Project Life Blog Hop - May

It was whilst blog hopping through the One on 1 last month that I came across Jill Conyer's Project Life monthly blog hopping event - perfect for me as I love a deadline.

Now I am not sure if I am doing this whole Project Life thing the way I imagined I would do.  But for now I am enjoying noting the every day, taking more photos of just normal stuff and knowing that our family life is being documented.  This has taken the stress out of scrapbooking too.

For those that don't know me, I work full time, I'm a mum with two teenage kids and a Navy wife to Paul lives and works interstate just now - he comes home about every three weeks for a couple of days. I am a scrapbooker, card maker and Stampin" Up! demonstrator in my spare time!  So we start with the last week in February (if you want to see my previous updates click here).

I use a couple of apps on the iPhone to help me to remember the important stuff each day.  Not that I use them every day!  I use Momento and Project 365.  This is great because it means I can make notes anywhere and at anytime.

I nag the kids for photos too - and this page has two photos from Paul too.  I've left some blank parts on the written cards as I need to find some facts and figures - you'll see a couple of blank spots throughout these pages.

I am finding it a challenge to switch around the plastics as I seem to take a lot of photos in landscape - but I have found that for some bits of the album it is easier to work out where I will put a photo and then add it to the 'to be printed file' on the computer so I can just slot it in at a later date.

As I was struggling to make some photos work in the plastics I left a whole page out!  I panicked for just a little bit before I decided that I will ask Olivia to fill up the page with photos of her time away with her friends - phew problem solved.

I love the date cards - I am trying to complete a page per week - although for some events like holidays I am using as many pages as I need.

I also love clipping photos from my phone.  The text message from Olivia is a great example of this - we have so many SMS conversations - it is good to be able to print these too.

This is the beginning of the Easter holiday pages - I have used a few pages and more photos than hand written cards.

Isn't my friend's daughter amazing - doing the splits on a paddle board.  Olivia took the photo of the jetty in the dark - love it!

Yes that really is my husband doing yoga on a paddle board!

Its amazing how two grown men entertain themselves isn't it .... such show offs.

Again a couple of blanks on the written card - I can't remember how many fish they caught lol.

Well that's as far as I have got.  The next few weeks after this have become a little sketchy - hence I joined the blog hop .... to refocus my thoughts and reignite my passion for Project Life.

So I will definitely be back next month.  Time to hop along to see Laew.

Thanks again to Jill for prompting me to make a start on my catch up.

Til next time.

Nikki

x

 

Project Life Update

I've mentioned a couple of times that finally I have succumbed to the whole Project Life 'thing' but I haven't gotten around to sharing this with you.  Can I just say .... WOW WOW WOW!  This takes memory keeping to the next level - I love it - thanks Becky Higgins!  

What else can you do on a very wet and very cold Saturday afternoon?  Update the Project Life album of course!

I really liked the new Cobalt design - there are a few colours to choose from.  On the advice of some friends who had already completed a year of Project Life I invested in two of these albums, a Core Kit and some page protectors.  The Core Kit contains all the little journalling cards and space fillers together with stickers.  I also use a date stamp which I bought years ago.

The first page is pretty easy - there is a placement ideas card that I followed - so far so good! (I need to add something to the white space on the top right I think!)

I plan to complete one page per week, but for those weeks which are super busy then I am just going to go with the flow and fill as many pages as it takes.  This first week in January was spent in Sydney with Paul and our friends - so lots and lots of photos and memory making happening at this time!

The cards are part of the Core Kit and are colour co-ordinated - with stickers too - not really a sticker girl but I am using a few here and there.  I am making an effort to record the every day stuff too - the little things that happen that we will forget before the year is out.

This is the week after Sydney that I spent de-cluttering - and yes I did really include a picture of my oven being cleaned - just so that when life gets urber busy .... I can look back and say 'hey I am a good housewife - see my oven was clean in January' LOL

By the time we got to the end of January I was back at work and recording the every day was slipping. But I still managed to complete some sort of a record! 

And another week where things are a little bit out of order but still every day life that I wanted to record this year.  You'll see a little bit of scrap paper there with 'aussie flag' written on it - this is spot waiting for a photo - I have just come up with this plan :)

And here's my most up to date page.  I found the date cards really useful and I've been working with all the different page protector layouts that I bought.  So my plan to keep ahead?

I've downloaded two Apps - Momento and Project 365.  Momento gives me somewhere to jot down things to remind myself when and why something happened .... and Project 365 is a photo a day app - with an SMS reminder to take a photo every single day.  Whilst I know I will never use all 365 photos it has worked well for me as the weeks just become a blur and it is hard to remember the mundane every day life we all lead.

I love both of these Apps because they are on my phone and I can update them at any time.  The camera on my phone isn't brilliant (hubby as the new iPhone 4S and wont swap with me sniff sniff) but that's okay - any photo is better than no photo at all.

I have a 'printing' folder on the computer so every day when I charge the phone I have the opportunity to upload the photos, edit them and pop them in the printing folder.  Then once a month I plan to print them off.

I've also been writing the little cards before printing the photos - that way I can decide whether to print a landscape or portrait photo to fit in the right space in the protector that I have chosen.  I want to get a bit more creative with it but for now I am happy.  It has given me the 'space' to be creative with my scrapbooking - which I am loving very much.

So there you have it ..... Project Life is amazing - I am really loving it.  What wouldn't you give for a snapshot of your life as a child growing up?   My kids are loving all the photos already and we are only 8 weeks in!

Til next time.

Nikki

x

 

Hurry Up 2012!

I'm not a huge fan of wishing your life away - I've always got so much to get done I'd like to slow life down just to give myself a head start most of the time ...

But ..... I've plenty of crafting planned for 2012 and I can't wait!

Have you noticed all the new buttons down the right hand side of my new look blog?  

I've signed up for several Big Picture classes next year including Stacey Julian's TWELVE; a brilliant scrapbooking course for three months and I've finally been able to buy a Becky Higgins' Project Life kit (I've gone for the Cobalt colourway) having missed out last year (can I tell you how unbelievably excited I am about that); and I am also embarking on Cathy Zielske's Eat Well Move More journey too.

We have our final One on 1 blog hop planned for tomorrow - the final chapter for 2011 and the grand reveal for 2012 - yes I'll be doing this again too.  I've loved loved loved One Little Word - its just 'ME' - tune in tomorrow for the wrap up on 2011 and to check out my new word for 2012.

Don't forget ladies, anyone can join up ..... its fun; check it out.

I'll be sharing my progress here throughout 2012, and of course, I'll always be showcasing the lovely Stampin' Up! goodies all year long too!

Happy New Year's Eve!

Love Nikki

x