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| Sometimes scraps are those old-school scrapbooking border strips...this time, from 2004! |
You know, gifting someone else your unwanted or excess supplies is a great thing. But not when it is stuff so old that no one in their right mind, even on an especially charitable day, would possibly want.
In the world of scrapbooking supplies (which is the vast majority of my old stuff), old is not often cool old, as in vintage or retro. Most times, it's cutesy and it's what-was-I-thinking-when-I-bought-this. Sometimes, it was elements or stickers or other acutrements that matched the paper I just had to have. Occasionally, it came free with my purchases.
After 7 years, I've accumulated a pile of this stuff. And it is an embarrassment to me to even consider gifting it to anyone else. I'm just not one of those who is willing to forward something on that would probably get thrown in the discard pile or worse, the pile to send on to someone else!
In fact, when I sit and ponder it objectively, I realize there have been more than a few times that I've taken what what was a seemingly impossible item and made it work somehow. It's not something that happens as a result of a scientifically scheduled experiment, easily replicated. No, there is some magic that has to occur. The time has to be right. The mood, the Muse, the music of creativity all have to be willing and awake.
But, it does happen. More than I really wanna admit. So, I go with it. I keep the stuff and try like hell to use it. And when I get the Ick vibe off a piece of it, I drop it in the trash like I'm not noticing. Somehow, doing this reconciles the cheapskate hoarder in me with the indulgent buyer and the recycler and the challenge-lover.
Basically, I like to think of it as Gifting My Muse. Keeping her honest and on her toes. Making her work for me. (yeah, right, haha) The only bad thing is the nagging whiney voice inside me who begs for nice new cool stuff to feed my Muse, as in, when am I gonna get to play with timely and currently cool things instead of all this old crap?
Sounds indulgent and ungrateful, but I hear myself think this way too much. What helps is to join a group of people who are struggling with the same thing. I'm in two such groups over at Art Journaling Ning: Cult of Stuff group and 30-Day Craft Cleanse.
I am actually able sometimes to tell that nagging, whiney voice to STFU. And that's worth its weight in old unused supplies, lemme tellya. winkwink ;-))
