Documenting Life with Project Life

I have been using Project Life for several years now.  You can read about how I got started with Project Life here.  In this post, I wanted to share with you some changes I have made for 2015.

This year I am really trying hard to get back to documenting the everyday life.  Last year I just did major events such as vacations, outings, birthdays, etc.  I liked doing that, but I felt like I was missing so much.  So far this year, I have been trying to have enough pictures taken of our everyday life to fill at least a two page spread.

Last year I didn't really do any journalizing until I developed the pictures.  I usually did not develop the pictures until I had enough to get a good deal at Snapfish or Shutterfly.  This meant that I could go months without updating my Project Life book.  Therefore, when I would get my developed pictures, it would take me hours to get everything in my book.  I don't have that kind of time right now.  This year I am trying to go through my pictures, determine which ones I want for my scrapbook, and do the journalizing on a weekly basis (usually on Saturday or Sunday).  To help me remember what pictures go where and to help in visualizing my layouts, I developed this planning page:

These pages are all kept in a binder.  I write down what picture goes where, where I want a journal card, and where I need a filler.  You can see another planning page I developed here.  Once the pictures are developed and put into my scrapbook, I remove the page from the planning binder.

I am also trying something new this year in the way that I plan out the weeks.  Last year I divided my Project Life binder up by months.  I would create a monthly divider card and also had the plastic Project Life binder dividers, each labeled with a month.  This year I am back to dividing my scrapbook up by weeks.

I decided to label each week with a mini calendar with that week underlined and then to include on the dividing card what number week it is.

How are you documenting your everyday life this year?

Organizing Project Life

I have been doing Project Life now for just about four years now and I absolutely love it.  You can read about how I got started with this great scrapbooking system here.

What I want to talk about today is how I am planning on keeping all of my Project Life stuff organized this year.  I would love to have a whole room I could dedicate to scrapbooking, but I only have a shelf in a closet to store my supplies.  When I want to scrapbook, I take what I need to the dinning room table and do it there.

In the past, I have kept all the cards that come with the kit that I am currently using in the box that they came it.  When I want to scrapbook, I put that box and my scrapbook binder on the table and get busy.  Now, I have more supplies that I use instead of just the box of cards for a certain kit.  I have cards left over from other kits and specialty cards (holidays, ones from Pinterest, etc) and I have stickers and filler paper as well.  I didn't know how to keep this all organized so I would know where everything was and not have to carry a hundred boxes to the table when I wanted to scrapbook.

Here is the system that I have come up with to try this year.

First is how I am planning on recording the memories.  Last year when something happened that I wanted to put into my scrapbook, I jotted it down on a calendar and then every Saturday I would go through my pictures, pick the ones I wanted to include and complete the journaling for each one.  The pictures would go into a "To Print" folder on my desktop and would stay there until I found a good deal on print them through Snapfish.  This meant that when I did print pictures I would have a least 100 of them at a time to put into my binder.

I liked this system because I could journalize while the memory is still fresh in my mind.  However, this year I would like to really have the colors of my journal cards flow with the colors of my pictures.  Therefore, I am not going to complete the journal cards until I have the pictures in the binder.  I am still going to wait and develop a ton of pictures at time to save some money, so I needed to come up with something to help me plan a little a head of time.

I designed this template (click here for a printable).  It is pretty simple, but there is plenty of room to to journalize on this planning sheet plus jot down where on the page I want to place this picture and journal card plus any other "fluff" like stickers, memorabilia, etc.  I printed these pages back to back and have put them in a binder.

I also went through all my project life cards and grouped them by type of card and then by color.  This way, if I need to find a blue journaling card, I have them all in one place.  I found this plastic storage bin to hold all my cards, some stickers, my pens, pencils, etc.

I took all of the rest of my stickers and grouped them by theme.  I placed each them in a food storage bag and labeled them.  I don't use these a lot, so they will stay on a shelf in the closet.  However, when I need one, all I have to do is grab the theme that I need instead of having to page through many packs of stickers to find the one I need.

I am hoping that this system will work well this year :)  How do you keep all your scrapbooking stuff organized?

Wrapping up the Year

At the end of last year, I started a new tradition with my scrapbooking.  My husband and I reflected on the past year by writing down the answers to some simple questions.  I then slid the sheet with our reflections on into my Project Life binder.  We both enjoyed reflecting on the past year and looking ahead to the next one.  I am looking forward to looking at our predictions for 2013 to see how close we were :) I looking forward to the year that I can include my daughter into the reflecting.

Here is the sheet that I created for reflecting on this past year and looking forward to 2014.  Here is a link if you would like to print it - New Year Reflection.

Project Life

I love to scrapbook.  It has always been a very relaxing activity for me, but after having my daughter I just didn't have the time anymore. My good friend Sarah, from The Arena Update, introduced me to Project Life and it changed the way I view scrapbooking.

Project Life is a very organized quick way to keep track of your memories.  Becky Higgins has all the hard work already done for you.  Project Life comes in a variety of binders, core kits that contain journaling cards and filler cards, and scrapbook pages.  The hardest part is deciding on what design theme to choose.  After you choose your materials, all you have to do is take your pictures, jot down a few words about the picture or a memory from a specific day, and put in the plastic scrapbook page.  Becky Higgins has some great videos to explain the whole process of Project Life.

My first Project Life album was one that I created for the first year of my daughter's life. Every day I took a picture of her and wrote down a memory from that day.  Now that she is two, she loves to look through the the pictures and point out everyone she knows in them.  Her dad and I look through them and can't believe how much she has grown.

It got harder and harder to take pictures everyday, so for my 2012 Project Life album, I decided to do a week a layout.  Some weeks had a lot going on in it so I covered more than one layout for those weeks.

The system that seemed to work the best for me was to keep a monthly calendar on my desk and if I took a picture of something or wanted to remember something that happened to include in my Project Life album, I would write it on that date on my calendar.  Then, I try every Sunday to sit down and complete a planning page for that week.  I jot down what picture goes where, where my journal cards will go, and then if I am adding in anything else such as a newspaper article, art that my daughter created, movie stubs, etc.

Project Life Planning Page

If I had time at the moment, I would then complete my journaling cards and put them in the binder.  I try to wait to print my pictures until I can get a good deal at Walgreen's   Usually this means I am printing 75 or more of them at a time, but it is very easy to slide them into the scrapbook page in my binder because my planning pages tell me exactly where to put them.

For my Project 2013 album, I am not planning on covering a week in a layout.  I am just taking pictures as the days go by and each Sunday sitting down to determine what is going to go in the album.  I love Project Life and the freedom it has given me to do something that I love, but is not such a time commitment that I have to choose between it and my family.