LIFE | CAPTURING THE MEMORIES PROJECT LIFE STYLE

This year I’m going to make a concerted effort to do something with the bazillion photos I take every day via my iPhone.  Last year I watched on the sidelines via Instagram as people used Project Life to document their lives and capture their memories.

When we were married (way back when) I got into scrapbooking something fierce (I like to think of it as my gateway craft) and I went mental having fun putting together our wedding album. Scrapbooking lead me on to other crafts and eventually I just stopped making layouts.

I really cherish my scrapbooks but I found having to have the supplies and the time when there were so many other crafts I wanted to do too laborious.

I investigated Project Life last year and I just couldn’t bring myself to spend the money and get back into the physical scrapbooking… I looked at their digital version but at the time found some other excuse as to why I couldn’t do that either.

Now that we’re at the beginning of a new year, and this being the year I’m going to do more for my family and less for everyone else, I figured I’d have the time to collect our stories together.

So last weekend I took the plunge and started the Project Life Digital version.

I had a blast!

I had to do some quick learning on how to create clipping masks – a few minutes with good old Google and watching a couple of video tutorials and I had it mastered.

Here’s the best tutorial for how to do it that I found: How to Create Clipping Masks in Photoshop Elements 11

There’s a couple of reasons that I decided to go with digital over physical:

1. Reduced cost – the cost of digital files is really cheap considering that you get unlimited use out of them (can’t say that about card stock).  It also means I’m not eating too much into the craft budget so I can still buy fabric!

2. Storage – It’s a lot easier to store digital files than find room in my already bursting sewing room for more craft supplies.

3. Immediacy – I don’t have to print any photos out to make my layouts I can just use what I’ve got straight away. Which is great because it means that whenever I’ve got 15 minutes free I can have a play and I don’t have to do battle with the printer.

4. Flexibility – being digital means that I can use the things I buy for the scrapbooking on other things, like my blog and Facebook, which will be very handy when I get it in my head at 5pm on a Sunday that I want a blog makeover.

5. Corrections – it’s so easy to go back and edit the digital file when I see a typo (which happens all the time) unlike with paper based scrapbooking.

There’s probably more benefits, but these are the main ones as I see them for our situation.

I had so much fun putting these together and I can’t wait to see how they evolve over the coming year.  My plan is to do at least 2 pages per week and just record the things that I remember, stand out and having special meaning to us.

My plan is to have them printed into hardcover books at the end of the year. I’ve done some photo books in the past and they make great gifts and are so easy to store and share. I’m not sure what the pricing is going to be for that, but I’ve got a whole year to do research and find out!

In the meantime I’m going to have fun and enjoy a new hobby that doesn’t make as much mess as my other ones!