Once upon a time, in the land of sun and cactus, this first time/full-time mom joined a ‘Mom’s Club’ when we moved from Los Angeles, California to Scottsdale, Arizona. I love the rain and trees so at first I just cried. We moved for my husband’s job which  would define his career. But the cost of living there was amazing and our rental house had tall ceilings and several bedrooms and even a pool, all for the same price as our tiny house in L.A.

So off to this Mom’s club I went with my 18 month old son and a lot of sun block. I made one or two friends but I was out of my zone. I was a bit more ‘Bohemian’ than these well dressed women with hair that wasn’t wilted by the sun or sweating in their crisp T-shirts like I was. Their kids were not having a meltdown in the play area covered in sand like my son. I discovered then he didn’t like sand or dirt, let alone all these kids running around and swinging like monkeys. But we continued to attend some of the great field trips and gatherings that introduced us to indoor playgrounds (yes, a must for summer in AZ), horses, railroad park and the wonderful membership to the zoo.

As the months went on and the weather cooled down  approaching Christmas my son had begun to talk and said quite defiantly one day “I don’t go Lambs club anymore.” It took a minute to connect Mom’s club and Lamb’s club as the same thing and I said ok.  We hadn’t made any real friends yet and it had given us a great idea of kid friendly places to go.

One week I got an email announcing the Mom’s Club was now organizing ‘Mom’s Night Out’. I thought this might be fun and less work than the play dates and my son could stay home with his Dad.

The first one was scrapbooking at a woman’s house who had started her Creative Memories business.This is in the days when no one was doing this new ‘mom craft’ . After growing up in the Arts in Australia thanks to my mothers career and I had attended Art school this was a wonderful idea. Not only did I get to take photos of my kids but make a book of Art with the photos! Turned out the ladies I met that night would become friends and it became a wonderful place to gather once a month in a big room ready for us to sit around, create, talk about kids and husbands with a glass of wine and snacks. For this SAHM it was the best night of the month. I was a free bird for 4 hours with others who were just as pleased to be there as I was.

18 years and MANY albums later I am grateful for such a formative adventure into what I now consider the diverse world of Paper Arts. I had another child and I kept scrapbooking but by this time I was set up at home and I started to create more with paper than just photo pages. Also my friends in Australia started a Scrapbook Paper Company and they introduced me to online scrapbooking groups and I started scrapbooking with all my Aussie friends old and new. I can say many of us are still friends and still in contact, some I have never met in real life but still hope to. We have watched our kids grow, our talents change and even inspired each other artistically. We still do. Some of us have Etsy stores now.

My children love the albums. They will look through them now (20 & 16) and laugh, remember stories, and laugh about all the photos, artwork, school work and letters they wrote which are now beautifully preserved in these books of many different stages and styles. It was the door that opened up my art. I will be ever grateful to ‘The Lamb’s Club’ for that.

#scrapbooking#paperart#SAHM