Project Life

I decided to give Project Life a try with the "hand holding" of my sister-in-law, Corinne.  We are giving this a go together.  I have been scrapbooking for many years and it has been a long time since I've tried a basic method of scrapbooking.  I think Becky Higgins Project Life may just be the remedy for my lack of motivation to scrapbook!

My hope is to do one page per week with Project Life and add in layouts I create with my PersonalScrapper.com kits.  It has taken me a month to get started!  Once I completed my first couple of weeks, I loved it.

Here is why Project Life will be good for me:

1. I have everything I need to complete a page.  The Project Life kits come with plenty of items to create an entire album (and then some!)  Plus, they are all coordinated and have great patterns and designs.  I am also going to use up some of the obscene amount of product I have collected over the years! (I am using the Clementine Project Life kit)

2. I can keep the entire thing stored in one box.  There are a lot of great ideas out there for organizing your Project Life supplies (see Miss Wendy's blog, for example!)  I, however, get to use my dining room table as my work space.  It is in the middle of our house and it has many functions like scrapbooking, homework station, laundry folding, oh yes, and eating.  So, I need to be creative with my storage and supplies.  The box my kit came in is compact, sturdy, and already organized.  Thank you Becky for packaging this up so nice!

3. K.I.S.S. Keep It Simple Sweetheart!  I can unleash my craftiness on my other layouts.  This project is all about documenting our daily lives.  In order to keep focused on our day-to-day memories, I can't be spending hours on these pages.  I will admit that it is a challenge to stick to a very simple method of scrapbooking but at the same time, it is so refreshing.

4.  I get to do this with my SIL.  Corinne lives in California and I'm up north in Oregon.  We would love to be doing this together in the comforts of a scrap room but, that just isn't a reality.  She's got triplets and I've got three kiddos so even if we were closer...do you think we'd be able to get much done?  This is a great way for us to cheer each other on and make sure we are getting the memories documented for our families to enjoy.  This is part of the reason I fell in love with the hobby of scrapbooking, it brings people together.

So, here are my first couple of weeks of January.  I will do my title page at the end of the year because I have a plan that will require pictures from 2012.

gosh.  these pictures are dark. I'll try to find more light next time.

When I sat down to begin my pages, I couldn't get it to work for me! Every scenario I tried felt too chaotic and I wanted a more streamlined look. I searched all over google, the Project Life Team blogs, and instagram for ideas on getting started. It helped a little but, I just needed to keep playing with the kit elements until it worked for me.

I love that I can go back to add more embellishments, digital editing, or switch things out if I want to!  I just need to get into the swing of things.  I love the philosophy of Project Life and look forward to playing around with it some more.

Are you doing Project Life?  Share your blog/website link, I'd love to see how you are approaching it!  It seems like there are a lot of people that are starting Project Life this year...I just love the community of scrapbooking!