Project Life 2014 - Title Page

If you've been here before, you know that I do Project Life.  I can't even describe how much I love this project and how it has changed my idea of memory keeping.  When I started scrapbooking in 2003, I fell for it hard. The idea of playing with pretty paper and supplies and recording our family's memories was infectious for me.  It became my creative outlet and I realized I had a talent for it. For a long time, I basically focused on big events with a few little mini albums thrown in here and there.  I didn't think about our everyday memories.  When I discovered Project Life a few years ago, I was floored.  I lurked around for awhile to see other's albums and in 2012, I decided to dive in.  And I haven't looked back!  I love the idea of recording our everyday, even in a small way.  The pockets are small to help keep me from being overwhelmed, all while I'm recording things that my family would normally forget.  My husband and I love looking back through the albums and remembering the little things that we take for granted on a daily basis.  I still do 12x12 layouts of special things I want to record, but Project Life has helped to take the pressure off of doing a huge page of every single thing I want to remember.

For 2014, I'm continuing to record our everyday on a weekly basis and I will stick to mainly the Design A page protector (seen below).  I try to make each two page spread span one week.  Sometimes, we have low key weeks, and only one side is enough to record it, and that's fine with me.  It doesn't bother me when that happens.  I don't want to force anything with this project or I will stress out and it will become a chore, which I don't want.

Today, I want to share my title page for my 2014 album and some of the supplies I'm using for this year.

Supplies used here:
12x12 We R Memory Keepers album in Aqua
Becky Higgins Design A page protector
Cards are a mix from:
Studio Calico PL kits  (this link is for the current kit - mine are from past kits)
Seafoam PL core kit
"Life Documented" card was handmade by a friend
2014 card and our last name is cut from my Silhouette Cameo
Random supplies from my stash - wood veneer, enamel dots, stamps, cork arrow
Pictures printed on a Canon Selphy CP900 printer
Creative Memories corner rounder

I'm working on playing a little catch up for January right now.  My plan is to share each month here all at once.  This week I'm working on catching up on January and I will share all my weeks when they are finished.  Thanks for taking the time to take a look!

If you want more information on the Project Life system of scrapbooking, please check out Becky Higgin's site!

Project Life, Week 4

Full view

Week 4...already?  Wow, where did January go?  This week was a good one.  Lots of stuff to fill my pockets up.  Dogs went to the vet, we spent a great morning at the park, got our new iMac, Caylan started reading an actual book...reading!...it rained in Tucson...I got some new jeans....Layla had her 18 month check up...yep, it was a good one.

Left side

Right side

 And yes, yes I did put my weight in my PL and also on my blog.  There it is.  All out there.  No excuses now!  Am I crazy or brave?  Maybe a little bit of both with an emphasis on crazy.

Project Life Week 3

Full view

And we're on to Week 3!  Trutting right along!  I absolutely am loving this process.  I've made my process a little easier this year by gathering some of my supplies that would be good for my album at some point and storing it on my Raskog cart with the rest of my PL supplies.  Mainly, alphabets!  I pulled some tiny prints and some colors that go well with my kit and keep them together.  I'm determined to make a dent in my 147 different fonts...yes, I said 147.

Left side

 This week, I documented a couple things from TV: the Golden Globe Awards (so so so happy Les Mis won great awards!).  I also documented the NFL playoffs...although I was bummed Atlanta didn't win....  And it was 31 in Tucson last week.  Say what?

Right side

My husband and I were able to get away for a date night to see Jack Reacher and have dinner at Bamboo Club.  Awesome. *Later I went back and added a yellow heart-shaped paper clip on the "date night" card.  I also wanted to include the fact that Layla is now sitting forward in the car....eeeeeek!  It was a great week.  I'm working on week 4 and will probably need to get week 4 and 5 done at the same time.  Trut, trut, trut!

Project Life, Week 2

Full view

I finished Week 2 over the weekend and absolutely love the way it turned out!  I've decided to keep the date cards (always located on the upper left corner for me) simple this year.  One piece of washi tape along with the week number, and I'm done.  Since the date cards for the Seafoam kit are pretty graphic, I'm good with that. 

Left side

One thing I love including in my Project Life albums are actual pieces and papers from our everyday life.  My older daughter is working on writing her numbers and lower case letters, so I took the paper she was practicing on and cut out a piece to include.  This will be priceless years from now.
I caught a picture of my girls walking hand-in-hand through Target and had a Target marketing paper I kept randomly so I cut out the symbol and journaled on it.  

Right side

When documenting my daughter going back to dance class, I was looking for some ribbon and saw that had this ribbon from Dear Lizzy.  How perfect does that work with her dance picture?  The Scrapbook sticker is a new sticker Studio Calico is using on their packaging for their monthly kits.  I love it so much!  The @ symbol was cut with my Silhouette Cameo.

And that's Week 2!  I've already got my pictures printed and my notes for Week 3 that I am hoping to finish up this week.  I'm also working on a blog post for my new menu planning system that will go up this week.  Hope everyone had a great three day weekend (if you had one).

Project Life, Week 1

Cover page

Previously, I had decided not to add my Project Life spreads on my blog.  It got to be a little boring (at least to some of you, probably) and I didn't blog often enough to really share my album every week.  Upon further reflection, I decided I WILL share it weekly.  Since I am very good about keeping up with my album and I want to blog more often, I think it will be a good push to be sure I'm blogging more so that it's not just Project Life.  I'd like a good variety, so I think it will help.  With that...here is my first week of Project Life.

Full view

Left side

Right side

Insert which is in the album, although not pictured.  This is a Studio Calico Handbook page protector and is 6x8 in dimensions.  Front side.

Back side

I am using Becky Higgin's Seafoam Core Kit which was designed by Elise Blaha Cripe.  I just love Elise.  I've been following her blog for a while and purchased a few things from her shop, which is just awesome stuff.  The card with the Neil Armstrong quote is also available on Elise's blog.  I love the Seafoam kit because I LOVE the colors - hello beloved turquoise - mixed with black, white, some yellow, grey and kraft.  The cards are simple enough that they can be left as-is or dressed up.  The card on the right side that says, "That's what Layla said," was designed by Geralyn Sy (who's an AMAZING scrapbooker) and I just love it!  It's a digital card so I can print it as often as I like, which will come in handy when Layla starts saying more words.  I also ordered one for Caylan which I've used in the past. 

I really love the cover page and my first week.  The insert is in the album and sits just in between my first week spread.  It's a nice little addition to document my New Year's Resolutions.  I'm playing a little bit of catch up because I just got the kit this week, so I'll be working on week 2 tomorrow and will share this weekend.  I hope you enjoyed it and will come back and see my weekly updates on my Project Life album.  If you have any questions about the album or my process, please don't hesitate to ask!

Other supplies:  Design A Page Protectors, We R Memory Keepers 12x12 album in Orange Soda
For more information on Project Life, please visit Becky Higgin's blog for fun videos and tutorials.

Letting Go

A lot of this going on around here...

I've gone into super-organize-and-go-through-everything mode.  It started with my house stuff.  Did some organizing/purging in my scrap room.  Got my kitchen pantry organized.  Need to go through Layla's toys/clothes and sell some stuff she's outgrown.  Then it moved onto moving forward with some projects and letting some go.

This has been on my mind for a while.  There are  few projects I've been doing that haven't really been amazingly fun to me.  They seem a little more daunting than exciting.  After some contemplation, I've decided to let some of them go so I can concentrate on what I really enjoy.

1. December Daily - I've done two December Daily's for the past two years.  If you haven't heard of this, it's a project that was created by Ali Edwards.  She does one each year and you can purchase kits and follow her process to help you create your own.  It's an album that chronicles each day in December to capture the holiday season.  Don't get me wrong, I do love the concept.  And I love my two albums I have.  Unfortunately, for me, it became more daunting.  I struggled to finish it and didn't enjoy the process based on what was going on in our lives.  So, I've decided to let it go.  Plus, with Project Life, I don't really think I need it.

2. One Little Word - this is another Ali Edwards project.  It's a year-long class at Big Picture Classes.  You choose a word for yourself that you want to focus on and incorporate into your life.  Then, you follow prompts each month to create pages that focus on the word and where you are with it.  The reason I'm letting this go is because it's not really speaking to me.  I chose a word: Strong.  And it's fine, but the project and the album isn't really speaking to me.  Seeing the message board for the class, it's really helping a lot of people and they're really enjoying it.  Me - not so much.  I guess it's just something that's not really for me.  I'm going to finish the album since I did start it, but not a ton of effort is going into it.  So I won't do it again.

3. Project Life - I AM NOT GIVING UP PROJECT LIFE!  I just wanted to emphasize where I am on it.  I LOVE this project!  I love collecting all the little things that would normally be forgotten soon after it's happened.  I love looking back at the past 6 months and realizing what we've done and where we've gone.  My husband flipped through my first album and loved looking back as well.  So, definitely moving forward with it.  However, as of right now, I'm not going to share my album.  It really became daunting to take the pictures every week and post them with the details.  Plus, my blog became nothing but PL and I didn't want to do that. Update on how it's going: beautifully!  I haven't gotten more than 3 weeks behind at a time.  I keep really good notes about what I want to include each week.  I save EVERYTHING!  I enjoy setting up in front of the TV on Sunday nights and working on the week.  I really love it and can't wait to dive in again next year.  Planning on getting the Clementine core kit next year when it's back in stock.  And for 2014, I plan to combine the leftovers of the Turquoise kit I'm using now and the Clementine kit I'm using next year to make my own kit-of-sorts. 

I feel less pressure by letting these projects go and refocusing on what I really want to create.  Now, to go through some baby stuff...

Project Life: Week 11-14

Welcome to Weeks 11 through 14.  Here we go:

Week 11

This week we headed home (with lots of travel drama).

My sorority sister got married in Scottsdale this weekend.  I got to go and meet up with some great friends.  It was a wonderful reunion!

Week 12

This week consisted of lots of getting back on schedule and getting back to normal.

And Layla started crawling.  YIKES!

Week 13

Got caught up on some project this week.

    

     Had some Easter fun and went to see The Hunger Games.

Week 14

I'll be back tomorrow with weeks 15 through 18!

Project Life: Weeks 15-18

Welcome to weeks 15 through 18!

Week 15

This was a hard week.  My grandmother passed away.  I included an insert of her obituary.

The second spread is dedicated to her through the years.

Week 16

Spent a lot of time at home this week.

Week 17

Very good week - went to the fair and JOSH CAME HOME!

So happy Josh came home!  And can we talk about the Banana Pudding Shake at Chick-Fil-A?  Seriously.

Week 18

Gym time together, dog sitting, signing up for Vacation Bible School...

Even got to sneak out on a date to see The Avengers!

Thanks for sticking with me.  One more catch-up tomorrow!!!

Project Life: Weeks 19-21

Thanks for sticking with me so far.  Here's the last of my AH! I GOTTA CATCH UP blog posts.  Here's weeks 19 through 21:

Week 19

We did some fun shopping to get ready for our anniversary trip!

For Mother's Day, Josh and Caylan got me a pearl necklace.  They were able to choose the oysters, watch the pearls come out, choose a setting and they made the necklace right there.  Josh took pictures of the whole thing and included them in my card (sized for my album - seriously, how awesome is he?).  It was the best present EVER!

Week 20

Friends of our got married this week - one year out from their big wedding - they just decided to make it official at the courthouse.  The big wedding will be next year in Texas.  They asked us to be there and it was such an honor.

We went to a birthday party - the blank spot on the bottom will hold a good picture of Caylan with her friend Rhyleigh when a get a copy from the party.

Week 21

Book club, gymnastics, lunch with a friend and triple digit weather.

A BBQ, signing up for pre-school, good beer and an impromptu dance party.

And now, I'm officially all caught up!  Tonight, my mother-in-law flies in.  The rest of this week will consist of family time, Caylan's first dance recital....and then we leave on Sunday for our vacation!  I'll be back after that with more Project Life and a list of goals to focus on.  I'll be making that list in the Bahamas when my mind is clear and I can reflect and focus on what I want and what's important.  Everyone have a wonderful week and I'll be back soon!