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Week in the Life 2014: October: Sunday

The big word of the day for Sunday's Week in the Life (WITL) was Birthday! Newborn birthday and Bruce's birthday. It was a BIG day for me all around.

I'm so glad it happened to fall in this project period so I could document it.

First of my 7th nephew was born today. Lucas. He also happens to be my godson as well. He was the sweetest little bundle of joy.

Naturally I had to use a picture of him and me for my first page.

Here's my weekday layout with the sizings that I used.

Second spread was all about Lucas and family. Seeing as that was one of the biggest highlights of the day. It came first in the Sunday portion of WITL.

I knew I wanted to convert my color pictures of Lucas to black and white. Baby pictures seem to come more alive in black and white. At least that's what I think. Newborns can be really pink, red, have blotches...all that unpleasant stuff from being birthed that just doesn't look good in color pictures. :)

Moving on...I know babies are cute. I should have added another spread just of babies but this wasn't just about the little guy it was about the whole day. :)

So next up is Bruce's birthday and food. Those two go together like bees and honey. pb and j. white and rice. LOL anyway.

I woke up and immediately wanted to give him the gift that I had been tirelessly working on for weeks. His birthday hunting quilt. I called it "I got you in my sights" because I designed it to look like a hunting scope complete with cammo fabric as well as deer and even a blaze orange border. I also added, because he LOVES IT, flannel backing.

On each picture I added some fun phrases that I created in word and cut out of cardstock. I liked doing that. It was a fun way to add a little something to each picture.

The last spread was fun to make too.

I ended up watching Jacob for awhile because Kim just had a kid and Thomas needed to get some sleep. He'd been up all night during labor. So I took my turn at taking care of Jacob.

I couldn't decide which pictures I wanted to put. There were so many. I don't often get the chance to watch him so I took A LOT. I ended up going with a couple of my favorites.

This one was definitely a favorite. He actually stood still for about a second and smiled nicely for me. This doesn't happen often. Usually I'm chasing him around ("chase me auntie jen, chase me!" or he's trying to avoid the camera.

This one was another favorite. I got out the sidewalk chalk for him and he just LOVED it. He was so serious about it and I loved the way he holds his chalk. Full finger grasp.

His favorite part of the chalk was when I had him lay down on the ground and drew an outline of his body. Then he got to fill in all the major parts like eyes, ears, hair, nose, shoes, etc.

Lastly this one. Baby bath time. He's definitely mischievous. He loves to splash and get you wet. I know this so I come prepared. Usually about 3 or 4 towels to minimize the damage.

Last layout of the day was this one. Some photobooth pics of me and Bruce. I don't usually take a lot of pictures of Bruce. He just isn't into it that much but I talked him into these because they were silly and fun. Kind of like us.

and that's it for Sunday folks. It was so epic. I loved it. So glad I got it down into this project.

My last page of the album was kind of quick summary of what went on...in graphics format.

Thanks for stopping by. If you'd like to see the rest of my October 2014 Week in the Life please click here:

 

Week in the Life 2014: October: Saturday

Inspired by Ali Edwards' Week in the Life, I have been posting my own WITL album.

What is WITL? In an nutshell it's a week long forray into your life. A documentary about all the normal everyday things that you do. Something you wouldn't normally scrapbook about because it seems ordinary. But you know what? It's not ordinary. The everyday changes as you grow and get older.

This project gives you a glimpse into your own life, your habits, your choices, your normal and it's so freaking sweet! Trust me. Take a look at one of those days in my life.

Here is a look at my basic layout for each day of the week.

I start with a 6x8 pic of myself. it's like the starting page for the day. I also add a smaller 3x8 of the details of the day by time. So...wake up at 6:30 a.m., eat breakfast, and so on.

Next spread is the other side of the 3x8 which has a transparent picture and journalling about a topic that I wanted to highlight about my life at this point in time. Saturday's was exercise so the picture son the right coincide with that.

Onward to the next spread which is usually pictures about my ordinary day which for Saturday included grocery shopping, household chores, projects and relaxation.

If you notice I also included a card with some basics from the day. Each day of the week had one.

Turn the page for one more spread and the last spread of the day.

I put pictures of some of things I ate that day as well as other random pictures of what I did. I also included a card, that is in everyday of the Highs and Lows of the day. Just something where I could journal about what I thought was great and what wasn't so great.

Thank you for reading this post and if you enjoyed it and would like to see more of the Week in the Life posts click here:

Week in the Life 2014: October: Friday

Week in the Life Friday!

Today was centered around Halloween! I made sure to put in more of my "normal" day as well but I did concentrate on Halloween quite a bit. I love Halloween!

Here's the sketch of what design I use for each day. I use many different sizes of page protectors so that I can have variety of different pictures sizes and it keeps it interesting.

Here we go!

First page is a big picture of me in my Halloween costume....can you guess what I am?

Bernadette from the Big Bang Theory. I know, wrong color hair but I thought I got most of everything else down.

I bought that skirt specifically for this costume and you know what? I actually wear ended up wearing it because I like it. I don't normally wear skirts so that was a lucky find for me.

My detailed account of the day by time.

Turn the page.

A picture of myself and some of my co-workers (including my brother Chris, he's Hoooowwward. LOL)

Note the big bang theory icon was copied from their site.

This Halloween card is actually an insert. I needed more space so I added a small 4x6 page protector. If you turn it over you'll get this gray card that I made in Photoshop.

I liked adding this card because I wanted to make sure I highlighted the picture of my Family on Halloween including who was wearing which costume. I thought it worked out nicely.

This is my family or at least part of it. Not everyone dressed up but quite a few of us did. Who's your favorite?

Michelle made her costume (she's in the Frozen costume)

Jack is a Ghostbuster. He borrowed Uncle Chris's goggles.

Kim is a housewife (Thomas isn't in the picture but he's the mailman. Get it. She's preggo with the mailman's kid. LOL)

Moving on are pictures from my house and Chris's house at Halloween.

Chris's House. ooooh aaahhhhh. He really gets into Halloween. He turns his yard into a graveyard complete with a smoke machine, blinking red eyes, moving dead bodies, zombies...it's pretty cool.

Here's my place. Not quite as cool. Not by a longshot but still fun.

I have man-eating pumpkins and scary jack-o-lanterns. I actually scared a little girl enough so that she wouldn't come up to the house for candy. She stayed on the road. It was hilarious.

Here's the entire page. I split it up with Chris's house on the top and mine on the bottom.

Turn the page for more Halloween fun.

The page on the left is a collage of the day. I had SO MANY pictures I knew I'd have to do a collage to get them all in.

I also added a 2-3x4 insert to get my usual high and low card and -basics for the day.

and that's it for Friday. It was a busy and exhausting day but so much fun. Glad I got to document it in this style. Usually I do a mini book for all of Halloween's activities.

I hope you enjoyed this post. If you'd like to see more posts on my Week in the Life spreads click here:

Week in the Life 2014: October: Thursday

Week in the Life Thursday layout is here!

Today has the same layout as the other days but I've used more letter and phrase stickers not to mention a black and white collage and sewing! I had a lot of fun with Thursday's layout.

Here is a pic of the layout for the week.

I'm using a 6x8 album using a couple different page protectors including a 6x8, 3x8, 2-4x6 and 4-3x4's.

This was a fun pic to take. I set my ipod on a towel holder and set the timer. I like how you can see the image twice. One is fromthe reflection of my makeup case and the other is the actual picture. It feels a little bit Norman Rockwell. :)

Details by time for the day. This isn't the most glamorous section of the day but it's probably the most informative.

Turn the page and you get a layout about my hobbies and crafts and what's in my wallet. The two don't really go together but I wanted to put both in and this seemed the most logical spot.

I created this 3x8 in Photoshop Elements using a low transparency picture in the background with journalling on top.

I love looking back and seeing what it is I had in my purse. I can tell you that right now it's totally different. I'm thinking right now that when I do this documentary project again I'm going to put another one of these pictures in it just because in year's time it is totally different.

The next spread was all about my prep for Halloween on Friday. This one is probably one of my favorites. It was so much fun to do and I love the bright orange pop of color.

A fun card I made out of my Halloween stash of scrap supplies.

Glasses for my Halloween costume...which you can find out about on the Week in the Life Friday post coming soon. :)

My cherry candy card. I realized when I was getting ready for Halloween that I had a lot of candy that was cherry. I LOVE cherry candies so I took some of the different candies and put them in a jar in my craft room, you know, for late night snacking or just a hit of sugar.

I thought this made a good post. Something probably not a lot of people realize about me and something that I hadn't thought to share.

Last page.

Informational last page about some of the things I ate and some basic things about what I was doing.

Each day has the left and right-hand side cards.

just some pictures from the week that I didn't want to use individually but thought they would be good as a collage. I turned them into black adn white so that they were easier to see. With the array of different colors and lighting it was a bit of a modge podge without the conversion to black and white.

Hope you enjoyed this post! If you'd like to see more of my Week in the Life Album click here:

 

Week in the Life: 2014: October: Wednesday

As I'm ramping up for another Ali Edwards' "Week in the Life" Documentary in August I decided to post pictures of my last year's album each week.

Let's start with the plan.

This is my layout for each day of the week. It's the same for each day. I like to keep some things consistent so that the album has better flow.

I'm using a 6x8" album.

First spread always starts with a picture of me and a 3x8 listing of my activities during the day (in a time stamp order)

My headers always contain a large "day" of the week, followed by the actual date and an embellishment that fits the activities of the day. I then digitally add some words that describe my day and a cardstock strip of the day of the week.

The cardstock strip was easy to make. I just opened up a 4x6 file in photoshop (I use elements.) and added a text box for each day with the day of the week. You can change the background and font color to your liking. I made sure to leave some space between the strips for cutting.

Spread 2: Today included a specific detailing of my home. That's the one main thing I wanted to concentrate on.

In the above image I put 4 3x2 images on a 4x6 page because I wanted to have more photos.

In the next section I concentrate more on my day; getting a haircut, carving pumpkins.

I even have a card that I do everyday with some basic facts about the day: Where I was, what the weather was like, what I ate, enjoyed, listened to, etc.

The last spread of the day:

My high and low card that I do for each day. Just to document what I thought was the best thing and the worst thing. Need to keep balance. Life isn't all sunshine and flowers. There are some negatives too. Granted I don't like concentrating on negatives when I scrapbook but putting one low isn't necessarily a bad thing.

At lunch. I usually read at lunch. today I was splurging on a pop and I also keep a journal during this week. I find at lunch is a nice to time to do half of my day then at night I'll finish up and write about the rest of the day. That way I don't have to worry about trying to remember what happened during this Week in the Life.

The End.

I hope you enjoyed today's Week in the Life post. If you'd like to see more please click here.

Week in the Life: 2014: October: Tuesday

Week in the Life Tuesday! Woot woot.

If you missed Monday click here.

I am using the same format each day. Here is a quick sketch of the basic layout.

First pages

First page is always a large 6x8 of me with a handdrawn day of the week, an embellishment (a star today), the day, the words for the day and Tuesday repeated over and over.

Words are a day are about 10 words that describe my day whether it be good or bad.

This 3x8 is always a recap by time of what I did that day. It's usually free from embellishment although today I added an embellishment of a worker at her desk.

Turn the page and you'll get the topic of the day. Work.

This insert was all about work so I took a picture of my mouse and park of my keyboard and reduced the transparency to under 25% so that I could type over the top and be able to read the story.

I really loved doing this 3x8 spread. Every day I loved doing it. Loved picking a topic and using a picture to record my thoughts. I am probably sure I"ll do that again.

Next page is 2 4x6 pictures. I added some journalling to each and some phrase cut-outs.

Flip the page for the next two pages.

On this spread I usually tried to put a picture of lunch or dinner for the day as well as pictures of what I'm doing.

Gotta add a little embellishment. ;)

I also liked adding some black and white images. I like to do this with images that just aren't as good it takes out the bad color. Also, I think adding some black and white images mixed with color helps the page not look so busy ergo keeps a focal point. What do you think? Agree? Disagree? Indifferent?

I added a card with the -ings on it. Just a basic description of the day. Like a twitter comment worth of words.

I sewed on this card...cuz you know it was the quilting card. That was fun but I think my settings were a little screwy so it isn't perfect but I'm not usually going for perfect. I'm going for almost perfect. LOL or I'm just trying to get it done. Depends on the day.

Honestly though...the more time I try to reach perfection the more time I spend which reduces the amount of pages I actually get done. In the end when I'm looking at my albums years from now I'm going to care more about getting the pictures and the journalling than I will about how perfect it looks. I won't care that I selected the perfect embellishments. When it comes down to it I'll be staring at the pictures. So...perfection is overrated.

Phew. glad I got that out.

The next set is my dinner and evening pictures as well as the high and low card that I have for each day.

I like adding those nice recaps in there. I feel like it helps me take stock of the day by choosing a high and a low. Also, I'm keeping the balance. I'm not focusing on all the good or all the bad but a little bit of both.

Balance is always good.

Here's a close up for you. It looks a bit nicer than the two-pager.

This page ended up being all about Bruce, my boyfriend, which is fine because he's a part of my life. I wanted to focus on what makes me happy right now. What little things make me happy.

Gosh I really like this 3x4 pic with digital journalling. Really love it.

Last page of me relaxing. I made those phrase embellishments. I didn't buy any kits but wanted to put some journalling that fit me instead of trying to pick through my embellishments.

I don't always think that way but for this project I wanted to try doing my own thing instead of using everyone else's product and templates.

I hope you enjoyed this layout. Click on Crafts on the nav bar above and then click on Week in the Life for more layouts and pictures.

Week in the Life: 2014: October: Monday

Week in the Life. A scrapbooking project. Started by Ali Edwards and my topic today for the next several Wednesdays.

If you've never done Week in the Life before I encourage you to ride this train. Week in the Life is a week-long project where you document your life in pictures and words. I'm talking your schedule, the minutiae of everyday, the little things, stuff you wouldn't ever think of scrapbooking. Pictures of what you eat, your shoes, the stores you shop at, your schedule, what time you get up, what you use on your hair. Stuff like that. It's an intensive project where you document daily life in a way that you normally wouldn't do.

It's awesome. You never really realize how much your life can subtly change over the course of time. This project will help you see that and help you document your life and all the little things in it.

"It's often the little stuff that's actually the big stuff." - I love this quote and it perfectly sums up this project.

In August I'll be doing this again so I thought it would be a good idea to start posting from last year to get me revved up.

So here's a look back to my 2014 Monday Week in the Life.

My cover page.

My album is a 6x8 size.

To keep this project going I try to follow the same format everyday. Same size of page protectors and use the same set of supplies. I don't vary much. This helps keep this project manageable.

First layout always includes a large photo of me on the left which has the day of the week in my handwriting and the actual date. It also has a bunch of -ing words that describe how the day was for me. Then underneath that I have a paper row of the day of the week.

Each day I'll change colors but I always keep the same style so that the album flows. I'll also add a die cut or sticker that fits the day.

The next item is a 3x8 description of the day using specific times and a brief description of what I did:

*When I ate breakfast, what I ate, what I did at work and the times associated with it.

Turn the page and you get another 3x8 layout. This one I custom-designed. I used part of a picture of a specific topic. In Monday's case I talked about my morning routine. I picked a topic that I wanted to document specifically. Something I wouldn't normally scrapbook about but thought was important. This turned out to be one of my most favorite parts of this Week in the Life.

My Morning Routine. The picture is of my feet on the shower mat in the bathroom.

Next I did 2 - 4x6 pictures that supported the "Morning Routine" 3x8 spread on the left-hand side.

Turn the page and you're on to the next layout.  Left: 2-4x6 pics Right: 4-3x4 pics.

All about the food for this day, my love of cooking and a card showing some of the basics for the day: Location, Weather, Eating, Drinking, Doing...

The "basics" card is super easy and something you can prepare ahead of time. You can simply print 7 of them out and fill them in at the end of each day. Easy peasy.

Turn the page and you have 4-3x4 pics and 1 large 6x8.

I chose to add a card called Highs and Lows each day. You can print these out ahead of time if you like then just journal directly on them during the project. I changed the colors each day as well. Just to spice it up a bit.

I concentrated on walking pictures for this spread.

AND that's it. Let's recap. # of spaces to fill: 2-6x8, 2-3x8, 4-4x6 and 8-3x4.

You can use any pictures you want. My layouts are a combination of my DSLR camera and my smartphone. Sometimes I'll adjust in photoshop and sometimes I'll use my phone apps like instagram. It doesn't matter, you can do whatever you like or what feels comfortable to you.

I hope you enjoyed this. If you'd like to look at some of my past Week in the Life Projects click here. Next week I'll be posting another post for Tuesday. If you have any comments or questions on this project please leave them below.

Jen

 

Week in the Life Day 7

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Week in the Life Day 6

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Week in the Life Day 5