Clip Art Closet

I am a shopaholic.  We know this.  I have a blog on shopping.  It's not because I like to clip coupons.  I write paeans to shoes and books.  I enjoy the process of arranging and amassing beauty, and imposing order on the material world.  I don't always purchase injudiciously, however.  In fact, I often put a great deal of heart and soul into my trophy-hunting.  My cowgirl boots are still the most comfortable shoes in my closet, ten years later, though I would like to grow the herd with the likes of Sundance, Sheplers, and Country Outfitter boots.  Replacing my backpack of fourteen years is not a decision to be taken lightly, after all, it finished high school with me, attended several colleges and universities, rode trains and planes, has a killer key clip, pen slots, and pockets, but I'm lusting for something a little more stylish and yellow now, a little less sporty and purely functional.  Every piece curated by the Inspire Me boutique is, well, inspired.  Each piece is a work of art in my closet.  No regrets there.  But my budget certainly can't keep pace with my curiosity for objects d'arts, hence Amazon Wishlists, and Google Docs of songs to consider buying.  The screensaver of favorite things helps.  I can't buy medieval jewelry, or anything out of a Chanel ad, obviously, but I can enjoy looking at them as my screensaver scrolls through them.  In college, I hit upon a hobby, though, which did a rather decent job of scratching the shopping itch, without breaking the bank.  I subscribed to every free catalog I could find, in which I was remotely interested, and cut out items of interest, which as they accumulated, I would paste into a shopping scrapbook.  Eventually I had to use aliases to continue receiving catalogs while failing to make purchases.  Recently, while working for an online bookseller, I was able to purchase some books and magazines very cheaply, and so I cut these too.  (I realize this might offend some bibliophiles, but you must understand that not all books are equal.  Cutting out pictures of flowers, with their genus species names, for a someday garden, is a very good use of a $0.25 encyclopedia of flowers.)  There is pleasure in the cutting itself, something to do with the precision.  One of the best gifts I've ever received was a pair of decorated Conair hair-cutting scissors from my mother.  (She got me my other best gift too, which is a yellow tea kettle.  (Yellow has long been my favorite color.))  I sort the clippings and keep them in little plastic photo storage cases in clear, plastic, brief cases, which greatly increases the dorkiness of this hobby.  It's great to have clippings on hand--an easy reference to show a couturier, architect, or interior decorator, or just to whip up a quick greeting card or illustrated letter.  If your shopping addiction runs more to the idea-of-the-thing than the thing-in-itself, try replacing it with clip art, and I promise to help you discover its manifold uses.