Project Life: 2014 Week 4

Hello, hello!  I have another Project Life spread to share with you all today.  I am so relieved to finally have this layout up.  After sharing week 4, I will officially be caught up blogging about my completed layouts.  Now I just have to actually catch up with creating the layouts for the rest of 2014.  Yea that's right, I'm about 25 weeks behind.  But I am not letting myself give up, it will never get finished if I do, and these albums are something I really want to be able to look back on.  So I'm slowly playing catch-up, and will try to keep up with posting my layouts on the blog as I finish them, wish me luck!

So back to week 4.  It was a pretty busy week, and so I ended up with a lot of pictures.  Instead of not including certain pictures, or trying to squeeze them all into two layouts, I decided to spread out with a three page layout.  Yea, I'm crazy like that.  Most of the excess pictures came from Tuesday of that week, since it snowed and we got to leave work early.  So I dedicated the whole first page to pictures from Tuesday.

I had a lot of fun with this title card, as I always do.  I started with a plain 4x6 card, and hand lettered in the title "this is a story about".  Even though I measured it out, the spacing of the words somehow got a little wonky, so the last two lines are closer together than the others.  This type of thing really bugs me, but it would bug me even more to have erased and redrawn every word, so I just left it.  Always working on embracing the imperfect!  I then finished up by using a couple square scraps of paper to add in my week number and dates, then embellished with some enamel dots.

For the second 4x6 slot, I decided to include a week in review card.  Since this card ran Sunday through Saturday, and I do my weeks Monday through Sunday, I had to get a little creative.  I wrote in the dates next to each day, and just slipped Sunday the 26th in at the top of the card, even though it actually happened at the end of my week.  Not ideal, but you work with what you got.  I then added some flair to the top using a strip of white (looks clear to me too...) washi tape and a couple buttons from my stash.

For each picture in my 2x2 slots, I simply cut out a card from white cardstock, and back the photo with different colored polka-dot washi tapes going different directions across the card.  This way all my photos coordinated, but weren't too matchy.  I alternated top and bottom as I went across my page, so my pictures make sort of a zig-zag pattern.

I filled in all the empty slots with journaling and a few decorative cards.  For journaling cards that related to a specific photo, instead of the day in general, I simply indicated that with an arrow pointing to the picture.

I love catching pictures of Melissa doing something absolutely sweet (which she does often) so of course I snapped a pic when she went out to clear off our cars.  Capturing and recording these small acts of love really help me to appreciate how lucky I am.

We also enjoyed some yummy treats on our snow day.  For this card, I backed my two pictures with white card stock to frame them.  This also helped to unify two pictures that otherwise don't really go together.  I added some thickers, and hand labeled each of our indulgences.  Still working on my cursive, so I've been trying to include it at much as I can, practice makes perfect!

This next card is another favorite of mine.  As it was snowing, I took a picture of the same spot each hour.  I love seeing the progression of the ground being covered.  I backed each picture with the same square scraps of paper I used on my title card, then I added a time stamp label below.  Add in some journaling on a shipping tag and some enamel dots and boom, done.

That completes the first page of my week 4 spread.  The next two pages are a full two page layout, which I'll show you at the end of this post.  But for now, I'm still going to take it one page at a time.  Here is the left hand side.

Since these pages are a new full two page layout, I couldn't resist adding in another title card.  Again, this is probably my favorite card of this page.  I used some simple alphas to add my week number.  I then added a printable label and a chipboard arrow to include my dates for the week.  And what card is complete without some enamel dots thrown in for good measure?

I honestly was at kind of a loss for what to include in this next pocket.  I had no idea, so I just threw in a monthly calendar card, used some washi tape to mark the week and called it good.  I still feel like it needs more, but honestly I'm stumped.  It may just have to stay like this, even if it is a little plain.

Most of the tiny 2x2 slots on this page ended up being filler or journaling cards, since I only had two pictures I needed to fit in here.  It was pretty easy getting something on each card though, since they're so tiny.

Mini things make me happy, so I had to include the miniature Chinese takeout container that was included in our order.  Unfortunately, the picture I snapped didn't really do a good job of showing the scale, so I had to use some journaling and captions to illustrate why there is a random picture of two takeout containers.  It really was the cutest little container.

As well as an early dismissal from work on Tuesday, we got an entire snow day on Wednesday.  I used this time to do some serious purging and decluttering.  One of the major space-sucks in my apartment at the time was the entire shelf full of all my notebooks of all my classnotes from every. single. college class I had taken.  This was like... in the ballpark of 50 notebooks, just sitting there, untouched.  I had the idea in my head that I would like to have these notebooks to look back on in the future.  But who am I kidding, who wants to relive the thrill of a 2 hour lecture, or 50 page chapter notes?  So I threw all those suckers away!  It was a little hard for the hoarder in me at first, but once I started it was addicting.

There were also stacks and stack of index cards that I had taped magazine clippings onto back in high school.  I thought this would save space, as opposed to saving the entire magazine.  Which in theory it did, but I could have saved myself the time and effort and just thrown it all away, because not once in the 7 years since I created these little cards did I ever take them out.  So in the trash they went.

Ok, back on track Merrit.  The next card recorded a particularly cold winter we were having.  I believe this was during some sort of extreme cold front or something or other.  All I know is, it was freaking cold.

Now onto the next page spread.  I really enjoyed making this page, and am so smitten with how it turned out.  I love how clean and white the whole thing is, with pops of pastel pinks and greens.

I ended up sort of combining the top two 4x6 slots into one mini layout.  Each card shows one of the two things I did that day, one good and one bad.  So I sort of contrasted them using coordinating elements.  The first one records the early morning I had, since I had to wake up for work training.  I really, really enjoy my sleep, so having to wake up at 8am on a Saturday really wasn't my idea of a good time.

To really unite the two cards, I cut a label in half to stick onto each card.  This really gives the card the appearance of being one connected unit.  It was my first attempt at having an element straddle two cards, and I really like how it turned out.

The second card is all about the date night we enjoyed that evening.  We went out to an amazing Afghan restaurant we both love, and really just treated ourselves to a night out.

And what would a trip to a fancy restaraunt be without pictures of our food?  The lighting was really dim, so it was hard to get a great picture, but its the memory that truly counts.  I again backed these pictures with a small frame, and added a label with a made-up handle to show the name of the restaurant.

I honestly had nothing to include in this slot, so I just added a fun quote card.  I embellished very simply with some enamel dots and a chipboard sticker.  I'm still working on getting comfortable with filling up cards without any real picture or journaling dedicated to the slot.  I have a hard time when I have no direction or purpose for what goes on these cards.  I'm hoping that with more experience, I'll get more comfortable with these 'useless' slots.

This week I was also lucky enough to finally get an IKEA Alex!!  I had wanted one literally for years, and I finally allowed myself to buy one.  Unfortunately, when we got it home and started setting it up, we realized it was missing a piece.  Literally, the last screw I needed to finish assembling it.  So I had to wait to get it all put together until we could get back to IKEA to pickup the missing piece.  Boo.

Next I included an adorable picture of my two girls snuggling on the couch.  I believe (as many Project Lifers do) that it is just as important to include the simple, everyday occurences, as it is to record the huge, special events.  Melissa and Dakota are most often playing when they're together, so I loved capturing them calm and cuddly on the couch.  I was also thrilled to find out my wood veneer flag fit perfectly into the printed flag on the card so there was a slight border.  Meant to be!

The final card holds a QR code to a video of Dakota playing with her favorite toy, Raccoon.  She has had this toy forever, and just loves the thing.  It is all sorts of ragged and matted by now, but we just don't have the heart to get rid of it.  Raccoon is part of the family now.  Dakota also likes to get a little rough with her toys, so I thought the 'fierce' hashtag was pretty appropriate... #Napoleancomplex would probably have worked just as well too, #smalldogproblems...ok I'm done.

And now I promised you a full shot of the second two pages of my week 4 layouts.  Here they are all laid out together.

I hope you enjoyed taking a peak around my layouts for this week, and let me tell you, it feels good to be finished with the last full January week.  I cannot believe I'm this behind!  I'm almost finished with week 5 though, so I'll be sharing that with you guys next week if all goes as planned.  Let's hope I can get more caught up before the year is over!