Digital Disaster!

As a Creative Memories consultant I've shared over and over about how important is is to make sure that your digital pictures are backed up, in more than one place.  In fact I have warned my clients and the women attending the Creative Memories parties that it's not a matter of if your computer will crash, it's a matter of when. I predict that there will be a whole generation of children that wont have pictures of their childhoods due to digital files being deleted, destroyed, lost, or just plain inaccessible.

Well, recently it's been my turn at "when".  I'm writing this as a heads up for those of you reading, but in some crazy way, I'm hoping for some healing from my pain. 



The reality of the situation and how easily this (losing your digital pictures) can happen has sunk in!  Did I mention that I knew the dangers of digital?  I was a good little CM consultant, I had done things correctly.  I had two external hard drives, one to store my pictures (memory manager vaults), one that I used for a back up of those pictures and a full backup of my desktop computer and I had just purchased a subscription to an onlne back up site. You'd think that will all of this I would be safe right?  Wrong! I must share with you to demonstrate just how delicate the digital situation can be.

So this is how it all happened. . . . One day I tried to back up a file on my desktop to my external hard drive that for years had been located stationary in my desk.  It wasn't accessible...don't know what the problem was/is, but for some unknown reason I couldn't back up or access the files on that drive. I started to freak as there was about 6-7 thousand pictures backed up on that drive.  But I thought no worries...I also have those pictures, and more, on my other working hard drive.  I need to have my son-in-law the computer guy look at it to see if it's repairable or if I need to replace it.  And I then I procrastinated, well not really procrastinated as it was constantly on my mind, but life is busy, busy, and I kept forgetting!

And then one day, not to long after, I plugged my working hard drive into my computer, you know with the 6-7 thousand pictures from the stationary drive, PLUS about 2 thousand additional pictures. Initially the picture vault opened, and then I received an error...and that was the end of that...I could never open the drive again.  NOW THE PANIC STRUCK, there was nothing I could do!  I prayed...yes I'm a praying girl, and I gave the drive to the son-in-law.

No Luck!  He tried to pull the pictures and couldn't get them off, it seems the type of drive I purchased was notorious for this problem!  So I pulled myself together and realized that there wasn't much I could do about this situation. So I begain to gather stray pictures from a few memory cards laying around the house. I thanked God that there were many pictures still on the cards as I had not completely deleted all the photos.  I realized that there was a new feature at Costco where I could download the full resolution picture from Facebook to Costco and print pictures.  Over the last couple of months, I've gradually found, borrowed and replaced pictures.  I needed to access my daughter's Facebook account and download her graduation pictures and I was starting to feel better....not good but better.

Until last night, Someone hacked her Facebook and her email, took over her page and to make matters worse....DELETED ALL HER PICTURES! And then tonight, I had my memory card next to me on the sofa and it somehow found it's way to the floor, AND THE DOG ATE IT, adding it to her destruction~! That on sent me over the edge!  I didn't lose much this time as there was not many pictures that I hadn't backed up. My family knew I was on the verge of a complete meltdown, they felt awful! While my loving husband was trying to figure out if there would be any way to repair the card (as you can see, that's doubtful!)

I resolved to be even more diligent about the back up of my digital photos!  Tomorrow I will be adding another external hard drive to my home so that will bring me back up to two.  Since the initial disaster, I've been more diligent about uploading my pictures to Smugmug. (the online site) and I will begin to print my pictures more regularly, not just when I want to scrap them.  It truely is the safest way to ensure their safety!!

I hope that the details of this digital disaster will help you to understand that it too could happen to you!  Don't procrastinate, back up your pictures and PRINT YOUR PICTURES! If you are not a scrapbooker, or you're not into digital photo albums, you can either store them in a photo safe box or slide them into a quick easy photo album.  DON'T WAIT....LEARN FROM MY MISTAKES!

Fun Digital Halloween Projects

Every holiday brings some fun craft project I'd like to complete, I enjoy the fun of it.Now if I only had time for them all I'd be a happy girl! Halloween is no different, I always want to make bag headers and fill them with candy to hand out. But that's a very costly treat for my neighborhood, there are sooo many kids.

I use my Creative Memories Storybook Creator to create many of these fun little projects; it's amazing how versatile it is and how much you can do with one little computer program. Although the main focus of this program is for digital photo albums, I design cards, calendars, name cards, even personalized gifts and school projects. I actually have two copies..one on my home computer and one on my work computer.

Today I thought I'd share a couple of fun Halloween projects that can be created with Storybook Creator.

These cute bingo cards can be adapted for many occasions, birthdays, classroom parties, baby showers, etc.  The possibilities are endless!  The directions to create a bingo card can be found here at the project center on my Creative Memories website. Go ahead click on the link and see if you can create your own.

The above treat bag toppers also have endless possibilities, the same birthday and classroom parties and baby or wedding shower favors.  Add your favorite treat, candy, cookies just about anything, and create your personalized topper.  They're so easy....and the directions....yep you guessed it, they're available to you by clicking here!

Want to check out more ideas for Storybook Creator?  Visit my website project center or contact me via my website. 

Have fun!!

New Beginings

Well the brand new year is off and running and there is so much to look forward to. I'm confident that this year will bring many picture taking opportunities for my family and can't wait to share those moments with you.

I'm not real big on new year resolutions because they always seem to get broken and then I usually feel bad. Why set yourself up for "bad" feelings?  I'd rather not, thank you!  So I've decided to start the new year with a new outlook and a new beginning, and whatever blossoms from that, will be new and exciting!

What better way than to gather your pictures and start a brand new photo memory project, or continue an old one?  It doesn't have to be extravagant, just start.  We take all these great pictures throughout the year and most of them are hidden in our computers or on memory cards!

I love scrapbooking, but the reality is with a job, house to keep, 3 daughters and a brand new granddaughter on the way, I can get overwhelmed with several scrapbook projects going at one time. I don't have time to "scrapbook" everything, and frankly, when I get overwhelmed, I don't want to scrapbook anything! I totally understand the "I don't have time for that" comment from so many! That's why I love Creative Memories' Picfolio Milestones albums. It wasn't always so, I had an aversion to this type of album when it was first released because it wasn't a scrapbook album. What were they thinking? But acceptance has come....It's so easy to quickly slide my pictures in, share the story on one of the precut papers from an album kit and before I know it my family pictures are in albums for us to enjoy. No Guilt....Just Albums!

See how easy it can be!

Watch, Enjoy, and then give me a call or visit my website to begin celebrating your new beginning with a new album.

Scrapbook Title Page

Creating the perfect opening page for your album projects has always been a dilemma.  I want the design to encompass the overall album theme and yet be pleasing to the eye.  Even having a catchy phrase can make me smile.  It's always difficult, but I've finally figured out the secret...DON'T OVER THINK IT!

Actually that thought can be used many times in scrap booking.  I noticed that Creative Memories has Album intro page ideas in our project center so I thought I'd check them out and share with my scrapping friends.  You can access the complete idea page here but my favorite is this vacation intro page.  I like the mix of bright colors but mostly the timeless feel of the black and white pictures.  

You can find the directions for creating this page on my website at www.mycmsite.com/deeanna and visit the project center, or by clicking here.  Remember you can create all the traditional scrap book ideas shown here digitally, by using Creative Memories Storybook Creator Plus 3.0 digital scrapbook software. 

Even Nancy O'Dell can find time to scrapbook!

Where to start!  There's so much going on in the scrapbook world with Creative Memories I just couldn't figure out where to start.   There were several exciting announcements made this last week during Creative Memories Creative Memories National Convention, and I've been sorting through trying to decide what to tell you first. I decided on an announcement that is actually an upcoming event, because I felt it really did cover the WHY of Creative Memories.  As a scrapbook fanatic you may run into others who just don't understand your passion for memory keeping, and although we know our reasons for making albums, sometimes it helps to hear it from someone else.  Expecially someone who is so busy that we can't even imagine her having time to scrapbook, but because she understands the importance and benefit to her children she makes the time.

Nancy O'Dell of Access Hollywood fame, has written her second book, this one called "Full of Love" highlighting the the importance of keeping Scrapbook memory albums and is also introducing a brand new Hummingbird Scrapbook line offered by Creative Memories. Click Here and check out the news interview with Nancy and the sneak peak of the Hummingbird line from Creative Memories National Convention.

No More Throwing Money In The Trash for Me!

Creative Memories Tag Maker has many different uses, not only can you decorate your scrapbook pages and hand made cards but I really have second thoughts about EVER purchasing another greeting card. 

If you're a mom of school age children, you'll totally understand what I mean when I say that you have "sticker shock" when visiting the card section after picking out one of the MANY children's birthday gifts for the MANY birthday party's your child will attend.  Then, to watch that card you spent $4.00 or more on, be tossed to the side so the child can get to the perfect gift you brought, is a little frustrating. Plus, you KNOW (cause we do it also) in a few days that card will find it's way right into the trash can.  You might as well just throw your money in the trash now! 

SOLUTION: I love this tool to add an adorable little "to/from" tag to all my birthday gifts. It will definately save you money on birthday cards, AND you'll find it handy for cards and scrapbooking too!  ps....you can create your tag with or without the hole, so you can attach it with your Creative Memories Adhesive or add a ribbon for hanging.

Take a look at this quick tag for Mom and for more creative ideas with the Creative Memories Tag Taker visit the project center at my website you'll find a whole area dedicated to ideas for the Creative Memories Tag Maker.

In the beginning....

For my first post I decided to share a little about my vision....if you can call it a vision.  I seriously am not sure what I'm doing with this blog idea.  I want somewhere to share my ideas and thoughts and also share how to create.  Create? you ask?  Create what?  Well that's where my vision gets blurry.  I started a blog in an attempt to accommodate both my personal story and my creative ideas, but that has turned into more of an inspirational, "life as I see it", blog. This blog, the one your are reading now,  will be more on the creative side because I love to scrapbook, both digitally and traditionally. I'll be sharing ideas here, but more than just sharing, I'd like to offer my services to you.  To create cards, pages and scrapbooks for your personal needs.  I hope you will find what I offer here to your liking.  In the meantime, You can visit my personal blog at www.designingdee.com if you'd like to get to know me better.  Don't forget to stop back by and see what's happening here.