Of course, being a part of the scrapbook community I have been aware of the Week In The Life concept for years but it just never really appealed to me. This year however, something clicked and I knew it was the right time for me to do it. Our lives have changed drastically in the last 5 years and I expect them to keep changing in major ways over the next few years as well so, I knew that it was an important time in our life to take the time to press "pause" and capture what our lives look like RIGHT NOW. Right now while we have one last child in the nest. That 18 year old who has completed high school, is working full time, soon to be starting college and could choose to move out and begin a life on her own at any time. Next year, our lives could be a whole lot more boring here at home. Ha ha.
Anywho, onto my process. I went about this project just as I do December Daily, another yearly project by Ali Edwards that I have been doing for 4 years. I purchased Ali's kit that was available through Studio Calico (here is a link to the KIT in case there are still any available) because honestly, just buying the kit made more sense to me for the ease of things. The easier it is for me, the more likely I knew I would be to complete the project. There were two options for the kit, the only difference being the album. I chose the white album with the days of the week horizontally written over and over and over again across the cover. It is quite busy but, I personally liked that. Just looking at the cover made me think "routine" and "all the days in a week" and that is exactly what I want to capture. Here is the awesome pic of the kit I chose (decided to just use the pic off of the site because it is much better than any I would have taken).
Look at that album....isn't it beautiful? ;) And the kit itself, well....I just couldn't say no. The album is 6 x 8. The kit also came with a large number of page protectors in 5 different styles. I also ordered my kit early and by doing so was able to get some very pretty daily tabbed dividers.
I first sorted the photo page protectors that came with the kit so that each day had one of each style of protector. There was one extra full 6 x 8 page protector and I placed that one as the very first page in my album where I will write the "why" for this project (you can read more about this concept and watch her video about it on Ali's blog HERE) as well as possibly a few pictures. There were also 2 page protectors with many 2 x 2 photo slots. I temporarily have placed those at the back of the album. I am currently thinking that after I have taken all of my photos for the week and created each day's contents filled with as many pictures as I like, I will take all of my "leftover" photos and size them down to 2 x 2 and slip them in those protectors as a collage of the week. Then, they may stay at the back or they may come up to the front as sort of a teaser of the week to come. ;)
The days are currently set up with very little consistency. The one constant is that the 3 x 8 page protector is the first page of each day. Beyond that, I have the other protectors randomly placed within each day's pages. Right now, I foresee keeping that randomness because I don't typically like things in such a set "rhythm". I see the story as being more interesting with the sizes of the photos changing greatly from day to day because of the placement of them within the dividers (if that makes sense).
Once I had the dividers and page protectors in place I cut down a clear page with white words to fit inside the 6 x 8 sleeve that is my first page and temporarily placed "The Story Of This Week" card in with it. I really am not sure I am loving this card there and it will most likely get moved.
I also placed a patterned 3 x 8 card in the front of each of those sleeves and a daily morning, afternoon and evening 3 x 8 card behind it. I then randomly started adding in the 3 x 4 cards from the kit. Now again, currently these are in no particular order. Not even the cards that have the day of the week printed on them. I just don't know that I want the eye to always be drawn to that card in the top left pocket or bottom right pocket, etc. My main goal was just to get the cards in place and once I start adding pictures, the story will start to unfold and all of these cards could possibly get moved around. This means I could have done all of this prep work for NOTHING! Ha ha. No, that won't be the case I'm sure because with my December Daily projects I typically doing some rearranging but never a whole album. Thank goodness.
You will notice in my pictures that I did not start adding any of the bits and pieces (embellishments) yet. Not even the wood veneer days of the week or the vellum numbers. I was anxious to start my prep work but not so much that I wanted to permanently place anything yet. Once I sit down with my photo and the story details, those pieces will find their way into spots that flow for me.
Here are just a few more shots of my album, flipping through some of the days so you can see my temporary setup. I tried not to go too picture heavy because there just isn't a whole lot of difference from day to day at this point.
I will be back soon with a new post highlighting some pics from my week of capturing our life as it unfolded. Until then......
Hugs,
Jeanye
