Help! My week 44 just exploded...

[tkradtke]

Okay... my week 44 has just exploded into a million pages! This year I have embraced the "as many pages as it takes" philosophy, but this week has gotten ridiculous. And now I just realized that I forgot a fairly major event.

So, here is what I've got so far...

This week was very Clara-centric and with lots of stand alone events.... meaning instead of a bunch of random one photo events, I have several lots of photos events. First off, the Stanley Cup came to Clara's school and then it was her playoff vb game which I included more photos of than I would normally in order to fill that page, so I could group all of the pictures from Friday the 30th together (two events... Halloween parade at school and Clara's birthday party). The activity for the girls was a photo booth, so I wanted a spread with some of our favorite photos. That leaves photos from Halloween night, which are few. Just one page worth tops. I was coming to grips with having an odd number of pages this week, then I realized that somehow I left out a major event... my daughter's dance performance at Mars/Wrigley.

So... what would you do? The dance performance happened on Thursday so I have a few different options:

1. Redo page two of my first spread, reducing the number of volleyball photos and adding some of the dance ones. Keeping the odd number of pages for the week.

2. Make a two page spread of dance photos to slip between spread one and spread two to keep things chronological. Also keeping an odd number.

3. Make a one page layout of dance photos to even out the page Halloween photos. This would make the week even, HOWEVER the events would not be chronological (I would have Thursday photos coming after the two spreads of Friday photos). BUT, since the performance was to Thriller with the girls dressed as zombies, it does flow with the Halloween photos.

Ugh... it shouldn't be this hard! I'm leaning towards option 3, but the chronological order thing is bothering me way more than it should. And it's making me a little crazy that this week has exploded into 8 pages!

Any ideas on how to handle this would be greatly appreciated!

THANKS!!

 

[klee73010]

I think I would do option 2, if you've already resigned yourself to odd number if pages for the week. The chronological thing would bother me, too, in this type of album, I think. To even it out, I might even do an extra page or two, and it would be using that half/half line of thought, triangles probably, to have 1/2 page one event, 1/2 page other event. (Thinking those new half templates, I think by Heather Joyce, made into a PL working template)

 

[tkradtke]

I think I would do option 2, if you've already resigned yourself to odd number if pages for the week. The chronological thing would bother me, too, in this type of album, I think. To even it out, I might even do an extra page or two, and it would be using that half/half line of thought, triangles probably, to have 1/2 page one event, 1/2 page other event. (Thinking those new half templates, I think by Heather Joyce, made into a PL working template)

Thanks Kristina! You've got me thinking. I do have enough dance performance photos to make a two pager, so I can keep things in chronological order (that was really bugging me). I think I may channel my inner Rebecca and add a regular scrapped page opposite my Halloween photos using a template. I love her inclusion of regular scrapped pages along with her pocket pages in her PL books, but since I don't scrap anything but pocket pages anymore, I haven't added any yet. I think I can handle a template though. The photos I have left to scrap are Halloween night and one photo from earlier in the day (I take a photo of my kids once a month in the same spot, and I had taken October's photo that day). That photo could be my stand alone page to go opposite the Halloween page. Hmmmmm.... I think that might work! Thanks again for helping my brainstorm!

 

[carilyne]

How about a page of "What a week this has been?" you could crop a pic of each event a little differently if you don't have enough pages Or just do a page of exhausted people. Or journaling a little of each. Lots of fun things you could do on that extra page and help you feel better about it.
Or even I have to have a page to make it even and journal about yourself -- how many car trips, what else you had to fit in between all that (how did you do it?). Or what you couldn't get done?

 

[Lindzee]

I like option two also. Don't skimp on the memories to fulfill a number of pages or balance in odds and evens. Also keep it chronological. Might make sense as to why you would choose one or three now but five years down the road, you will say why did I do this.....

 

[RebeccaH]

Knowing what I know about you, I think having your events out of order would bug you... but if you could get past it, I like idea #3.

If not, then I like #2.

Also, I was going to suggest the same type of thing that Lindzee suggested - do a page to round out the end of the week to balance out the Halloween stuff. I've done this a few times - once I did a word art / quote page to summarize something about the week or that point in our lives. I've even used just a coordinating patterned paper and left the page blank... Whatever works for you without weirding you out that you have odd pages and out-of-order photos.

 

[Karen]

The most important thing is getting those memories in the book. No matter what you end up deciding will be awesome!

 

[dotcomkari]

kisses

 

[tkradtke]

Thanks so much for the input everyone! I'm going to go for option #2, because, as Lindzee pointed out, I won't regret having the extra photos in my book! And then I'll add the extra page as suggested by Carilyne, Lindzee and Rebecca to even out the pages for the week... just not sure which route I'll take with that one yet. But I'm excited to step out of my comfort zone and do something other than a pocket page!

After reading the input from this thread and Rebecca's thread, I'm starting to brainstorm some ideas for 2016. I really miss the concise two page PL spreads I did my first year, but I also love all of my photos and extra pages that I do now. So, here's the starting point for next year's plan (I apparently really like bullet point lists)...

1. Rename the whole project something away from PL... like The Radtke Family Yearbook.

2. Do one concise two page "project life" spread for each week.

3. Behind each of these spreads do as many extra pages as needed for each week. For example... the week that this thread is about, instead of the week being spread out over 8 pages, there would be one summary page (the PL page) and separate pages for each event. I figure most of these would be pocket scrapped, but it would leave things open for other types of pages as well. Like a regular scrapped page, an art journal type page, or just a huge photo with some embellishment (like Rebecca has done in her books before).

I think this could work for me for 2016. I need to change things up each year or I get burned out. Right now I'm getting burned out on weeks that take up 8 pages. I also didn't enjoy some of my summer weeks. Some weeks we were all in different places due to travel and camps and instead of having one summary page with a bit of everyone, I did separate spreads for each person. It was hard to follow what was happening when. I would still do the detail pages for each person's trip, but there would be a PL page to start it all that gives an overview of everyone.

I'll need to mull this over some more, but I'm liking the idea to start!

 

[klee73010]

I am still considering a weekly project for 2016. My husband says "why set yourself up for something like that, you've never finished when you've tried before" blah. Pish posh on him. Don't know what I'd do with it yet...

 

[bbachand]

Just a thought . . . I use my Month of Challenges layouts to fill in where I have an odd number of pages for the week (or month since I have moved towards a monthly approach). Using my Month of Challenges layouts means there are some non-chronological pages thrown in but I don't mind mixing things up in this way.

 

[Lynnette]

In order for PL to work for me, that means I limit myself to 2 pages per week. YES, that means sometimes there are TONS of photos that don't make it into the book, especially if it's a big event. Oftentimes I will just have one or two photos to represent the big event. However, I also still scrap more traditional pages - sometimes even pocket style - that reside in a different yearly album. I'm not as antsy about staying on top of these layouts and may scrap them right away, or wait even a year or more before getting them scrapped. My Project Life album is strictly a week at a glance. I really like this system because it makes it much more manageable to stay on top of my PL (I'm currently only 2 weeks behind), it allows me to scrap a little of everything right away because it includes big events and lots of little moments/things, and even if I never get around to scrapping all the photos at least it was represented in the PL album.

Good luck figuring out what to do next year Tracie! I always love your layouts.

 

[tkradtke]

Thanks Lynnette!

Project Life has been an ever evolving thing for me. I had burned out with scrapping and quit for a few years. PL brought me back to getting pictures printed and memories recorded. Part of what burned me out was that I hopped around with my scrapping and I never got around to printing since I had so many gaps. PL solved that for me. I had completed projects to print! Then I started adding more and more photos and pages because I hated leaving anything out. I truly love having all of these photos printed in books, but I'm beginning to realize how much I miss the more concise 2 page per week PL spreads. I don't want to give up printing all of the other photos too though. I have toyed with the idea of a PL book and a yearbook with the rest of the photos in it. I really like that idea, like you do Lynnette. My only fear is that I'll get behind with the other book and not get it printed. Do you print pages or books?

 

[Danyale]

Project Life has been an ever evolving thing for me.

Isn't it? For me this year I decided to embrace it all. My album has paper, PL, digi pages printed. I even insert cards I may get for birthdays (and add photo of those friends if they were with me). I am soooo much happier once I let go of the "rules" - if there were any. I may have created them in my head, so it has been a much happier and consistent album for me.

Consistent= pages are getting done

I can see how blessed I am. I love your pages, they are amazing! You have a beautiful album no matter what you decide works for you. ♥

 

[Lynnette]

I only print pages - mainly for this reason! I really, really love the look of a nice hardbound photo book but by doing individual pages and using page protectors I can add to an album even years down the road. I really only do photo books for vacation albums.