Take-the-Cake Tuesdays: 10 on the 10th Edition

This edition of the weekly Tuesday feature at Take a Second Glantz, 

where l celebrate a few(ish) things that really take the cake, 

is also part of Shimelle's 10 Things.

If you're a "regular" around these parts, you know that I am madly, obsessively in love with Project Life. Here, in no particular order, are 10 reasons why:

1. This system is so, so flexible. With just a few different types of page protectors (see the widget below for a sampling of what I currently use in my album), I have yet to encounter something I can't find a place for in this album. When I was first considering Project Life, it looked to me to be a giant photo album scrapbook, but with sleeves of different sizes and formats, it has more dimension and interest than I ever thought possible.



2. Looking at a blank 12x12 canvas can be overwhelming at times, especially when my mojo isn't flowing. Limiting the format to a few varieties of page protectors, looking at one sleeve (or a few) at a time, is less intimidating and actually makes me more creative in the long run.


3. As I'm trying to catch up, I currently get one to two weeks worth of pictures printed and scrapped, finally getting photos off my computer and into a format through which they can be enjoyed by others. YES!


4. Because I didn't order an actual Project Life kit, I am being "forced" to use my stash. This is good because it means more shopping in my future space in my craft area.


5. This project has resulted in me documenting our lives and memories more consistently. I know that this is something we'll be extremely grateful for in years to come.


6. Anyone who's ever spent any amount of time with me can vouch for the fact that I collect a lot of ephemera (aka "junk"). I'm the girl who slips the printed napkin from the bar into her purse when she thinks no one is looking so that I can remember where I went that night. Side story: my best friend knows me so well that after my bachelorette party, she handed me an envelope full with bits of memorabilia she had collected throughout the evening. And no, I haven't scrapped it yet. But if I had been doing Project Life at the time I would have because... this system gives me a place for all that "junk" I save: programs in inserts, tickets in sleeves, greeting cards cut down and used as journaling cards. It might be the most brilliant part of the system for me and helps to cut down on the clutter in the house (well technically, anyway).


7. Admiring the Project Life albums of others, I am constantly finding new techniques that I want to try. While this also happens when I look at traditional albums, I find it less intimidating to try a technique on one photo or one journaling card than to try a technique that affects an entire 12x12 layout. If a few photos in an entire album look a little off, I'm okay with that. I have completely given up perfection with this album, and that has allowed me to be creative and PLAY.


8. Not every day is a picture day for me. Sometimes I forget, sometimes I don't feel like it, sometimes nothing's inspired me. But I'm not the only one in the house who takes random pictures on the 'ole iPhone. If I have a blank spot during the week, I can ask Hubby to check his phone. With our traditional scrapbooks, unless I know about something going on that he's taken pictures of, like a trip or event or something, those photos very rarely get printed and included into our albums. This system is a great way to incorporate Hubby's point of view.


9. Before embarking on my own Project Life journey, I spent many of my blog-reading hours oohing and aahing over the albums of Ali Edwards, Cathy Zielske, and Elise Blaha Cripe. They have very different styles, but the one brilliant thing they all do is incorporate poignant blog posts into their albums. Once upon a time I had the intention of printing a Blurb book of my blog each year. I actually even started one, but talk about time consuming! This "great" idea quickly turned into a fleeting one, and so my writing remained in the blogosphere. Now, though, if I write a particularly meaningful post, I can resize it, print it, slap it on some paper, place it in a 6x12 or 8x10 page protector, and give it a permanent home among the rest of our memories. Love. This.


10. Finally, and maybe most importantly, getting into this project has made me more mindful of the present. As I've thought about the type of documentation I want to include in our album, I'm taking better note of things - whether it be mentally, on a calendar, or in an online gratitude journal (thanks, Cheri!) - as they're happening. Being encouraged to stop and smell the roses is definitely a happy, and unexpected, side effect.

Today, Project Life, I raise my fork to you. You take the cake.

Click here to see my Project Life album to date.

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Congrats to Cheri on winning my 300th post celebratory B&N gift card! If you need help with how to spend it just let me know.

Project Life: Weeks 2-4

I finally found my Project Life groove and in doing so have come to LOVE this project.

I've been keeping the layouts really simple in the interest of catching up, doing little more than varying the page protectors depending on the orientation/number of pictures and ephemera I have for the week. I've also kept the journaling pretty basic. In doing so, I shocked myself and was able to get three weeks done in one week (and two weeks have extra inserts)!

Week 2
Because my pictures didn't fit in chronological order, I used yellow circle stickers to label each photo with the date. On the left side, I included some ephemera: in the second row, a thank-you card I received from the person whose neighborhood is pictured in that day's photo and an invitation for the event that is captured in the photo in the last row.

During Week 2, I had written two blog posts that were really meaningful to me, so I did a little resizing and slipped them into a 6x12 page protector. I used a printout of my blog button to indicate the source of the journaling.

I also included a divided 6x12 page protector that holds three 4x6 photos. In it, I included a picture of some supplies I bought at Michaels that week (I just really liked the picture), an email I had written for work, one of Hubby's Facebook statuses, and an overview of the weather.

The right side holds a horizontal 12x6 at the top, so I included the front cover of a program for an event I attended that week, as well as some extra journaling that goes with the three vertical 4x6 photos at the bottom.

Week 3

In the reverse 12x6 at the top of Week 3, I used a journaling card to accompany my Instagram photo of Mimi, and instead of journaling a "week in review," I made a color copy of my calendar, cut it up, and pasted it (in a pleasing-to-me way) to capture the week's events at a glance. I used SMASH tape on top of the page protector to label two of my bottom photos that made little sense without explanation.

On the right side, I again used an invite for an event I attended and wrote additional journaling in the white space. I was super happy with my decision to split the 4x6 photo in the middle row across the seam, and I snuck two pictures into one sleeve at the bottom. I cannot express how much I LOVE the flexibility of this system.

Week 4

This week started out with a huge festival, for which I had TONS of pictures, so I decided to showcase only this one event on the left side. I skipped the journaling and instead used letter stickers to put the name of the event on top of the page protector.

This week had an insert of the event's program.

I let the back of the program show on the reverse side of the insert.

And then I had fun with Instagram! This page protector holds nine 4x4 photos (I made a collage of 12 Instagram photos - from this week and future weeks - in Photoshop and printed it on 12x16 paper at Sam's Club). In the middle row, I used precut 4x4 paper from a Creating Keepsakes kit I had in my stash to add journaling and to "decorate."

I think one great benefit of this project will be putting fewer photos in my Library of Memories storage binders. There are definitely pictures I want to duplicate and use on layouts in my LOM albums, but I think the vast majority will wind up in my Project Life album and never get reprinted for LOM triage.

As with any new project, there's a learning curve to this. After completing layouts for these weeks, I realize that I really need to put some sort of simple filing system in place for any ephemera I might use in my Project Life album. I want to get a bit more organized with the supplies I'm frequently pulling from my stash for this project. And finally, if I'm going to continue blogging this project (which I hope you all will indulge me in doing) I need to learn patience in taking photos of my finished pages. I get SO excited when I finish a page that I just HAVE to take a picture of it then and there. Often, this is when the light is coming through the windows in my scrapping area directly onto my work space, causing that obnoxious glare, for which I apologize. It would probably also be a good idea to take a few close-ups of journaling and the like.

It feels so good to be documenting our memories more consistently (doing so has even gotten me putting together some digital scrapbook pages again!). I'm not sure this is the type of album that our friends will necessarily want to spend time looking at when they come over, but I know that we will enjoy it for years - and hopefully generations - to come.

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There's still time to win: Comment on my 300th post by July 9th to be entered in a drawing for a $10 B&N gift card!

Project Life: Week 1

Y'all thought I gave up on Project Life, didn't 'ya? Surprise! I didn't.

My original intention was to have a 2012 volume, but when I admittedly fell four months behind I decided to make my own rules, creating a first volume that starts with my birthday.

The title page is an enlarged 12x12 picture from my birthday dinner cut to fit the six 4x6 spots in the page protector. I then journaled directly on the photo using an American Crafts Candy Shop silver gel pen.

I kept my first week really simple. You can see the green painted inside cover. I used American Crafts Black Jewelry Box Thickers to create the month title on a piece of BasicGrey Obscure patterned paper. I used Pebbles Share & Tell journaling cards in Orange and Spring Green, as well as two freebie digital elements (source unknown) to create the journaling card on the bottom left of the left page and a birthday card I received.

After scrapping only the first week, I have already learned four valuable lessons: 1) I have to throw perfection out the window if I have any hope of sticking with this project; 2) I have to do a little at a time; 3) my plan for the page and the reality of the page will probably not be the same, so be flexible; and 4) it's fine to look at other project life albums and get inspiration from them, but I have to do what works for me.

I obviously have some catch-up to do, but I can already see how meaningful this project is going to be.