52 craft projects // project life 2013

I love scrapbooking but finding the time to do it is a real challenge for me. Mainly because all my scrapbooking supplies are hidden in storage boxes so I need ~15 mins to get it all out (and usually about half an hour to clean up my mess). Add the time of having my pictures printed at the next pharmacy(or even order them online and wait for them 2-3 business days) and you need at least a whole afternoon to get a couple spreads done.

Some spreads in my 2013 album have lots of details and movie tickets etc.

Other spreads were put together months later and only some random facts were pulled from my daily planner or my cell phone.

My album consists of everything that happened the past year - happy and sad moments, family trips, parties with friends, lots of knitting and sewing, some random crafts, lots of plant pictures and blank weeks that were filled with studying.

I really love having one picture fill the entire spread.

The last weeks of the year were composed in monthly spreads rather than weekly, because I was running out of time.
Using a core kit really helped speed up the process. For 2014 I plan on making monthly spreads and spreads for special occasions, and probably some spreads that concentrate on my craft adventures.

Do you use project life? Or another form of scrapbooking? I'd love to see how you documented 2013 :)
This is project #51 of 52 craft projects I'm attempting to complete in 2013. You can see all the other projects I've complete so far here.

hooray!

The project life supplies I ordered (back in the beginning of December...) finally arrived - hooray!
I ordered my yearly supply of page protectors, some blank journaling cards and Elise's seafoam kit!! I wish I could sit down right away and get started on my 2013 album but my local knitting group organized a sewing day. Of course that's not a bad reason to skip classes either! I'll share a picture of the pouches we made (if mine turns out good enough to be shared with the public...) tomorrow and hopefully the first PL post of the year by the end of the week.

In knitting news, I've started knitting the Tiong Bahru shawl early this week. The design is gorgeous and the pattern is very well written, but even the stockinette stitch section takes forever, because there's a lace border that still requires quite a lot of attention. Of course I needed a new 'in class knitting' project, so I started a pair of Hermione's Everyday Socks. The pattern is easy to memorize and I finished the first sock in just three days - definitely an instant gratification project!

I'm also test knitting a shawl but it deserves a post on it's own, so I'll leave that for next week :)

On Project Life 2012

Remember how I once mentioned Project Life? Well, 2012 is over and I hardly ever posted about it on the blog. My excuse for not sharing it here is that I posted about 80% of the pictures that made it into my album on here anyway. But since it's a new year it's time to get rid off some bad habits, right?
This year I'm gonna try to share some of my PL spreads here. Maybe like once a month?

If you're not familiar with Project Life, check out this homepage. There are tons of pricy products you can buy but all you really need is a couple of transparencies, a D-ring binder and some pictures + a variety of patterned papers. I only purchased some Design A transparencies, 3x4 journalling cards and a cheap American Crafts album that I got at Michaels on sale.

What I love most about PL is that it encourages you to scrapbook regularly. Ideally every week but I only had my pictures printed every other week. I feel like I took at least twice as many pictures as I did before I started PL. It's a neat way to document the everyday life :)

Here are some spreads from 2012. I can't wait for my supplies to arrive(I ordered more transparencies and the seafoam kit. Excited!!) to really get started on 2013!

Project Life: Weeks 4 + 5

I can't believe I'm halfway through week 6 already. Still love the project!



Lots of photos from my daily life this week - thrifting, baking, knitting, meeting friends, renovating...



Week 5 shows some of my current garden obsession!



Watching these little guys grow makes me proud - aren't they gorgeous?! I used one of Saaleha's gorgeous decorated index cards as a little plant journal where I document how the plants are growing and what influences their growth. Hopefully it will make the next round of planting seeds easier.



I had a stall at a local craft fair with my mom where I purchased the cute little sheep (bottom left corner) and had enough time to finish knitting the Dryad scarf. Also, my mom attempted to teach me how to spin - such an exciting new part of my fiber addiction :) I'm dreaming of spinning and dying yarn for a shawl... but I need a lot more spinning practice first :D

Project Life: Week 3

Still loving this project. I finished the spread on Monday already but the weather has been terrible around here, thus it was almost impossible to take decent pictures of the spread.


Nothing too exciting this week - I planted some seeds(zucchini and basil! yum), sewed some stuff, baked several times and ran errands. And lots cleaning.

Lots of washi tape, stamps, pattern papers and perfect pearls this week. I can't wait to spend an entire evening art journaling - it's long overdue! I love experimenting with different techniques for each pocket - that's what they're made for, right?

You don't know what Project Life is all about? Check out this website and see my cover page and supplies here. All my PL posts can be found here.

Project Life: Weeks 1 + 2

Oh man, this project is addictive. I decided to document my last three weeks in Canada in one spread because I didn't want to be really behind before I even started this project.



The first spread is pretty picture-heavy. I'll include more journaling in the future when I'll (hopefully) document throughout the week rather than whip everything together sunday evening.



This spread is pretty simple - just some glitter alphabet stickers to add some sparkle, some snippets like business cards, my boarding card, a movie ticket etc. and lots of pictures and some handwritten roundup of the week. I thought including a weekly quote was neat to I chose one I read on GoodReader a couple weeks ago. I first saw the idea of including weekly quotes on Elise's blog.



I finished the second spread on Saturday. There weren't enough pockets to include anything from sunday. Well, nothing important happened anyway so I didn't care ;)



The second spread shows more of what my life has been like since I got back to Germany - lots of baking (hey, I have to make use of having a KitchenAid mixer at my disposal before I move out.), crafting, meeting friends and taking pictures of my cat (mainly because he's the only family member who doesn't complain whenever I get my big camera out. And let's face it, he's a cutie!)



This week I included quite some instagram pictures although the quality isn't the best. Lots of handwriting because our regular printer refuses to print on cardstock. Ridiculous, right? I'm absolutely in love with the pink and white chevron pattern paper. It's adorable. I'd totally buy a wallpaper like that and cover my entire apartment in chevron wallpaper. Or maybe just one wall. Btw, did I mention that the bathroom in my new apartment is pink? You should've seen my reaction when my mom emailed me the pictures while we were talking on skype. Isn't a pink bathroom every girl's secret dream?

You don't know what Project Life is all about? Check out this website and see my cover page and supplies here. All my PL posts can be found here.

Project Life: getting started

The first time I heard about Project Life was last summer on a blog. I thought it was a great idea but moving to Canada and getting through the first year of college didn't leave much time(/money) for paper projects. When I saw PL pop up everywhere across the blogsphere in January I was intrigued to give it a try. But I decided to wait until my birthday in April because it meant that I'd be home soon with lots of supplies at hand.

How I'll tackle this project: I'll try my best to finish the spreads on sundays so I can post them either sunday evening or monday. As we all know, life is unpredictable and I don't see myself working on this project consistently until April next year. But I'll make an effort to document as much as possible in this album.



For the title page I used a photo I took on my 21st birthday. I used Photoshop Elements to divide it into six 6x4 inch pictures and had them printed at a drug store. Since photos are printed in a 10x15cm format rather than 4x6 inch the pockets are slightly too big. Oh well, it's only a couple of mm :)



I stapled a business card of the restaurant we had dinner at for my birthday to the picture and added the date in the bottom right corner.



Supplies I use: I got a American Crafts 12x12 D-ring binder from Michael's in Vancouver. It doesn't look as fancy as the official Project Life binders but it was much cheaper and it will do the job. I bought a Big Pack of Design A photo pocket pages. I'll have all my photos printed at a local drug store (DM) since I don't have a photo printer at home.



This is my current workspace. Some of the supplies I'll use every week are my advanced tape glider, a corner puncher, black ink, lots of washi tape, a cutting mat and a craft knife as well as lots of pens. I'm currently in love with American Crafts slick writers, Zig writers and Sakura micron pens. Also I'll use all kinds of scrapbook papers I've accumulated over the past years, the Journaling Cards and lots of stamps and craft punches.

Are you doing Project Life? Do you have any tips on staying on track with a project like this?
I'm so excited for this project!