:: project life reflection and moving forward ::

Wow!  I have so much to say about Project Life, but I'll try to be succinct:

I LOVE this PROJECT.

That pretty much says it all.  Here are a couple of recent weekly spreads (from Thanksgiving week and the first week of December).

For both of these I mostly used Studio Calico Project Life Kits (Nov. & Dec.).  Of course, I added a few things from my stash. I am loving the SC PL kits, and I will continue my subscription in 2014!

So how did I do in 2013? 

OK. I missed several weeks. I learned a lot about myself along the way, and I documented more than I have ever done before. So overall, even with the missed weeks, I am happy I tackled the project, and there is no way I can see my life without it.

Will I go back and finish 2013? 

Maybe. Like I said, I documented more in 2013 than I've ever documented, and I am totally happy with that. I want to move forward into 2014 with a clean slate (that's part of what the new year is about, right?), and not worry about 2013. However, if I find myself with extra time on my hands, or I'm motivated to go back, I will.  My focus is going to be moving forward, though.

What will I do the same in 2014? 

I am going to continue to work with the Studio Calico Project Life Kits. They are awesome. I started the year last year with a core kit -- Seafoam -- which I also love.  It is quite likely that there will be cards from that kit included in 2014. I will also continue with the 12x12, weekly, two page spread (with inserts when needed & as time allows). I used several different page protectors in 2013, but I mostly used the BH "A" style, and will likely continue using those. I will also stick with the orange WRMK 12x12 binders (they have already arrived on my doorstep)!

What will I change for 2014? 

I will likely not buy another core kit. It's not that I don't like them, it's more that I like the Studio Calico kits better, and I probably only like them better because I get bored with just one core kit. With the SC PL kits I feel like I can still have cohesion, at least over a week, maybe even over a month, but I also have a lot of variety. I do like the BH mini kits. I have a couple, and I imagine I will incorporate them into my PL next year (and I might buy more).  :-)  The only other thing that is quite tempting to me is the HSN exclusive "Just Add Color" kit!  I am loving the little 2x2 squares in that kit. I have resisted purchasing that kit (so far)!

Over the next couple of days I hope to share how I've started organizing for next year's PL, and how/when I plan to share my work on this blog next year. Here's a little sneaky sneak of my title page in progress:

Thanks for reading!

:: projects abound ::

Oh blogger friends, how I have missed you.  I am alive. I didn't fall off the face of the earth. Something did happen, though.

School started.

and not just for Charlie and me........

first day of preschool

But first she had a birthday....

This time of year is so crazy! It seems most things get neglected. I have managed to get in a bit of craftiness here and there....

this week we camped...there was an insert

I'm taking a class at BPC called "Project Life Lessons".  One word -- awesome.

here it is without the insert

left

right

insert front :: the food

insert back :: the beach

I've even spent some time in my art journal. This Bob Dylan quote made me do this:

And I even made a few layouts...

all about brushing teeth....

and playing in the water.
that background started white....and then i got out the gelatos and stamps
those letters were white...you guessed it...gelatos (so fun)!

Yep, she still loves Batman. She really wants to be him when she grows up.  However, she has discovered that Batman isn't real (he is just in the movies - gasp!). So....now she wants to go to California, so she can "be" Batman in the movies, when she grows up.  Or today.

I. Love. Her.

Scrap Your Story :: project life week 27

Caution: This post is full of fun. Proceed at your own risk. I have a new challenge from SYS, a tutorial, free cut files, and a give away!

This week at Scrap Your Story, we are creating our own embellishments, Do It Yourself style! For this challenge I created a Project Life layout to share with you and I prepared a short video tutorial to show you how I created elements on my iPad, transferred them to my computer, and then cut them with the Silhouette Cameo. A great way to get your own handwriting or hand drawn designs onto your LOs or other projects. Fun!

Here is the two page spread (plus an insert) :

This week I used a mixture of the Seafoam Core kit, some of my scraps, and my first Studio Calico Project Life Kit.

What's included in this week's spread: I made a trip to the DOT, we had a family reunion, prepared for our trip north, and celebrated Independence day at my brother's house. This left side of the two-page spread reflects pretty much everything up to the Fourth of July. I had so many photos that I wanted to use this week, that I didn't put in a journaling card, I limited my journaling to one or two sentences per photo, with one exception:

I had another photo from the family reunion that I wanted to include, and I also wanted to include a more (private) story about that day. So, I added a pocket -- when you lift the photo of the four siblings, you see the other photo I wanted to share, and I had a big 4x6 space to share some journaling! Perfecto!

I used the front of the 6x12 insert to focus on the fourth of July. The photos pretty much speak for themselves, so I just stitched around them and added a decorative square. I made the stars/boarder on my iPad, and then cut it out with my Silhouette (this is my "DIY embellishment"). I used the inside of the stars on my title/date card (I also wrote the "hello" on my iPad and cut it out with the Silhouette). I will share how I did that later in this post!

I used a fun paper clip to attach a few of the items from our trip to a piece of "map" patterned paper (cut 6x12) and slid that in the page protector as the back portion of the insert. One of the things I love about Project Life is a place to put all the little bits of stuff that would normally be thrown away -- or be piled somewhere, now they have a home.  :-)

The entire right side of the spread is about our trip to the zoo and the concert. I am actually doing a mini-book about the whole trip, so I didn't feel the need to add a lot of journaling. One of the reasons I'm doing the mini-book is because I knew that I would have too many things to share about the trip; too much for a PL layout at least! So, the highlights of the trip only for this -- the zoo and the concert -- most specifically, Bea got her 15 minutes of fame (yep that's her on stage with Rick Nielsen -- more in another post)!

Don't you love that "Travel - take me away" card?! It is part of the July Studio Calico PL kit. So is the "Adventure" transparency. It came in the mail this week and so I decided I had to use them right now and document the week of the trip (even though I am terribly behind on PL)! I have some wood veneer letters that are coming (I hope) and I will add a few hand written words and the wood veneer letters to that travel card when the alphas arrive (I'm thinking "Apple Valley, MN" will probably be out of wood veneer letters).

OK, you've made it this far, congratulations, I'm impressed with your endurance! Next, a video tutorial. Be kind, please. It's my first. I just want you to know that I say, "diagonal" and I realize it should be "diagonally". Argh. And there are a few "ums". Please forgive me.  It was 11:30 at night when I was recording the audio, and I went outside so as not to disturb my family. I'm pretty sure my neighbors were out on their deck listening to my....ahem...err...uhh....several takes...so I decided to leave it as is!


Wow!  I'm assuming you have now made it through the video! As a gift to you, I have three (really five) files for you to download if you'd like! The first folder contains two of the "stars" cuts that are on my PL insert. One has the stars filled and the other is exactly like you see on the layout! You can get those here.  The second is the "hello" that I used on my title/date card. You can find that here. And finally, the "life everyday" cuts can be found here (I'm including the one I used, and a bonus one that has the words in a different place).

Oh, but there's MORE! As part of the DIY fun -- the other DT's at Scrap Your Story are also doing tutorials!  Make sure you check them out here.

And you thought that was it??!!  Of course not! I am giving something fun away! Wood veneers. I'm totally addicted. For realz. I'd like to share my addiction with you. I'm giving away two packages of wood veneers to one lucky winner!

To be eligible to win you need to:
1. Become a follower of my blog.
2. Leave a comment below.

That's it! You have until Thursday, July 25th, 11:59PM CST to enter. The winner (chosen by random.org) will be announced on Friday, July 26th!  Winner is Chelsea!  See this post for another giveaway!

Freckled Fawn is not sponsoring this blogpost, this is more of a Random Act of Kindness, from me to you. :-)

:: project life update ::

Anyone behind yet?  I am!!!  Before I started Project Life (remember, this is my first year), I kept seeing all these blogposts about staying organized and some of the things people do to help them keep up, etc. I read them, but didn't really do anything about it, because I was thinking, "Just print the photos as you go and slip them in the pockets, how hard can that be to keep up?" Which is just silly, right? At the same time, I wasn't completely naive, if you remember I was totally worried about not completing regular layouts because PL might take up my whole 'creative' time. Well...remember that thing we call "LIFE"?  It happened. I got on a Design Team (yay!) that involves a layout a week, which is way more than I've ever done regularly (this is mostly because I have a more than full time job AND a three year old, and, well,  I like to spend time with my family. It would be quite silly if I spent so much time trying to document our lives that I missed out on our lives, now wouldn't it?  :-) Plus, I'm supposed to "be present", to keep true to my One Little Word)! I am a slower than average scrapper, I know this, and it's OK. As a result of all of that...I got behind. Now I know what all these experienced Project Lifers were talking about! So, I'm catching up and I thought I would share how I'm doing that!

1. I already organize my Canon digital files in folders on my computer by month. This saved my bum more than a few times during my 365 photo adventures. And now for PL, too!

2. Even while I was keeping up, I would use the Stickies app on my computer to jot down stuff, mostly as it was happening, or just after, so that I would remember the stuff I wanted to stick in my book. I might not use it all, but my material was there. I suppose you could also do this in journal form, but I don't. A journal seems like I would need to write more. That would take more time. This is easy and painless.  ;-)  It looks something like what you see here on the left.
<<<<<<<<<<<<<



3. As I got behind, and even while I was on track, I used and conitnue to use the Momento app on my iPhone as my biggest crutch. I could not do Project Life without this app! You can set it up to automatically sync with as many feeds as you like/use (twitter, instagram, flickr, facebook, etc.). It then sticks them all in one place, with times and dates! Holy sorcery, Batman, that is like magic, just sayin'.

The photo above left is what it looks like when I open the app.  I can scroll through to the date that I want and then click to see my activity for that day. Once I click, I see what's on the above right! Shows the photo that I uploaded to instagram, as well as what I wrote to go with it. I can scroll up and down if there are multiple entries from one source or many sources. The whole day is right there. But oh, that is not all. See that little writing icon in the upper right corner? If something happens that you want to remember, but you don't want to upload it anywhere (don't want it public, or whatever), you can click that little button and use the app like a journal. Badda bing! Oh yeah! That's what I'm talking about! MAGIC with a capital M.

4. So, what I have done since I've been behind is go through my folder of Canon photos and pull out the photos that I think I will use and stick copies of them in another folder with the title of the week, say, "week 8".

5. Then I look at my Momento app and see what I'm missing.  All the time cross checking and/or creating the sticky note on my computer with jotted down highlights.

6. I create a "week 8 iPhone" folder on my computer, and then, using the transfer app, transfer any iPhone photos from that week onto my desktop.

7. Once all my photos are in one location, I can edit, resize and print those that I want to.

8. Finally I delete all the extra photos (duplicates, icky ones, etc.).

I now have a stack of photos, my "stickie" of text, and my Momento app for reminders. Most of my quotes I already have printed and I just need to pick the one that speaks to me for the moment -- if none of them speak to me, then I sometimes need to make that card as well. That's the hard stuff, then I just have to put everything in the pockets and "purdy it up".  :-)   I do sometimes use texts, emails, tweets, Facebook or Instagram comments as part of the journaling.  I often have too many photos printed, but this is OK because I can use the others for a layout or display them around the house!

I'm behind with PL, but I'm even further behind with sharing my PL! So here are a few weeks of fun (click on photo for slightly larger images):

Week5 Without Insert

Week 5 With Insert

This week we had a snow day, so I took several of the photos of our day of adventure and put them in an insert.  This is a coin protector with 20 slots, front and back (so 40 potential photo spots).  I split my photos into "snow" and "inside".  I didn't have 40 photos, so I filled in the rest with paper/journaling.

Week 5 Insert (front)

Week 5 insert (back)

Week 6 (NO insert this week!)

For Valentine week, I used a bunch of pink and red instead of the Seafoam Kit.

Week 7 Spread Without Insert

Week 7 Spread With Insert

Week 7 Insert (front)

There are actually kinda two inserts here. The envelop is in a 4x6 is attached to the larger insert, but you can flip that up to see the back of it, and better see the bigger insert (which is a note from daycare reminding us of B.'s valentine party and the list of students we made valentines for (and a couple of valentines).

Week 7 insert (back)

The back of the insert was what B. made at daycare for us.  I LOVE that I now have a place to put all of the lovely things that B. makes and other little memorabilia.

You may have noticed a new tab across the top of the blog called "project life".  You can find all my photos of PL layouts there. If you want to see the full blogposts about PL, you can do that here!

Here's a sneaky sneak for tomorrow's Scrap Your Story Challenge:

The layout that I will be sharing tomorrow is definitely one of my all time favorites, and it started with just some white cardstock. I absolutely love the final result.

Coming soon : a new Scrap Your Story challenge and more PL updates...I might even throw in a tutorial. ;-)

project life :: week 4 & a new challenge blog

Holy busy week, Batman! This Project Life thing is fun!

week four :: page one

I apologize ahead of time::  for some reason many of my photos on this post are quite wonky! I took the photos while there was still light, and by the time I had a chance to check them out and see that they were wonky -- it was too late to reshoot!  

week four :: page two

Guess what?  I have an insert this week (it's becoming a habit).  This week I just needed an 8.5x11 insert for some err...uh....paper.... I got a speeding ticket.  Ugh. In our community we have these traffic cameras that catch ya -- and they caught me!  Bad part was, I didn't even know I was speeding!  Argh!  Oh well, I haven't had a ticket in a zillion years, so I suppose I was due??

The other side of the insert is a print out of this blogpost and several instagram photos of other blogposts -- to document the fact that although I had a very busy week this week, I still posted on the blog four times -- no wonder I got that speeding ticket, right?

Insert close up (back)

I love my quote this week!  And B.  Oh B.  Why won't you ever keep your clothes on!?!

Favorite pocket this week:: these cards!  I cut some cards to the right size and put them in B's art area.  Then all I had to do was wait until she made something for me.  YAY!  I will do this again.

 Favorite Story for Week 4 :: Hiding and eating candy

New Challenge Blog :: With a giveaway!  If you look to the right...there are a few new buttons on my sidebar.  One that I would like to highlight today is a new challenge blog -- Scrap Your Story Challenges.  I stumbled across the blog yesterday, and it looks exciting! Their first challenge will go live on March 1st, but you should check it out now because they have a giveaway that could be yours! 

Coming soon :: I have several Project Life pages to share and of course a layout or two.  Let's not forget that lovely new Silhouette Cameo -- I have several things to share involving that....
And one more thing....I have an announcement that I am bursting to share.......oh so many fun things ahead!  :-)

Later taters!

project life :: week 3

Week 3 spread without insert

Holy catbirds, Batman! The weeks just keep flying by!

with insert, front

with insert back

Another insert this week!  This time I used an American Crafts 12x6 page protector, and stitched it a bit so I had an 8x6 spot and 4x6 spot.  Mainly I wanted to add this awesome drawing of my daughter's, along with a photograph that I snapped while she was drawing it.  :-)  Journaling reads: "I love that she draws in her art journal.  I love that she drew Africa.  I didn't even know she knew the word Africa." (and then on the photo at the bottom) "Why does she keep growing?"  For this journaling I used some fun striped washi (that I'm pretty sure is Recollections), and then cut some white strips of paper to write on.  For a little added fun, I trimmed the white strips so that one end looked like a banner.  Journaling this way is my favorite because I can mess up and easily fix it!

I needed something for the other side of the insert. I had taken several photographs of B. taking photos with her pink camera.  I had a difficult time deciding on which one to add to the book, so I grabbed a second one and cropped it 12x6.  I don't have a printer that prints that size, so cropped that photo into two photos (8x6 and 4x6) so I could print them (and I needed to use them as that size anyway). FUN!  The related photo is right beside the insert, so I put some fun arrow Washi that I got in my January Scrapbook Circle kit, across the top of the big photo, pointing toward the second photo.  I felt like that tied it together a bit.

This week I also wanted to add just ONE MORE photo for Saturday, so I made an extra pocket using these self-stick photo flip pockets.  I did need to alter it a little bit, but mostly it worked really well, and you may see that technique pop up in future weeks!

flip pocket closed

flip pocket inside

This is such an enjoyable project. It is so awesome that I now have a place to put the photos that I take and I love being able to stick in things like her art work! So far, I think that is one of the best parts of this project.  I was recently cleaning out some "stuff" and I just kept thinking, "Wow, I wish I had done project life [insert year here] because this would have gone in the book, now what am I going to do with it?" Plus, there have already been stories that I've documented that may or may not have made it in to a traditional scrapbook layout. Awesome.

Coming soon : OLW Blog Hop on Friday (yay) and 'Week Four of Project Life (guess what?...there's an insert)!