbing, surfing. Lots and lots of swimming and still not enough trampoline, gymnastics, volleyball, water, polo, and weightlifting. And I missed so many other things. I just couldn’t see enough of it.