Some days I don't get it......

Okay now I'm having just a little poke at the mag editors here......there are some days when so much of my stuff gets rejected in one hit that I wonder whether the editor even looked at it or just hit the "dump that crap" button on her little email program!!!!! I have to say that I actually really like the above two layouts but especially love the "disaster area" one that I did about my sons' room. Maybe it was just the combination of brand spankin' new products, a couple of cool paint techniques that I hadn't done before and that I personally just think I created a really great layout which to me would have said "good chance of getting pubbed". C'mon now, surely you know what I mean - don't you sometimes do a layout, an OTP, an ATC or whatever, and sit back and look at it and go "I can't believe I just did that cos it's so damn good!!!!!" It may not happen every time you sit down (I know it doesn't for me that's for sure and I have the "not for publication" layouts hidden away in an album to prove it! lol) but sometimes, just sometimes you come up with that gem that is just amazing even to you, the person who created it. It's when layouts like that get rejected the same day you subbed them that I start wondering what's going on. Yes I KNOW that some mags have more layouts accepted already than they know what to do with, and I KNOW that my style isn't representative of a large proportion of the scrapbooking community (but isn't that the idea? - to show the whole spectrum of styles?) and I KNOW I should be grateful for what I've already had pubbed (which I totally am, believe me!) but no matter how good your self esteem is, when you create something that you personally can summon a bit of self-pride up about, and even the best stuff you've ever turned out gets rejected, it does knock one's sense of abilty somewhat, makes me question how good am I really? I'm not having a wallow, I'm just musing about the things in life I don't understand. It's all well and good for us to say to ourselves as scrappers "it's okay if you don't get stuff pubbed, as long as you like it that's fine" but some of us want to have that recognition, that affirmation that we really are great at something that is purely from the heart stuff, not mummy stuff, not employee stuff, not wifey stuff. Y'all know what I'm talking about here.

Does anyone want to share thoughts on this one? I know there are lots of scrappers who've never cracked a pub even though they've subbed literally hundreds of layouts. I know some scrappers who have just about everything that springs forth from their hands accepted. I'm kind of middling here - I've subbed probably about a hundred layouts and my acceptances are listed down on the left hand side here on my blog. It's not a great strike rate but better than some. The irony of it all is that some of those layouts that have been accepted are not, in my opinion anyway, the best I've done so I sit and ponder why they were accepted while others are in my belief fantastic layouts for my level of ability and my style and yet they weren't taken. It maybe comes back to those factors I talked about before but everything aside, do you as a scrapper who wants to get something published have the same amazement when on fire great layouts are rejected and the not-so-fab ones are accepted? Are you at the point where you don't know what magazine editors want at all anymore because you can't seem to come up with it? - no matter how many times you've subbed and no matter how many styles or themes you've tried???? Or are you so well pubbed that you don't fret over the rejections any more and do what you like whether you think it might get pubbed or not?

It's my bugbear for the weekend now, this whole subbing thing. Is anyone willing to share their experiences about trying to get published? It may help a lot of others who have never submitted anything and those of us who routinely sub can sit and empathise.

Let me know what you think girls, because another common theme I'm hearing lately is that many of us "freestyle" scrappers are missing out on pubs just because our techniques are too detailed, too complicated, too different or (and I find this hard to believe) too "out there" for the traditional scrapping magazines. I could start another tirade against the PLB (perfect life brigade) here but I won't - but I do hold some of them responsible for freestyle and especially reality scrapping being a less frequently pubbed style. My life is not all perfect photos, rulers, straight edges, co-ordinating stickers and sunshine. My life, like me, is messy, grungy, fun and funky sometimes, with sometimes a few uneven edges, organic, rich, soak-it-up, raw, real, alive, breathing and kicking!!!!!! I asked Cass today whether somebody - ANYBODY - would consider a scrapping magazine targeted at freestyle, "out there" (whatever the hell that's meant to mean), non-conventional and reality scrapping. It seems like we have to resort to blogs, challenges, crops and gatherings of like minded scrappers to see the kind of stuff I know I would want to see in a mag at the newsagent. Right now we have three very mainstream scrap mags in Australia. I don't know if there is room for a fourth but maybe one of the papercrafts mags could embrace the idea?

If you've got any thoughts on this then please share!!! I know it's a hot topic among lots of scrappers of all levels of publication, or not, as is sometimes the case and I'm curious about what you think. If you think I'm an up myself idiot you can say that too but surely we've got opinions about the whole publication thing?

Talk to me dah-ling, tell me your deepest inner most thoughts.......no, no! just the scrapbooking ones!!!!!!

Love, Lu