A Confession

I have a confession to make.

I am a Project Life dropout. Last December, I told you about my plans for a Minimalist Project Life. By early February, I had enough but was giving it one more chance. I told my newsletter readers that I really was not digging Project Life. I asked my newsletter readers what there 2012 scrapbooking plans were and had several readers write me back. I’m such a terrible person with email that I just filed those emails away because I wanted to write a post on the topic, but just wasn’t quite ready to. You see, I still wanted to get back into Project Life before digging into those emails. Well, Project Life is not happening.

I think Project Life would work better for me if it were the only scrapbooking that I were doing. Instead, I want to scrapbook exactly like I have always scrapbooked: scrapbooking both the mundane and extraordinary in my scrapbooks. Over the past four years, I’ve made three day in the life albums about my daughter. Last summer, I did Week in the Life. This year, I missed Ali’s Week in the Life, but plan to do my own this year. To do day in the life or week in the projects and Project Life is just too much.

After I decided to create a Project Life album, I was asked to be on the Take Twelve Design Team for Ella Publishing. I think this really sealed the deal for me. I like taking one day each month and chronicling it. Take Twelve is more manageable and serves the same purpose (in my mind). I plan to continue doing a Take Twelve project in some form next year, too.

The way Project Life is mostly done (at least online) is almost in real time. Many of the bloggers doing the project are doing it on a weekly basis (i.e., 1-2 layouts on each week) (e.g., Ali Edwards, Julie Fei-Fan Balzer, Elise Blaha, Lisa Truesdell, and Kim Kalil). For me, this makes Project Life a census, when a sample will do. It is overkill to do both Project Life and the other scrapbooking projects that I am more interested in doing. I see no reason to do both and have chosen to drop out of Project Life.

So what about my newsletter readers? What did I learn from my newsletter readers?

They are scrapbooking a mixture of current photographs and past photographs.

Classes can help increase scrapbooking output. A couple of readers are taking Twelve at Big Picture Classes. Another reader uses kits, both pre-bought and her own. Other readers are planning ahead and thinking about the upcoming events they want to scrapbook and the past photos and stories waiting to be scrapbooked.

What is the big picture? What is happening online is not necessarily what is happening offline. What do you think? Are you a fan of Project Life? What are your scrapbooking plans for the rest of 2012?

P.S. Dear newsletter readers, My apologies for not individually responding to everyone. I really do appreciate your feedback, but I am not always able to respond personally to every email. 

If you liked this post, check out my e-book, The Scrapworthy Lives Guide to Market Research.

Stephanie