Learned this new word- Purging!!!!! and I have to say, I'm SO excited!!!!!!!! I swear I had never heard the English word before... When I did an interview representing the Gallery Stand Outs blog at the DigiScrap Geek Pod Cast, I was introduced to the marvelous ladies at Get It Scrapped (an educational scrapping site, in case you don't know it) I was surprised to see that I had actually a profile there! It was from when Laura was invited to one of their live chats/crops I think it was last year... anyway, I had a look at the classes and found their forums, so reading (slow as I do) found out about Sketchbook Pro for Mac which I want to download, (it turns out we have it in the tablet) I also introduced a new word in my English vocabulary: purging/purge- and with a bit of a push from what I read, I started what I should have done a long time ago- Started with 310. 37 GB of space in one of my External Hard Drives (I have 2) I had already made some moving around last year, without deleting much apart from ancient flat flowers or tags from freebies that I was 100% sure I would never use, put lots of old kits in different folders and moved to the EHD that had the most space, so I went to get started with the oldest stuff- I have to admit LOVED lots of what I found, all those kits from where I first started buying,this would be probably in 2008 & 2009, designers were giving spectacular freebies and I started buying from them as they were so generous... I found stuff I still would use these days and made me feel like I need a holiday of my CTs so I can use all those!!!! Then there were lots of kits from my first proper scrapping home (as I started in 2006/7 on online programs where all the kits were within the programs before I moved to the industry as we know it) stuff and some other sites that don't exist anymore- Got rid of a LOT of freebies, kept the very very first ones as I got all sentimental.....what I did was, in the other EHD, I made a folder called Clean Ups, then sub folders into fasteners, ribbons, papers, flowers, leaves and so on- so if there was just a couple of elements I knew I would use, I moved those and trashed the rest of the kit... of course I kept some kits in full, but I am not even gone through half of what I have and....oh gosh look at this numbers: I started around lunch time with 310.37 GB of space with some interruptions to eat some other long stories... at 19:10 after emptying my trash/bin: 316.02 GB of space!!!!!!!!! in other words I gained 6 Gigs, which, for a hoarder like me, is a HUGE achievement!!!!! I don't think I would have done so if I didn't come across the posts of the ladies at GIS, so I have thanked them, but thought I share here as it may encourage someone too Still have a LOT more to go through, and funnily enough, this was the first time I was able to focus into something without feeling the anxiety or slipping into "I wanna go to sleep and wake up when Sarita is 25" mood.... so, I maybe more social , lets pray it lasts (my good mood) so, I dare some of you hoarders like me (I know quiet a few here! LOL .... should we do some clean ups? what do you like the most that you keep? I have to add I haven't gotten anywhere near to my Lilypad kits, I'm talking about 2009 & 10, I only started buying here in 2011... but I realized that I have an un-measurable love for stutches and fasteners in general, and have no problem whatsoever on getting rid of papers that aren't kraft or cardboard like so all my solids from the kits I went through apart from 16 were all deleted.... have you got a system? do you clean up often? I haven't even gone through the first year and I already feel so great!!! -that and lemon cheesecake, two for £2, and some Ice cream van cones !!!
i just did this, a month or so before iNSD. I went through all my obsessive downloading times (2012, mostly), and threw away anything I wasn't keeping or ever gonig to use. I deleted close to 20 GB of stuff.... some of that included tiff files for Templates, pngs for templates, that I just don't use in any of my programs (kept psd files and jpg preview only). Deleted multiple TOUs if I had a lot of one designer's things. organized by store and designer, and found the possibility of using Evernote to keep tabs on my supplies. (which will be totally awesome, if i ever get caught up....) Then.... iNSD happened, and I downloaded a new 20 GB of stuff.... LOL! but.... i've also decided I need to make a point of using things I have, rather than just buying new. but I also have decided to be more selective on the things I download. So, i'm not downloading every freebie that ever existed, more like, downloading the freebies I can see being used, or that coordinate with a kit I know I own, or will purchase. And.... I've pretty much decided I will not be exploring new stores. I have found the few I'm sticking with, and that's enough, for me.
If I ever get finished with tagging and filing the new stuff I might find time to purge. Seriously I understand the concept but each time that I try to purge, I find old stuff that I want to scrap with.
i did this in Jan. it is such a great feeling to gain space on your hard drive or EHDs . mostly i got rid of freebies. and really early kits that i knew i wouldn't use. i cannot remember how much i was able to PURGE (lol, so funny you have been a digi scrapper for that long and never knew the word!!! i guess HOARDER is way more common, right? lol) quite a bit too. i want to say i got rid of about 5 or 6 gigs. i couldn't bear to touch any TLP stuff though. its all still there! now sandy, tagging. that is something i stink at. nothing is tagged in my world. i gave up on that idea a long time ago.
I've been trying to go through my stash bit my bit. Here's my dilemma, I love a bargain and I still download freebies, argh!! I am a little more selective, only downloading what TRULY appeals to me. I got a lot of random kits when I subscribed to the The Daily Digi and I finally deleted the ones I KNOW I'll never use. I need to do more purging though, my new computer is half full already and I've only had it 9 months (I have a terabyte HD).
I'm doing it with my house right now - waaayyyyy too much accumulated! I gained about 80gb a couple of months ago when I culled through my photos and got rid of the psd files from my layouts. Such a good feeling to clear out the clutter!
that's the real problem ... culling those unnecessary photos (where you have 30 almost identical for each and every thing and can barely tell them apart!) and those PSDs you know you'll never need to go back to. 80gbs! i am jealous! that's awesome.
i did a huge purge recently as i started my crash plan backup. it was good to go through and get rid of stuff. i even emptied the recycle bin and tried not to think about it. i did not touch any of my ct folders though. i was ruthless with the rest. i am supposed to be printing a book a month i've been slacking i need to flatten sharpen and save all of my psd and tif then sort the layouts into folders by topic. that's a big hurdle for me. after i get stuff printed i will purge my psd & tif files, but for now i'm keeping them. all 2235 of them. gah! that's a ton of printing!
Cynthia, you inspired me to jump into the deep end. I spent a couple hours going through all my stash and I deleted several g's of stuff. I deleted OLD kits I've never used. I found if I looked just quickly through the kits with a superficial look I could make a quick decision to delete. I also deleted designers from my stash that I only had a freebie from or a single kits I didn't think I would use. It felt good to really clean out my ACDSee files/folders. Thanks so much for the inspiration!!!
I did finally force myself to move to an EHD any supplies from prior CT sites, closed sites (who remembers we are storytellers? I loved that site!), and sites I no longer frequent. But I can't bear the thought of a real purge. Can't do it. Spent way too much time accumulating it and paying for a fair amount of it! I kept on my regularly used hard drive only the supplies from sites I really love or current CT stuff. Even that was pretty liberating, although not as bold as a full purge!
I just threw away a bunch of kits from 2008! I didn't think designer styles had changed much since then... but oh boy! I don't know why I would go back and use most of that... it's like the old Disney animation in comparison to the new Pixar stuff!
Do you purge old layouts? I have every PSD file for every page I ever made... Then a high res jpg, and a small jpg. I keep all of it.... For credits, for just in case.... Idk. :/
I purged my supplies about a year ago and that did feel great. I probably need to have another go at it along with my photos!
I just purged a bunch - mostly old blog trains... and yes even some CT kits from when I was really into that back in 2013... it was tough but I really needed the space on my EHD.
Lovely post Cynthia and just the food for thought I needed. I find it very hard to let go of things I create! I know what I need to do to create space. I need to get rid of my psds. I have really a simple model. I only make pages that get printed; not a fan of just keeping it digitally. I have now four 120 page books printed so we are talking about 480 pds documents backed up! I think just deleting them from my computer will give me 200 GB. Annnddd when I'm a little more brave I may get rid of them from the EHD. Its as some of you say - just hit "delete" LOL!
