Putting forty years into a book

My project was a custom photo book, for which I had prepaid a voucher through Amazon Local.  I had tried out picaboo.com for a smaller book, on a similar kind of deal, last fall and made a book of pictures of our grandchildren, and it came out beautifully.  This time I wanted to create a book of the forty years we have been married; from our own baby pictures to our wedding through pictures of our children and their marriages.  I got this voucher at Christmas, and it was only good through last Thursday.  After that, the amount I had actually paid could be credited to any subsequent retail purchase, but I couldn't afford the normal rates, and the savings of fifty-plus dollars was huge.

Trouble was, I had to find where the pictures were.  The ones that had been in a bedroom nightstand, I thought I knew where they were, but that box was buried in the back room and I couldn't physically get to it.  Hubby has been swamped, and the other rooms are ahead of the back office room on the priority list.  Besides, those were the basic duplicates of what we had elsewhere.  I needed to find the main stashes.

One box was visible, and two more were unearthed.   Then I had to go through all of them.  Then when I got into the thick of it, I changed my mind of some of what I was going to use.  There were a couple of pictures I remember well and didn't find--they'll turn up eventually.

I thought that since I had done this once before on the same site, it would be easier this time.  I should have started a month earlier.  I did begin setting out piles last Friday and I did start out setting up the project online, but I also had a column to get in and a lesson to prepare.  I had to tear my mind away from the pictures and get those things done.  Then I came home from teaching on Wednesday and went seriously to work.

I pretty well spent the rest of the day on Wednesday, until 9:00.  I was confident that I could get the book done by dinner time on Thursday, and go to the Relief Society activity, and be tired but satisfied.

If only.

I woke up at 7:30 Thursday morning, with the first real sleep I"d had in several days, and went in to the computer.  I finished my project at 10:30 p.m., reviewed it and finished processing the actual order five minutes before 11.  I didn't make dinner, I didn't take a nap or a walk.  I spent 15 hours on the computer with very little break time..

One of the problems is that our internet connection isn't terribly fast.  The other that became apparent was the the mouse was starting to fail.  Hubby was gone for the whole day, or I would have sent him out to buy one.  We have an old computer, and it needs a wired mouse.  I was afraid that if I left I would end up chasing around trying to find one that would work, and lose more time.  In hindsight, I should have just gone to Office Depot and tried.

I want each of my children to eventually have a copy of this book.  I did go back on Saturday morning and add two more pages, images I'm okay with not having in but that our kids should have, from things we've done and places we've been.  I had already added extra pages I had to pay for, and I ran out of time to fiddle with it any more.  That's okay.  It was stop and order or lose the money.

Some of the shots I wanted to include didn't scan well enough or wouldn't fit the layouts available to choose.  If I were some great geek, I'm sure I could have worked around the software better, but the result is still going to be wonderful.  And there are so many choices I couldn't do everything I wanted.

I got to go through old pictures I hadn't seen for so long I'd forgotten them.  Pictures of Hubby as a baby, pictures of me.  Sorting all of the pictures of kids as they grew.  Some looked the same through childhood, just in different clothes, some changed a lot.  Some resemblances showed up that are less apparent in their adult state.

But one thing I'm reminded of is that babies change so fast.  I'm seeing that in our grandchildren, whom we don't get to see very often, since every one of them lives far away.

My sweetie, very young

Food coming, yay!

How does such a moon-face baby become this?

I scanned more than 150 photos, and a few I scanned (by mistake) more than once because I couldn't find them from the first time.  I had a chiropractor's appointment on Friday, and he said, "Let's not do this again, all right?" but I wasn't as bad as I know I should have been.  I was blessed, and I'm grateful.  And not sorry.

More to come.  TTFN!