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Project Life 2021


Laura
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On 12/25/2020 at 3:50 AM, MariJ said:

That's what I would do.   I know Lynne does 11 x 8½ pages, but it would still work.  Lynne, do you crop from the jpeg or the psd file?  That was my mistake when I first tried it, oops!   I was trying to crop the psd file and oh.......... that was a mess!    ?  ?

I do make the second page from a pds, but do it by opening a new file of the smaller size, marking all relevant files, right clicking on them and duplicating those files from the full page spread and sending it to the new file. I have never tried to do a crop. The only time there is a problem is when one page bleeds over into the other page in any significant way. Most of the time things work well.

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2 minutes ago, scrapgarden said:

I do make the second page from a pds, but do it by opening a new file of the smaller size, marking all relevant files, right clicking on them and duplicating those files from the full page spread and sending it to the new file. I have never tried to do a crop. The only time there is a problem is when one page bleeds over into the other page in any significant way. Most of the time things work well.

That's great, thank you and you've given me some tips.  I think I normally save the double page as a jpeg, then put it in PSE and crop off the side I don't want.

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I'm going to try again .I think I will try monthl,y that way there is a possibility(LOL). I'll use one kit that is all neutral so the book will look consistent. Thanks for tackling this project.

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I wanted to try something different for the daily prompts. Feel free to do your own photo for the day if you don't like the prompt.  The whole goal is to document YOUR life. Let me know what you think of these ideas: 

1.       Let’s start the year off by taking selfie

2.       National Play Outside Day: your favorite outdoor activity

3.       National Chocolate Covered Cherry Day- something brown and/or red

4.       National Blue Monday: something blue

5.       National Bird Day: something with birds

6.       National Technology Day: your favorite piece of technology

7.       National I’m Not Going To Take It Anymore Day: something that annoys/frustrates you

8.       National Argyle Day: something with argyle or your favorite pattern

9.       National Vision Board Day: what is your vision for the future?

10.   National Sunday Supper Day: your supper routine or favorite meal

11.   National Clean Off Your Desk Day: your desk/workspace or scrap space

12.   National Poetry At Work Day: poetry-related (quote, artwork, or whatever you want)

13.   National Sticker Day: something with a sticker on it  

14.   National Dress Up Your Pet Day: your pet (dressed or not dressed), or something associated

15.   National Hat Day: your favorite hat or hat-related

16.   National Nothing Day: What’s your favorite activity when you want to do “nothing” or relax

17.   National Snow Day: Something snow-related

18.   Martin Luther King Day: a right that you are thankful for

19.   National Popcorn Day: popcorn-related (movie, food, or color of popcorn)   

20.   Inauguration Day: Something patriotic

21.   National Healthy Weight Day: what are you doing to stay healthy

22.   National Cheesy Socks Day: show me your socks! Or favorite comfort item

23.   National Handwriting Day: something with your handwriting

24.   International Day of Education: something education-related

25.   National Opposite Day: something featuring opposites

26.   National Plan For A Vacation Day: something vacation-related (planning, dreams, souvenirs)

27.   National Library Shelfie Day: show me your books (or scrapbooks)  

28.   National Fun At Work Day: show me your work and/or how you have fun at work or while scrapbooking   

29.   National Puzzle Day: puzzle-related or something that is puzzling to you

30.   National Croissant Day: Your favorite non-American food, drink, or item  

31.   National Inspire Your Heart With Art Day: art-related  

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For ease of locating the daily prompts, I will be posting them before the first of the month within this thread and then sharing the link to the post in the initial post. I hope this makes sense. 

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On 12/26/2020 at 12:08 PM, AnnBK said:

I am so tempted to try this.  Life has been so hectic for the last few years, I haven't even taken many significant photos!  After this crazy year, maybe just dusting the camera off and trying to get a couple of pages done each month will bring something like normal! OK...I'm in!

Ann, I use my Project Life pages like a journal to recording what we have done.  Maybe you could do similar even if you do not have many photos... just do lots of journaling. 

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@Laura  I love all of the prompts!  ?. I’m excited to get started with PL 2021, and like I did in 2018 for my first year of PL, I’d like to do the daily prompts this year as much as possible.  I think they made my weekly layouts much more interesting.  They’re a challenge to keep up with, but it’s worth it.

Now... I just need to finish 2020... and, um, 2019...

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1 hour ago, Mikelle said:

@Laura  I love all of the prompts!  ?. I’m excited to get started with PL 2021, and like I did in 2018 for my first year of PL, I’d like to do the daily prompts this year as much as possible.  I think they made my weekly layouts much more interesting.  They’re a challenge to keep up with, but it’s worth it.

Now... I just need to finish 2020... and, um, 2019...

Mikelle, I was always so impressed with how creatively you used prompts with your family's daily life - it was inspiring and so cool to see. 

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@Mikelle, you will catch up. I have faith. You can do it. I'm not sure how I am going to do mine. I like @A-M and document my life for a year, but mix it with the daily prompts for inspiration.  Who knows! 

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Ok, I was too excited. I just had to get started! So, I created my cover pages for my album.  Here is my Front Cover and my Back Cover.  I am in LOVE with @Connie Prince's new Farmhouse Winter kit!  

PS- This is a great way to submit your first layout for this month if you are worried about not finishing it in time for the cutoff to qualify for prizes! 

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Hi ladies! I'm new here...followed BarbaraJ from a closing site after she said how much fun she has here. I have always wanted to do one of these type challenges but for one reason or another never follow thru after a month or so but after reading thru your posts I am beginning to feel like it is all in the preparation which I always never did I just kinda flew by the heels of my skirt tail so to speak.

I would love to say I will commit to doing this weekly but know for sure for me that is not realistic but feel certain I could do a monthly spread. I have questions and need help though please and thank you in advance.

Okay like say I go with the monthly spread....is there a set amount of photo's I need to have on my layout for that month and another question like for example I have say 3 events I want to post about in one month that don't really go together like maybe a kids birthday party, a trip to the moon, and my doggie posing for the camera. How would I accomplish that?  Would I have to do three separate pages to make everything mesh together?

and oh my goodness I have absolutely no clue how to choose a kit for the whole year? Help........ LOL

I love the photo prompts and am gonna try to do as many of those as possible as well! I am really excited to try this and I look forward to getting to know everybody.

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@JenniferJ  We love BarbaraJ, she's a lot of fun!   ScrapGirls is a very helpful and kind group and everyone is always eager to help so don't worry about asking!    Others will chime in, but from my experience I can tell you that I've often put all kinds of photos from a month or a year onto one page. It works fine, but really there's no rules here, it's however YOU want to create your pages.   
HERE is the first of a double page I did a few years ago;  there are photos from all different events on the same page.
And THIS is the accompanying page to December.  I used a lot of photos, but it's the way I do things.
I used Susie Roberts Templates "SRO Value Pack Daily Life 8.5 x 11" for these pages.
Others can share what they've done but it's really up to your personal preference.

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7 minutes ago, JenniferJ said:

@MariJ LOL loved that spread! Thanks for sharing and the inspiration!

Hee Hee, I have such a hard time with photos - trying to choose a few is like picking a favorite child.
I thought later that you might want to look through the Project Life 2020 Gallery.   Lots of inspiration and you can see how everyone has their own format or theme.   For 2020 I chose a topic(s) and scrapped a page about it each month.   I started out with scrapping a trip I'd made to my sister's the previous year.   Then with the onset of Covid I started scrapping pages about pandemic and quarantine life...   

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@JenniferJ, you can chose 1 or 2 photos from each event and minimal embellishments. The key is journaling. You can create separate pages of each event later. There is no set photos. The key is to document your life (daily, weekly, or monthly) so make it what you want. We would love to have you join! Check out the PL 2020 album in the gallery. It is great inspiration and provides examples of how different people did the challenge. Welcome! You got this!

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@JenniferJ  Welcome to Scrap Girls!  For years I never attempted Project Life (PL) layouts, it just seemed so overwhelming to scrap my daily/weekly/monthly life.  But in 2018 I decided to try, because my family had some major changes coming up in the near future and I wanted to document them for my kids (two girls, they're 11 and 14 now).  I decided on weekly layouts, which wasn't the easiest to keep up with and I did get behind, but in the end I finished, and it was so worth it!  Some of my favorite layouts to see are my Project Life layouts.  That year, 2018, I also managed to (mostly) keep up with the daily photo prompts, which again was not the easiest to do but was super fun, and made for really interesting layouts (to me!)

I agree with Laura, I think the key to PL layouts is journaling, and I tend to have quite a bit on my own layouts, but you don't have to do journaling.  I know some of the ladies who do PL have done art journaling layouts or just photos with small captions.  As Marilyn (MariJ) said, there are NO rules, you make these layouts exactly how you want them to be.  

The others have already given you some great ideas, and Laura has links to a lot of good PL templates in the opening post, but I thought I'd leave this link too, to the layout template section of the SG store:  Layout Templates   I personally am a fan of doing double pages, and this year (2020) I had a very hard time whittling the number of photos down enough to fit my journaling, so I ended up some weeks doing two double layouts.  Yikes, and I've gotten behind, but I'm trying to catch up this weekend and finish 2020.  I'm looking forward to moving on with 2021 layouts and photos prompts!

Anyway, again, welcome, and if you get behind on PL don't let it stop you, just keep plugging away at them!  ?  I'm constantly behind!

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@JenniferJ
Mikelle and Laura spoke about journaling and one year I had lots of monthly photos and my journaling ended up a hodgepodge of phrases, one after the other - some of which only I totally understood.  One very helpful tip I used that year is from April.  She advised jotting down your journaling as the month progressed and I found when I did that it was easier to put the pages together.   I'd keep a document and jot down what was going on throughout the month, then when I was ready to create the page all I had to do was find the photos and clean up the journaling.  The months I didn't keep track of the goings-on it was much harder to put the photos and journaling together or even remember what happened.
That said, I'm not a huge fan of journaling because it's all about the photos for me.   So, I have done PL years where I did layouts with mostly photos and little explanation.  That worked for me for those years.    Like we've said - no rules.   Whatever works for YOU.   :) 

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Exactly what you said Marilyn - I have a system for keeping track of thoughts and events so that I can journal more easily on my PL layouts.  I think April is really into bullet journaling, and knows a lot about it, but that's how I keep track of things.  At least, I call mine a bullet journal, but I pretty much only use it to jot down quick things to keep track of the days they occurred, and I paste a list of the PL photo prompts in it every month.  Photo below... I just started a new journal book, as my last one includes 3 years and is getting too fat to close!  Edited to add, as a family we use a shared Google Calendar to keep track of our appointments, who's doing what, etc.  It was a lot more full before COVID hit, but whenever I do a PL layout, I pull out my bullet journal and pull up Google Calendar on the computer, so I can cross-reference and try not to forget anything important in my journaling.

IMG_1825_BulletJournalPost.jpg

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@Mikelle  That's so cool, Mikelle - I liked seeing your journaling book.    The year I did daily/events journaling it was a list of short phrases one after the other with ... in between.  I'm not sure what bullet journaling it, maybe that's it? 
And, you're right - I forgot, but I also did check my calendar when starting the page because that has every little thing I do each day recorded.
Thanks for sharing this, great idea and looks so pretty too.

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14 hours ago, Mikelle said:

Exactly what you said Marilyn - I have a system for keeping track of thoughts and events so that I can journal more easily on my PL layouts.  I think April is really into bullet journaling, and knows a lot about it, but that's how I keep track of things.  At least, I call mine a bullet journal, but I pretty much only use it to jot down quick things to keep track of the days they occurred, and I paste a list of the PL photo prompts in it every month.  Photo below... I just started a new journal book, as my last one includes 3 years and is getting too fat to close!  Edited to add, as a family we use a shared Google Calendar to keep track of our appointments, who's doing what, etc.  It was a lot more full before COVID hit, but whenever I do a PL layout, I pull out my bullet journal and pull up Google Calendar on the computer, so I can cross-reference and try not to forget anything important in my journaling.

IMG_1825_BulletJournalPost.jpg

I love this idea....may have to scraplift it.

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Oh I am loving these ideas ladies and all of you have given me so many wonderful tips! I had never even thought to jot down my thoughts and nuggets of what was happening at least weekly. It sure would hep out alot when I had to go back and do my journaling to trigger things! Sometimes I make things way more difficult than should be!  I am enjoying the photo prompts each day!

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On 12/31/2020 at 4:13 PM, JenniferJ said:

... and another question like for example I have say 3 events I want to post about in one month that don't really go together like maybe a kids birthday party, a trip to the moon, and my doggie posing for the camera. How would I accomplish that?  Would I have to do three separate pages to make everything mesh together?

and oh my goodness I have absolutely no clue how to choose a kit for the whole year? Help........ LOL

I love the photo prompts and am gonna try to do as many of those as possible as well! I am really excited to try this and I look forward to getting to know everybody.

Jennifer, this is not as daunting as you might think. I do a two page monthly spread. If I have an event or something special I make another 2 pages. Sometimes these pages can be made for another challenge. I have had as many as six pages for one month. And sometimes the non-monthly pages are not limited to my monthly formula in choice of kits etc.

To choose a kit(s) to use: Pick a favorite designer. Look at several kits, value packs work really well,  and see if there are enough items and papers that you like that will be complementary to each other for multiple pages. If choosing 2 or 3 kits make sure they compliment each other in colors and style. I chose 2 value kits that had clusters and overlays with them to spice up things a bit if I wanted. Don't choose too many kits or it defeats the purpose. Most of all pick something that YOU like. Hope this is helpful. Looking forward to seeing your pages.

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On 12/31/2020 at 7:13 PM, JenniferJ said:

Okay like say I go with the monthly spread....is there a set amount of photo's I need to have on my layout for that month and another question like for example I have say 3 events I want to post about in one month that don't really go together like maybe a kids birthday party, a trip to the moon, and my doggie posing for the camera. How would I accomplish that?  Would I have to do three separate pages to make everything mesh together?

and oh my goodness I have absolutely no clue how to choose a kit for the whole year? Help........ LOL

I thought of something else about papers/backgrounds.  The year I did monthly pages I really had a hard time sticking with one collection.  So, what I did was I picked one background for each month and had it be relevant for that month.   Like in January I picked icy blue, February was pink/red for Valentine's Day, April was dreary rain/gray and May was flowers.  So, you can choose a collection for each month if you want, that's fine too.  I worried about using different colors and backgrounds for each month and how they'd look together, but others have done it successfully and I found that it really didn't matter.  Once the pages were all together they were fine together.  
And, yes - all of my photos from all of the different events of the month were all lumped together on my pages.  But, as Lynne said - if there's a special event in a month that warrants more photos and attention, I made a page (or two) just for that.    As Lynne said, it's not as daunting as you think!

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Here is something you can do to help remember what you want to journal.  Open up your "notes" app on your phone, or whatever app you want to use. Type your note to yourself, and then screen shot it.  That way, when you are going through your photo, your notes are included.  

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