Project Life 2012

Wow, are we really almost a week into 2012?  I can't believe it.  I feel like time goes faster every year.

I've spent the past month getting ready for Christmas, doing all the fun Christmas activities like making gingerbread houses and watching The Polar Express.  I've volunteered in my kids' classrooms and helped with Christmas parties.  My family spent Christmas Eve in downtown Cincinnati taking a carriage ride, seeing Santa, shopping, and having a great dinner overlooking Fountain Square.  And the day after Christmas we headed to sunny Miami for a week where we had great weather.  Unfortunately, we had to get back to real life and I didn't get to stay long enough to watch my Mountaineers demolish Clemson in The Orange Bowl, but seeing it on tv was pretty great too.  I also worked at the SPCA for a couple of days in early December, doing exams, vaccines and microchips.  It was fun to work again and a great easy way to get my feet wet after a 4 year absence!

I hope everyone had a great holiday season.  I always find it a little hard to transition back to the routine after the holidays, especially knowing how long winters seem in Ohio.   I am still writing thank you notes for Christmas gifts and trying to wrap that up also.

I have written several posts about scrapbooking before and I'm sure you're all aware of my love for digital scrapbooking and photoshop.  This year when I finished my yearly book it wasn't nearly as fun for me as it has been the past 6 years so I decided to try something different to document 2012.  I will still do my yearly digital scrapbook because I love the result too much to abandon it, and I also love that I can print multiple copies as gifts.  At this point, my family expects it  so I'm stuck!  But I thought I would add another scrapbook for just our immediate family this year, one that is a little more personal and maybe captures some of the more mundane aspects of everyday life.  I am choosing a format that will allow lots of flexibility and will also let me incorporate some of the digital scrapbooking into it.

So I decided to do "Project Life".  This system is the brainchild of Becky Higgins, and it is designed to make scrapbooking very easy.  The basic kit looks great, but you can customize it as much as you want and make it as elaborate as you want.  It seems to be a great way to start scrapbooking for those who have never done it before and are intimidated by the idea of creating everything from scratch.

Here's the link for the Becky Higgins website that describes Project Life.  You order a core kit that is made up of journaling and decorative cardstock pieces, a binder (I think you could use any 12x12 scrapbook with rings), and page inserts which come in multiple configurations. 

Here's what I ordered so far.  I can't wait to get it!!

Clementine Core Kit

Clementine Cardstock

I'm waiting to order my page dividers because they are out of the kinds I want (I have a few that will work to start with).  I am also waiting for the black binder, which should be available in a couple of weeks.  I prefer the black exterior to the more colorful ones.

If you're looking for a way to organize your photos and memories in 2012 this is a great system.  Take a look at Becky's blog and you'll see many different ways people have used the basic system to create a personalized scrapbook.