Ugh... this is why I don't like being behind...

Discussion in 'Project Life/365/52' started by tkradtke, Oct 31, 2016.

  1. tkradtke

    tkradtke Professional Brainstormer

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    I'm working to get caught back up and I've hit a bad week. When I'm behind, I'm a little overwhelmed by the photos to be scrapped so I don't realize how few I'm really taking. I'm about to start week 41 and I have 7 photos to work with. All of them phone snapshots. I've looked through all of my photos, our family's shared iCloud album, text messages from my husband and the kids and our family calendar for photos or journaling ideas (or ideas of images to grab from the web) to come up with those seven. I would really like to make that week one page, but I don't know what would go on the opposite page. I'm going to keep thinking and see what what other filler I can come up with.

    This also has me thinking some more about next year. I love the blog In a Creative Bubble and find her pages very inspirational. I was reading about how she does PL and I'm liking her concept. She does it by the month, but as many pages as it takes. I'm wondering what it would be like to do PL as almost a daily journal... just photos and journaling in order in a continuous album, taking as many pages as it takes for some events or skipping days altogether at times. I wouldn't have to worry about stretching 7 photos to fill two pages some weeks or cramming 20 photos onto a spread on others.

    My current concern with this is staying current. In one way, it sounds super easy to keep current because of the simple formula and not having to wait until the week is done to start. But on the other hand, I think it would be hard to get caught up if you got behind as there aren't little chunks to break the project down into (plus I'm not sure you could work out of order like I do sometimes now).
     
  2. Pallavi01

    Pallavi01 You have that sharp, useless look about you

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    Hi! I'm so jealous of you right now that you are so caught up! Yes you are! Because I am still doing my 2014 pics!! Hahah :)

    I don't have any real advise on this. The only thing I would say is try and not stress out and make pages for the sake of filling the spreads - I think you pointed to that yourself. Be ok to skip if you don't have much going on a particular week - you could always make a no photo page if you don't have much - journaling cards can be great space fillers. When you have morehappening , be ok to double up on the pages. I believe, the more flexible your system, the least stress you will have. Just my two cents!
     
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  3. bcnatty

    bcnatty Disney - it's all for the kids!

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    Oh man...I'm with Pallavi01!! So jealous that you are caught up...I think that I've only done half of this year...and most of the time the sheer magnitude of what I have to do to catch up overwhelms me and I just put it off...which puts me even further behind! That blog sounds interesting, I'm going to have to check it out!!
     
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  4. Lynnette

    Lynnette In my life, I've loved them all

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    I have gone back and forth in my mind about this! Ultimately for me it still makes the most sense to keep it one spread per week, mainly because if I didn't I would get really behind. As it is, I'm usually 3-4 weeks behind anyway, so to have an "unlimited" number of pages would really add up. Especially for times when I take a TON of photos, like special outings, events, or trips- I have a really hard time choosing which photos to include and I feel like if I didn't have the 2 page restraint I would end up feeling like I had to include everything. Knowing that I only have one spread to tell the story really helps me narrow things down. That said, Project Life isn't my only form of memory keeping... I do always plan on making more pages or even a separate album for big events & trips (whether or not it ever happens is another story! ha!)
    There are of course weeks like you are describing when I only have a few photos, and not much to say, but in that case I tend to add in more filler cards, and add in things like what shows we're all watching/books we're reading, etc.
     
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  5. IntenseMagic

    IntenseMagic Some grannies cuss a lot. I'm some grannies.

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    I am really trying to think ahead to next year as well. I told myself this year that I was going to go simpler and that didn't seem to happen. Next year, I really want that to be my goal. I've had weeks where I just feel like I don't have enough photos and like others have said, I tend to do more journaling or add filler cards. I've had quite a few weeks that I had even less than 7 photos, maybe 4 or 5. For 2 years of my PL, I only did one page per week. It worked well for me and helped me keep current. Like, Pallavi said, being ok with being flexible can reduce the stress. I think, for me, I would have a hard time with just doing it whenever, or by month. The weekly thing kind of keeps me on track...I guess I need those little chunks.
     
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  6. scrappyjedi

    scrappyjedi Patience you must have, my young padawan

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    I try not to stress at all about being behind. I'm still working on 2015 and TOTALLY okay with that!

    If I have a week without many photos, I look for some of those awesome filler cards that I always want to use on busier weeks but don't have space for. Less-full weeks are actually fun every once in a while!

    I tried doing the "as many pages as you need per month" approach a few years ago, and it didn't work for me for the reasons some others have mentioned. It just wasn't broken down into small chunks that were easy to check off a list. I like having the smaller time-period to base a spread on, and I've been doing Project Life for so long now that I'm pretty much on auto-pilot with "Design A, one 2-page spread per week." If I try to do anything else, my brain revolts!
     
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  7. bestcee

    bestcee In love with places I've never been to

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    I totally understand that! I also try to include those things that don't normally get included in busier weeks. Like a list of library books checked out, or a photo of the car, the house, my kids bedroom, or my desk. While it may not be current, technically, as long as none of those have drastically changed, you could use them. I've also added the history from our Netflix queue, or Amazon video. I have IFTTT set up to auto record song titles that I listen to through my Echo to a spreadsheet, so I can grab a "Listening Now" spot.

    I know I couldn't do a more daily project. I have seen monthly spreads by quite a few different bloggers, and I like how it works for them. I plan not to do PL next year (this has been the plan for awhile). I am thinking of doing a monthly roundup to collect some thoughts and photos. It won't be PL at all, I'm thinking more just a 2 page spread of photos and words. Super simple.
     
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  8. tkradtke

    tkradtke Professional Brainstormer

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    Thanks for all of the input everyone!

    I am really struggling to find my groove with PL again. Being caught up (or relatively close) is the only way this works for me. I'm not disciplined enough to go back and finish a project... I have to keep momentum going or I lose the whole project. I envy those of you who don't stress about being behind! My favorite thing in the world is being caught up. When I'm totally caught up, I love Mondays and can't wait for them because it's the day I start working on the previous week's PL spread. I know... I'm weird :-) And also, like I said, when I'm behind, I forget to take photos, I guess I just think about how many unscrapped photos I have and feel like I have too many, so I hesitate to take more.

    The reason I'm thinking about altering my approach is because I'm truly finding that PL is the only real scrapbooking that I do. This year's plan was to stick to one two page spread per week and scrap events separately (but to be included in my PL book). I'm finding, as I go to print, that my books are approximately 20 pages smaller than the same time period last year (last year I did the as many pages as it takes per week approach). That's a lot of photos that aren't getting printed. I enjoy making a non-pocket page on occasion, but I don't enjoy it as much as I thought I would. Those I think I like to do more for fun and "needing" them to finish up my PL book just sucks the fun out of them.

    My initial thoughts on next year are more of the continuous stream vs. weeks. I really want to simplify and maybe just pick one or two templates for the year. Maybe to keep the "chunks" mindset, I'll work on getting photos onto templates in weekly chunks and flesh out the pages as they get filled with photos. I'm not entirely sure yet. I just know now that pocket-scrapping is my primary (almost exclusive) way of getting my photos out into the world so I'm working to find a way to make the most of that.
     
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  9. bestcee

    bestcee In love with places I've never been to

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    This is over half the battle!!! You know what works for you, you know what you want to do, and where you are productive. Go for it!

    My first year of PL, I had paper journaling cards, just the grid box, and ones that I printed from digital kits laying on my desk and a few in my kitchen drawer. When I had a quiet moment, I would pick one up and jot a few thoughts. Then I could transfer the words to my digital layout.
    I also opened a 2 page layout, and left it in process so I could sit down during the week and work on it like paper peeps can. It worked great that year because my computer was in the kitchen mostly.

    So, maybe thinking out of the box will help you out?
     
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  10. sucali

    sucali sucali

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    I do one page per week and add as many pages as needed when I have more pictures or a special event.
    The additional pages can be in all styles...sometimes I also scan inportant letters or things from websites to document all.
    So I can do a "normal" scrap layout, have fun doing something different than PL and add this but there's always a regular PL page for each week so this is a line going through the whole book (sorry English is not my native language, it's difficult to explain...).
    One year I did monthly, tried to use the same color cheme/ kit for each month. This was the year which was very stressfull to catch up and I didn't have so much fun. I always felt that I am behind and catching up a whole month is stress...
     
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  11. RebeccaH

    RebeccaH Life is exciting, yes it is!

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    @tkradtke I kinda like the idea of a running stream of photos - very interesting idea, and a different way to approach PL for sure!
     
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  12. tkradtke

    tkradtke Professional Brainstormer

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    @RebeccaH It is different and the more I think about it, the more I think it's my plan for 2017. If it doesn't work out, I'll just switch up to weekly again and keep going. I'm playing with the concept now as I work on my extremely out of control week 44. It might be how I finish out my year... we'll see.
     
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  13. destiney1

    destiney1 Well-Known Member

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    i got behind in august. there may or may not have been a new video game that started to eat all my time. and we have 5, no wait now 6 birthdays in the span of two weeks in august. usually i just do the past week on monday. buuut then i get back in and was doing them out of order for a creative team. ended up having one week not labeled so the next week i labeled it a week behind sooo now all my pages have the week card a week off :( but i guess that will be the one flaw that makes a project perfect. I am lucky that i use drop box and all my photos are uploaded with the date. but i also like to take a few min and shuffle all photos from the week into a folder for that week. I started the year by making all the week folders with week number n dates. when i don't have a lot of photos (like week 36 where i had one photo... one!) i go back threw n see if i saved any new recipes, use some screenshots from my phone or capture tool for the computer to get maybe something about online shopping, cute art i found, memes, family facebook posts, maybe a cute pin on pinterest, or maybe something thats happening in the news. and i am never afraid to outright lie and take photos of things like a hot cup of joe, the kids shoes all piled up or just about anything that's really doesn't have a set date attached to it. things that are an everyday thing that i might normally miss to fill these weeks. Also i plan to put some regular layout pages in my book to and have been peppering them in on weeks i only use one page! hope these ideas help.
     

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