With the birth of my third child, I realized that my previous method of scrapbooking was not going to work. Mainly it took too much time and thought. I would also let it go for months and then have to do a marathon session to catch up. I'm sure events and commentary were lost in the process. To be fair, I started scrapping in 2007. I went back to scrapbook the twins' lives from their birth in 2003. I also went back and scrapbooked my entire life in an attempt to decrease the boxes of random memorabilia and photographs. It worked well, but I won't be able to keep up with four different albums at one time. I started seeing more and more bloggers using the Project Life method. I did a bit of research. I thought about it. And I finally decided that this method would work better for our new life. Although I do have a few modifications to fit our life. The twins' individual albums will stay the same. As I don't see them everyday, it makes sense to focus on events rather than a weekly time table. The family album and baby Arthur's album are transitioning to Project Life. My goal is to create a spread a week or at the very least biweekly. I want to focus on meaningful moments and journaling our lives. I love the idea of small events. I love the idea of flexibility with PL.
In preparation, I bought a few kits to get me started. I picked up the Baby Edition for Arthur's album (gender neutral edition full of grays and yellows), the Seafoam Edition for the family album, a mini Holiday Kit for both, and the Sunshine Edition (designed by A Beautiful Mess) for the family album. I wasn't planning on buying that many kits, but the Holiday mini kit seemed like a good investment, plus I snapped it up for 40% at Michaels. The Sunshine kit was just released and I love their designs too much to pass it up. This means that I am stocked with paper inserts for probably a few years (at least a year for each album). I also bought a Seafoam and a Baby designer paper pack to cut at my discretion. This seems like a lot of supplies, but I keep reminding myself that this is almost all I need to create interesting scrapbooks. I won't be randomly picking up stickers, paper, and embellishments. I plan on using scraps and already bought supplies to doctor some of the inserts. Some will go in as is. It's all about customization, but I do love a clean look without lots of embellishments or layering.
So, I am officially embarking on the Project Life adventure this month. I plan on starting the weekly spreads now that the baby has arrived. To prep, I have created a few transition/introduction pages to start the albums. I made a nice introduction page for the family album with journaling about the transitions and my theme for the album: Change and Growth. I journaled a bit about why we are changing scrapbooks and our family. I added pictures of our current (before baby) family and some facts about them. For Arthur's album, I used the same idea with different papers and inserts.
I then added in a page highlighting all my ultrasound pictures to document that part of the journey. I duplicated that page in Arthur's album just with different designer paper.
The next pages highlight the nursery and baby shower thrown by my crafting friends. I also inserted a few of the handmade cards I received from friends.
Overall, I am really happy with the flexibiloty of the PL system. I can make spreads that fit our events or weeks. But I also have a limited supply of inserts and page dividers. It forces me to make decisions instead of getting lost in the possibilities. Slowly, it is coming together. I can't wait to start highlighting our weekly adventures. I plan on sharing them on the blog on a monthly basis. Look for them soon...
Supplies used:
- PL Seafoam edition kit
- PL Seafoam designer paper
- PL Sunshine edition kit
- PL Baby edition kit
- PL Baby designer paper
- American Crafts D-ring binder (black and lime green)
- Corner rounder
- Date stamp
- Random baby stickers from stash
- Black marker