One of my goals this year is organization. To that end, I've been going through the 'dump it here for now' hard drive. Its a mess. But it's getting better! Now I have to tackle the biggest part: the Digi folder! {Insert horror scream here!} Once upon a time, like the first month I was Digi scrapping, I divided kits up into categories like paper, tags, buttons, etc. It didn't work for me. So, I'm debating on just getting the courage to hit delete. Or to see what might go back together. Decisions decisions..... On the fun side, I found 2 kits I forgot I owned from Retired designers! And a ton of Cheryl Templates. Why I had a folder labeled FDD and Fiddle Dee Dee Designs I'll never know. But I do know this is indicative of the reason my Digi Folder is a disaster.
Oh @bestcee this is me right now! I've been going through a complete overhaul of my 5 hard drives for the past 2 months! It's been slow and I'd rather be scrapping than reviewing/moving/deleting BUT it's getting better and I am finally able to FIND things! (I am moving from a designer based folder system to a theme based folder system.) I'm going to assume if it's from your beginning digi days, the supplies were mostly freebies?? So I say, delete and feel a weight lifted! I haven't missed a thing that I've deleted.
Sounds horrible to me. My mom instilled in me when I was young a "a place for everything and everything in its place" as well as "put it away now" attitude. I unzip and promptly file. I organize by store/designer/product - always have. I say if you haven't touched a lot of those things in your "first" digiscrapping folder, you probably won't want to use them now, might as well delete. Good luck
Since my computer crash last year I've wanted to better organize digi and image files. I've created a backup copy of newer images on my computer onto an EHD but my goal is to duplicate all of them which will take forever as I have thousands of photos. Plus, they are are different EHD's and I need to get them all on two drives, not scattered all over. Digi stuff is a bit easier b/c there are a lot of files but they are all in the same place. So I just need to make an EHD duplicate. I have some smaller EHD's but would like to have one big EHD so they are all together. I don't think it ever ends, does it?
Oh good luck with that! I have done the same thing, and as a matter of fact when I open a new kit and see an item I will never use I just hit delete. Why keep it if you k ow you're never going to use it!! I agree if it is a folder from your earlier days and you haven't even touched it hit delete.
I try to stay on top of things and organize like Kiana - store/designer/product. Whenever things get too disorganized I'm also just tempted to hit delete!
I'm being very delete happy, but I've also found some cute templates by Amy Martin from the digiscrap parade in that freebie file. So, I'm aiming for a quick look to see if it's a designer I know and recognize {as in, I currently like their style!} If not, delete. I've done this for the last 2 years. The problem is my earliest file system, and the drastic move it off the dying computer, and the dying ehds I've had occur. It's created a few duplicates due to not knowing if it was saved elsewhere. Now I have online backup, so I don't have that issue. It is a lot easier to maintain my current system, then fix the old stuff.
This is so on my summer to-do list as well. I'm semi-organized, but I need to do a major purge and I'd like to create some folders for retired stuff that I don't want to get rid of just yet.
Good for you! It takes time but I think it is well worth it! I've just decided--like 2 weeks ago, when I gave my parents a full EHD to keep at their house as a "different location backup"--that I'm going to stop backing up items older than 2015. They're on BackBlaze (cuz they're on an EHD I back up), so if I have to have something, then I can get it back; however, they're is no reason for me to have 6 copies of the same. old. stuff. (cuz I have 4 other EHDs) My style has changed since I started digi in 2007. What helped me decide to let go of some digi stuff was looking at my closet and realizing that I don't have many clothes from pre-2015, so why would I want digi stuff from before then? I don't feel bad about getting rid of clothes that I don't want anymore, so there shouldn't be a problem letting go of DS stuff. Anyway, the next EHD I buy will only get new stuff on it. It's time to start fresh and IMO, it's easier to keep an empty room organized than to go through and organize a mess.
This. This is what prompted my purge. I was looking for a kit, and it was in 4 different places. Not to mention 3 hard drives, at least once on each one. Sigh. I've already deleted 100 GB!
We had to get a new PC this past weekend so we just did a quick transfer everything from the old to the new, but we need to go through everything, reorganize and purge too. One if these days I may go through my digi stuff and add tags...maybe?
I am over EHDs at the moment. My 3 TB started clicking (and it hasn't clicked since) but in what I thought was a well-thought-out move, I ordered a replacement EHD. It's 5 TB so I was so happy to have even more storage! Long story short, I spent a day transferring files and blaming myself and my computer only to find out the drive was bad. Having moved quite a bit of photos, and then not being able to access them any longer, I had to do some restores from Backblaze. Another day to fix all that. I'm waiting until the current EHD completely dies. At that point, I'll have Backblaze send me a drive with all my data and whatever files I need in the meantime, I'll download one zip at a time until my drive arrives. LOL
My EHD is pretty organized thankfully, but that's only because I've kept the same organization pretty much since I started in 2006. The only difference is that now I rarely download freebies unless it's from a designer here, so I don't have a giant stash of freebies. I did finally go through all of that and deleted most of it because I knew I'd never use it with what I have available here. About ever year or every other year, I go buy a new EHD just to replace it before it fails and then I transfer everything to the new EHD and start adding from there. So far I'm able to keep all my digi supplies and photos all on the same EHD which makes organizing a lot easy for me too. Good luck on your re-org!
I might start doing this, just buying a new one every 1-2 years before the first one fails. It would save me a lot of heartache. LOL
I REALLY need to do this and I'm glad I'm not the only one with multiple extra drives where I have backup after partial backups. I really need to cull the herd too. I have so many freebies from my beginning days and old kits that I never used. Good luck with your project @bestcee .
Nope! Joint the crowd! I have one that I thought was dying, but it turned out that it was the USB port on the Laptop 1, not the drive. I have one that I outgrew, but apparently only moved a handful of designers stuff from. I have one that is portable and I use when I'm on Laptop 2. And finally, the 'File Cabinet" one. Which is the one I'm currently working on. I have decided on my ultimate goal, which has helped immensely. I know that I want everything (including non scrappy stuff) on the "File Cabinet" ehd. Which it always has been, and that part is organized. And then I want all the scrappy stuff duplicated onto the portable one I use with Laptop 2. And at this point, I will then add all supplies into ACDSee, and keep all photos in Lightroom. Things I've learned: *Using PSE Organizer actually made my supplies less organized! Glad I only used it for a short time! *Each EHD is organized in a different way. And now I'm adapting the one that works best for me! It was easy to figure out. It's the most organized one! *Knowing I have an online backup that was fully backed up before I started this process gives me the courage to delete. delete. delete. If i miss it in the next 2 weeks, I can go get it. If not, which is more likely, then yeah! *Great British BakeOff is awesome background noise for organizing.
I so need to tackle this project!! I had an EHD die with every photo I took from 2004-2009 on it. This week was our anniversary and my husband surprised me with a new EHD with all of my recovered files on it! He had snuck the old drive out of the house and had it recovered. He had to go to Switzerland this week, so he hid it in the house and texted me directions to where to find the new drive on our anniversary! I was so excited!! Anyway... I had the most jacked up method for organizing photos back then. The folders are all named Month then Year... so all Aprils are grouped together, all Mays, etc. And they're not even in year order because sometimes I put a space between month and year, and sometimes I didn't. Then, if there was a big trip, I would just name the folder something like "Summer Trip", "Hawaii" with no year associated with it. I backed the photos up online and tried to look at them in date taken mode which should be great... but I discovered that I never set the date on my first DSLR, so they're all showing up as being taken on 01-01-1980??!?!?!? I'll deal though... I'm just so thrilled to have my 20,000+ photos back! I have lots of EHDs now that I need to consolidate. I think working on a laptop is to blame. I keep looking for a better, more portable option. I'm hoping that if I go back to a desktop, this won't be as much of an issue. I can't even begin to think about tackling organizing my supplies... I have those strung out all over!
