Me in March - 2017 A to Z Theme Reveal

For those of us participating in this year's A to Z challenge, today is the day we reveal our theme, if we have one.  Personally, I found it much easier last year to keep up by having a theme.  Mine was "Music."  A month after the challenge I wrote a reflection post that captured all of my letters for the month.  It was a lot of fun and I learned so many new things and "met" a lot of other nice bloggers.

This year I wanted to write about one of my other passions, scrapbooking.  I was trying to come up with something that might interest people even if they weren't into scrapbooking because honestly, if you are not into that form of art, it can get boring (ask my husband 😂😂).  Then it came to me.  I decided to share the scrapbook album I am making documenting all the concerts we go to.  This is the outside of the first album.   

It is getting quite full already and I am only up to the year 2009!  I already have another album ready to start, but this still has room for a few more shows.  I'm hoping to at least get 2009 finished in this one so I can start the new one on a fresh year.  I'm kinda fussy about stuff like that.

This is the first page.  I love the symbol of the cleft and the way the colors surround it.  I got that picture from Google a long time ago and used it as the background on my phone for a while as well.  I think of this page as a curtain going up at a concert.  That's one of the most exciting parts of a show to me, when the performers first come out.  We've seen quite a few spectacular openings.  

I already have my alphabet set up and there are a few groups and pages that won't make the final cut, so I'll use some of them here in my reveal.  The album begins with the first concert we went to, even before my husband and I were married.  In fact, we had only been dating a few months.  With the exception of Iron Maiden (I'm not a metal fan), we've seen the other bands several times since then.

In 1983 we saw Stevie Nicks and a few years later the kids started coming so we didn't get a chance to go to concerts much.  In fact, it was 20 years later, in 2003, when we saw Fleetwood Mac.  Again a lull and the next concert was in 2006.  We only went because I won tickets from a radio station.  It was quite exciting.  The bands were Huey Lewis and the News and Chicago.  Huey rocked the house but we actually left before the end of Chicago because they just didn't sound the same to us.  My picture taking skills were in desperate need of refining and I had a camera that did not have a very good zoom but we had a great time and the pictures that I did get and the journaling I add helps us remember it.  

Going to that concert, though, got me addicted and since then we have gone to a minimum of 4 concerts a year.  Last year we attended 10!  You can see I really have my work cut out for me if I am only up to 2009 in the album!  

We've explored several different venues and the first time we went to the Mountain Winery was in 2007.  I didn't bring my camera for some reason but I pulled some images off the net and journaled about it so that worked.

When we saw Steely Dan at the Winery there were signs all over saying NO CAMERAS, so even though I brought mine, I didn't take any pictures.  Those were in the old days when I hadn't become so much of a rebel.  Again I grabbed some pictures off the net and managed to make two pages that would capture that night.  Nowadays if someone puts up signs about not taking any pictures, I've learned how to sneak some anyway.  I never use a flash and I am very careful about not taking too many on those occasions.  I'm not looking to sell them, I just want to document our experiences!

In between regular concerts, we've seen some plays like Jersey Boys, Rock of Ages and Rain to name a few.  You can't get good pictures usually at those venues either so I took the playbill and made a page for one of them that way.  The playbill is in a plastic pocket so if you want to see it, you can just pull it out from the top.  

Since I am only up to 2009 in my album and there are many bands that we have seen since then that fall into my A to Z categories, I have to start scrapbooking!  That's another reason why I chose to do my theme this way.  I really want to get those pictures out of the computer and on the pages of the album so we can enjoy them.  The only problem that I can foresee with skipping around in my documenting is that I try to have the pages coordinate.  If I end a page on the left side of the album, I want the page on the right side to match it.  I either have to get over that or come up with a "bridge" page because my first letter involves a concert that we went to last year!  There is no possible way for me to scrapbook eight years of concerts in two weeks!  My "creative process" takes longer than that, plus, I do have a day job!  I've been thinking that maybe if I need a bridge page I can describe the different venues we've seen.

Supplies are not an issue as I have a whole room dedicated to my scrapbooking:

and a whole container full of just music themed embellishments.  

   

So, there is my big theme reveal.  How about you?  Joining us on the A to Z?  Have a theme?  Want to see my concert album come to life?  I hope to see you along the way.  Click on one of the links above to follow me or sign up to get my posts by email so you don't miss any and don't forget to stop by and see some of the other bloggers on the journey.  I have a feeling it's going to be an exciting month!