Back on May 24th when I turned the big Two-Nine, I wrote out five personal goals to complete over the next year, one of which included documenting my 29th year.
At the time I wasn’t quite sure what type of album I wanted to create so in order to help me get a better idea about what type of album would be best, I made a list of exactly what I hoped to get out of my 29th year album. You can read more about my reasoning behind the list in this post but here is the short version of the list I wrote:
- Daily Life – Document what our everyday life looks like – similar to P365 but less structured
- Memorabilia – Create a home for all the little bits and pieces of paper/things I love to pick up
- Adaptable – Ability to adapt to the story – with more or less photos/story
- Easy upkeep – Needs to be manageable to maintain throughout the year
At the time I was leaning heavily toward Becky Higgins’ Project Life since it seemed exactly what I wanted but since it was SO trendy and I try to avoid anything too trendy, I decided to wait.
Flash-forward to July 1st rolling around and me realizing that if I was serious about making an album to document my 29th year, I needed to get this party started. So over the 4th of July holiday I took the plunge and ordered this:
An American Crafts 12×12 Faux Leather album in Graphite, Project Life Divided Photo Pocket Pages Design A and Project Life 100 Pack of Journaling Cards. I debated about ordering a larger variety of pocket pages but ultimately decided to keep things simple until I was sure I actually liked Project Life.
As is often the case with projects around here, my Project Life stuff sat sad and unused for another week or two before I decided to finally get down to business earlier this week…
And have since turned those pages above into this…
A completed two-page Project Life spread documenting Week 8 of my 29th year – July 12-18. Woohoo go me!
One of the mistakes I made when I did my Deployment:365 project back in 2009 was trying to get caught up on my layouts by starting at week 1 and working forward. Which meant no matter how many layouts I did, I was always several weeks behind. I do not recommend this plan. At all. It is a BAD idea.
So this time around I decided that although I’m now eights weeks after my birthday, I would start with the most recent week, July 12-18 and scrap that first and then while I’m keeping my book current going forward, I’ll work on filling in the weeks going back to May 24th. This way I can stay focused on the current stories rather than forever being lost in the past.
Here’s a closer look at the left side of the page:
Yes, that is Adam and I holding goblets of beer (at hopdoddy’s), haha. For anyone lucky enough to be in the Austin area, you should check out hopdoddy. It’s awesome. Delicious burgers made with local ingredients and tasty local brews.
Since the Project Life kits aren’t available anymore, I made my own title card to label each two-page week spread. Here’s a close-up of the title card:
For all my fellow font lovers out there, the tall font is Bebas and the smaller font is Museo Sans, both of which are available for free. For the patterned paper top, I used a digital paper from Zoe Pearn’s awesome Zoom Zoom kit and printed the whole card on Epson Premium Presentation Matte paper using my Epson printer.
Here’s a closer look at the right side of the page:
Since one of our big activities this week was the start of our quest for a new dining table and chairs to replace our sad dining table and folding chairs we’ve had since college, I included some photos of our trip to Crate & Barrel as well as a clipping from the front of a catalog we picked up at West Elm.
We also attended the midnight showing of the final Harry Potter movie this week so I dedicated several pockets and a journaling card for Harry Potter. Here’s a close-up of the Harry Potter part of the page:
I included a photo I took with my iPhone of the sign at the theater as well as our ticket stubs. In the bottom pocket I included the front of our Harry Potter-style 3D glasses as well as the top of the wrapper they came in since they included the name of the movie.
In order to make the glasses less bulky, I unscrewed and removed the sides of the glasses so they’d sit flatter in the pocket. It’s still a little bulky but once I complete next week’s page (the back of the Harry Potter card) I’m going to staple the corners of the pockets to hold the glasses inside and I think they’ll stay just fine..
Here’s another detail shot of the right side page:
For the two journaling cards, I wrote my journaling on the computer using my custom handwriting font by Darcy, added some Ali Edwards’ brushes (This One Brushes) and then printed them directly on the Project Life journaling card using my printer.
I didn’t realize you could do this until this week but because my Epson printer feeds papers through the printer without folding or bending them, you can pretty much print any custom size you want. Had I known this back in December, it sure would have made my December Daily album a whole lot easier, lol!
My thoughts on my 29th year Project Life album so far?
I am in LOVE. As in this-album-makes-me-want-to-do-a-happy-dance kind of love. There’s something so cool about seeing daily events and memorabilia like this all in one place. I am definitely very very excited to see where this album goes as the year progresses. I’m so glad I decided to jump on the Project Life bandwagon, trendy as it may be, haha.
So that’s my story from my first week of Project Life. Anyone else doing Project Life? Anyone finished any happy-dance inducing projects lately? Feel free to share in the comments!
Can I take Levitra if I am taking other remedies at the same time
okay, you’ve sold me on project life. I wanted to document my life when Jer is deployed similar to this and project life looked awesome..but trendy, lol. You’ve done it in a way that still screams NETTIO while being project life, which gives me hope that I can do it too!
You totally can! I think not having the kit (which is sold out anyway) helps since you’re not using all the same elements as everyone else. That’s what I was worried about – I wanted it to be ME not just another Project Life album.
So I already have so many fonts installed my computer screams at me, but I love that title font you used. Just installed.
I’m using Project Life to document our weekends and it’s been weeks since I caught up on the journaling part. Thanks for the reminder. I only do weekends because frankly, our weekdays are boring. Project Life is perfect for our weekends, though!
Yes weekends are perfect! That’s what I like about Project Life over a strict P365 album. Our weekdays around here aren’t all that exciting so it’s nice having the flexibility to include more photos from one day. This week’s spread has photos from I think 3 days but it still captures our week.
I’m doing a project life album for 2011. But I doing it all digital with a layout for each week of the year. I post my pictures on my blog each week and have my layouts posted as well. I love the Becky Higgins products, but I’m terrible with paper! Your album looks incredible!!
Oh nice! Yeah I don’t ever scrap paper layouts but I wanted to include memorabilia in my album so a strict digital album wouldn’t have worked. Project Life is a nice mix I think.
Love your font. love Love your album. Couldn’t agree more with starting at the NOW. I’ve done too many p365 projects playing catchup. My single rule for any album/series project is to start on the current date. Great post.
Yes, totally agree! Way better to focus on current stories while they’re fresh than to forever be trying to remember what happened 8+ weeks ago!
I am SO tempted to do Project Life, but I’m giving AWITL a try first. If ever I’m doing this I’d want it to be fully digital because I live in a tiny condo where space is a premium! (I think that’s why I haven’t printed any albums yet :P)
Ooo yay for AWITL! I’m planning to do one too but I think it’ll be scaled down from what Ali Edwards is planning. We don’t have enough going on here on weekdays to fill four spreads a day, lol.
I know what you mean! This is my first time doing it, so I’m just all about going through the process of collecting pictures and words and then putting it together. I’ve never done something like this (and yes, I sound like every other scrapbooker when I say this) and feel like I lead a boring life. Well, I’d like this project to contradict that belief. We’ll see, lol.
haha, I like the idea of using the album to prove you don’t lead a boring life. My life is pretty boring during the week too so I just try to make up for it on weekends, haha.
Hi Lynnette,
Looks awesome!
But you know it’s in fact your 30th year, right?
Hugs,
Leontine
LOL perhaps technically but as far as I’m concerned as long as I’m 29-point-something years-old, I’ll go with my 29th year. Just consider it as my “29th birthday year” with the birthday part dropped out, haha.
Whoohoo!! I love Project Life 🙂 I’ve wanted to do it for a while now, and now that we’re expecting, it’s all I asked for for Christmas. I want one of the new kits to document the last few weeks of waiting for baby, and then the beginning of baby. I think it’ll be a good mix. I plan to do the pregnancy and baby albums digital, so I wanted something paper too, and I think it’ll be a good fit. I can’t wait to see more spreads from you!
Ooo I’d love to see your hybrid-y take on Project Life! I think that’d be really fun to have the mix of pre-baby and post-baby in there. Plus it gives you a place to put any baby-related memorabilia you want to keep!
Pretty Cool album so far! Wonderful inspiration! I hope you’ll keep sharing your pages. I’ve not done a Project Life before…it seems kind of daunting to try to do it for a whole year. I think I would always feel behind. I did my own “Week in the Life of” recently and was able to finish it in exactly one week…and I’m STILL working on my December Daily but I did finish 2 pages this past week! I have several other projects that I’ve done the journaling for and taken photos, but haven’t decided on the format to use. Thanks for sharing!
The plan is definitely to share more pages as I go. Probably not every week but maybe a couple of weeks at a time. I do know what you mean about it being daunting though. I made it through 16 weeks of layouts with my Deployment:365 album back in 2009 and that seemed like a lot! Hoping I can keep this project going a little longer for sure.
Lynette, I think you have inspired me to take the plunge. I have been reading all about project life and learning more about scrapbooking and digital scrapbooking … so long that the full kits came and went right before my eyes. What type of printer do you have? Being able to print on the small journaling cards directly would put me over the top! Thanks for being so inspirational and generously sharing your stories and experiences.
I’m pretty sure I watched those kits go by right along with you, haha. As far as printers, I use an Epson RX595 inkjet photo printer. It’s a couple of years old now so I’m sure the majority of their photo printers probably print that same way. I think its how you’re able to print on 4×6 photo paper which I think most Epson’s do. I like it a lot!
Looks great!! I’ve never really liked the design of the full Becky Higgins kits, so I love that you are making it your own!!! It not only looks awesome…it’s totally inspiring!
Oh thanks! I didn’t really love the look of the kits either so I’m liking being able to do my own thing. The next edition of Project Life is supposed to be a la carte so you should be able to purchase just the items you want rather than the whole kit. I think it’s a good switch.
I just love your album! I would really like to do something like this. I always save ticket stubs, receipts for special things, etc. and I never know what to do with them. I love the divided pages. Maybe I will get brave enough to try this.
You should! That’s one of the reasons I wanted to do a non-digi album. I discovered when I did my hybrid/paper based December Daily album that it was so nice to be able to pick up stuff knowing it actually had a place to go. Plus it’s fun to see all those bits of life mixed in with all the photos!
Loooove what you’re doing with this and you’ve inspired me to get working on mine again after getting a bit behind. Love how you’re using what you have too and I got an extra album that I may do this with for next year! Thanks!
Woohoo, you can do it!
I love how you have customized it. I have one of the kits (Amber), but I don’t like it anymore. So I stopped doing it. Now I am inspired to re-start and make my own title cards. The plain journaling cards are sold out in Canada right now, I love their simply graph look. Thanks for sharing, I look forward to reading more 🙂
I was never really a fan of either of the kits so I was kind of glad they were sold out so I didn’t have to go that route. I much prefer doing my own thing since I can switch it up as I go. You should totally make your stuff if it makes you inspired to re-start your album!
I absolutely love what you’ve done with your project life album, especially the title cards. You’ve totally inspired me. 🙂 I do have a question about printing on the journaling cards. Did you just feed the journal cards straight into your printer? Did you tell the printer that you were using a custom size? Thanks.
Yep, I just fed it right through the printer!
First I measured the true size of the journaling card since it’s slightly smaller than 3×4 (2.81″ x 3.81″) and set up a document in Photoshop that size. Then when I went to print I set up a custom paper size using those same dimensions. I use an Epson photo printer which has a slider in the paper feed tray you can adjust for smaller size papers like 4×6 or envelopes, so I stuck the journaling card in the feed tray and moved the slider over until it held the card in there snugly but not too tightly. Then I just printed!
It was a lot easier than I thought it would be (I was prepared to waste a few cards getting it right) but it worked on the first try. I only wish I’d known about this trick back when I did my December Daily album – it sure would have saved me a bunch of time printing and cropping all my oddly sized pages, haha.
Have I ever told you that i love you?!?! I hadn’t really given much thought to project life but my GOODNESS I so want to do it now! This is perfect for me because really I haven’t been able to scrapbook much but I still want to document things and I think doing something like this might help me a bit more.. who knows. Maybe its more work than scrapbooking layouts but I think I like the sorta ecclectic approach to it! I’m so excited! I think I’ll do the same as you and make up my own sorta kit from digi files and see how it goes 🙂
Awww, thanks Kristin! To me it’s about the same amount of work as a digi layout – just a different kind of work. If anything it’s simpler since it’s mostly editing and printing photos. You should totally do one! And then maybe you can make some digi printable elements to go with it, haha.
Hey Lynnette. Love your PL and how you customized your pages! I am using one of the standard kits and I like it well enough but I don’t quite love the colors. I gave some thought at the beginning of the year to trying to make my own inserts using digital kits but decided to just go with the pre-made for the first year to see if I would even keep up with it. The more work and customization, the less likely I am to find the time to get it done. So far, I have been keeping up pretty well and really like how it is coming out. Next year, I might go with custom inserts — if I make a whole bunch in advance, it would be very similar to just using the standard kit.
I’m really picky about colors too which is partly why I didn’t want to use the standard kits either. Plus everyone and their brother were using them, haha! I’d definitely like to set up some custom card templates in Photoshop so I can use and print as needed, but I do love the flexibility of making my own inserts!
Awww Lynnette I love your PL album! Yes it’s trendy, but it’s also brilliant and a great solution, so why not hop on the bandwagon? I think there’s enough room on there, heh heh. I had the same philosophy as you. I started doing Project Life in April, so I just started doing the current weeks’ pages first. I have since then printed all the photos needed for Jan-Mar, but just get to the journaling when I have extra time. I’m totally okay with just having photos from Jan-Mar for now, until I have time to go back and add the journaling gradually. PL rocks my world! 🙂 And printing on the journaling cards through the rear tray of my printer is THE BEST! I love seeing the little journal cards come out of the printer. 😀
i would love to see more Pl pages, your digital work is awesome too!
Aww, thanks! I posted a little update on my Project Life album today: http://modern-school.flywheelsites.com/2012/01/17/an-update-on-my-29th-year-project-life-album/