Heather Johnson Photography

Welcome to Week Twenty! One thing is for sure, this project really makes me realize just how fast a year goes by. How is it that June is already next week?!

This past week was a busy one. Between coming back from vacation, a wedding, and a birthday party I could hardly tell if I was coming or going. I took hundreds of pictures this week and did dozens of loads of laundry…seriously I am amazed I am even getting these layouts done in time. I do want to have a bunch of inserts of the wedding and the party, so I don’t know if I can say I am technically done, but at the very least I have something to show today which is always my goal.

Left Side:

Really love this page–it’s pretty much all Clementine. (Included in the mix are Jessica’s free journaling cards, a MUST if you are using the Clementine kit for your project life!) The colors and graphics are all very “me,” and the pictures this week are just too cute! Marie started in on solids consistently this week, I just love the photo of her “sweet potato face!”

When I downloaded Jessica’s journaling cards, I also took a look at the rest of the blog and decided I really liked what she was doing with her pages. (The double matting.) The way the templates went right to the edge had always bothered me too, although I didn’t really know it until I started playing around. I am now going back and making all of my pages like this–just what I need, another project!

The beginning of the week we were still in California, so I placed a few images in there representing that. The story  along with the yellow car picture details out Holly’s confusion and exasperation at the effort it takes to steer a car–if you ever get the chance to go to Disneyland the Autotopia ride is a must for little ones. I laughed the whole time over Holly yelling, “I don’t even know what the steering wheel is doing!”

Right Side:

This page is very photo heavy–I did a backyard photoshoot with the girls on Thursday that yielded the big sister image. Don’t you love how Marie’s arm is wrapped around her sister’s arm? The drawing on the bottom left is a card that was left for us in our mail slot by our neighbors. (Their four year old daughter drew all of us, it was so easy to scan it in and make it part of the week–how could I not include it? It’s absolutely adorable!)

I finally recorded an everyday moment I had been wanting to get down for a long time, Justin’s “Where are my girls?” question he calls out as he comes home from work every night. It’s easily Holly’s favorite part of the day! The other Justin picture is one of him and Holly putting together the playhouse. She loves to help her dad in the garage!

The bottom right is Holly all dressed up to attend the princess birthday party across the street on Saturday. She looks like such a little angel here–really love the bokeh, blown up this picture really looks like a painting!

Here is the journaling from the Week in Review Card this Week:

Sunday was spent at California Adventure Park. It was the best day of the trip. Most of our time was spent on the California Screamin’ roller coaster. Easily the best ride ever….we rode it at least five times each! ~ Monday we came home. The girls did great on the plane! ~ Tuesday Mom did more laundry than she ever has in her life and Holly slept in until 10am. Really a crazy day. ~ Wednesday Holly was back to school for the first time in a week and a half. She was as happy to be back with her friends as Mom was to have the house back to herself! ~ Thursday Mom and the girls hung around the house during the day, and Holly and Daddy put the playhouse together at night. Just a bit more to go, and it’s ready for the yard. ~ Friday Mom and the baby went dress shopping for Billy’s wedding on Saturday and hung out in the basement as much as they could. It was nearly 90 degrees outside! ~ Saturday was quite a fun-filled day, starting with Flannery’s birthday party in the morning and Billy’s wedding in the afternoon. Took lots of pictures at both and had a great, great time!

Another week down, and another one started already. Hopefully this week I will be able to get together some inserts of Disneyland, the birthday party, and the wedding we attended this weekend. Memory-keeping is a lot of work:) !!!

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Project Life is a product and a system created by Becky Higgins. It can be anything you want it to be. To learn more about Project Life check out Becky’s Website. The pieces used in my album are available through Jessica Sprague here. If you live outside the US check Becky’s site for more information on sources. View all my posts about Project Life here.

I was on a mission to get this done tonight!

This week’s main theme was meeting up with the family in Anaheim. I tried to make the layouts not all about Disney as I am working on inserts now for the stories of the entire trip. This week I used yet another kit from the daily digi–Daydreamer. I really loved the colors, and the theme seemed to go well with all that went on last week.

The left side:

Here we have the story of Holly’s tonsils and a photo of Marie after she taste-tested her first veggies. I remembered to take a photo while trying on a dozen pair of sneakers before the trip–what an experience it is to find shoes that fit me!! Two of my favorite photos from our weekend are on this page as well….love the backlit one of the girls, as well as the b/w image of my brother with his kids and Holly as we waited for my mom and aunt to arrive. An hour into the trip and they were all already all smiles!

Right Side:

This might be my favorite page of the whole year so far. I LOVE that I was able to get Holly doing her twirling…she absolutely LOVES dresses that spin way, way out. We can’t find any in stores that have enough volume–but thankfully she has a grandmother who is one heck of a seamstress! Holly’s closet is filled with custom made twirly dresses!

Holly had the cutest quote about palm trees I recorded on the card on the upper right, and the Week in Review card summed up our week as usual. The journaling on the card reads:

Sunday Holly returned home from The Farm. It’s always so hard for her to say goodbye to Grandma and Grandpa. ~ Monday Holly had a really sore throat so we kept her home from school and went to the doctor. She tested negative for strep, but we were directed to go to an ENT because of her tonsils. ~  Tuesday we learned that Holly will probably need surgery on her tonsils soon. Steph came over and watched the girls while Mom tried to get some last minute shopping done. ~ Wednesday Mom found the cutest shoes EVER. So ready for our trip! ~ Thursday we arrived in California! While we were waiting to check-in The Gray’s arrived, and Holly was attached to Madison from that moment on. ~ Friday was our first day at Disney. Early favorite rides were The Haunted Mansion and The Thunder Mountain Railroad. Jenny and I were brilliant at working the fastpass system! We all stayed out way too late. ~ Saturday the group was spilt into two most of the day. Vacation is tiring!

Had fun putting together this week’s layouts with another kit from the digi files–did I mention how much I love the daily digi? I have so many new kits at this point I literally don’t know which one to use each week, let alone what I truly have on hand. (This is, in my opinion, the only disadvantage to digital scrapbooking–I can’t see it all without opening up one too many windows in Photoshop!)

This past week was very, very short on pictures. At one point I wasn’t even sure I was going to have enough, but then I remembered I had taken some photos with my iphone. Love, love, love my iphone. (It’s quickly becoming into the necessity of life category for me…I used to think it a like to have versus a have to have, but now I am not so sure. I would probably be willing to eat bologna and cereal for as long as I needed to in order to keep my iphone!)

Anyhow, I was suffering from a lack of energy and a lack of willingness to even want to deal with writing anything down. I don’t know if I was just burnt out, or if the novelty is wearing off–but it has been really hard as of late to come up with the ambition to work on my PL album lately. Is anyone else going through this?

Left Side:

A few things about this page…don’t you just love the date circle? I stumbled upon this collection at the Sweet Shoppe and just about went nuts. What a great resource to have for labeling! What you may not even realize (I sure didn’t until I opened them) is that you get a layered psd file for each cute tag/circle/etc. I can customize the heck out of that circle with colors and such–LOVE LOVE LOVE! I also am loving digital washi tape. And for the first time I threw on some flowers, which back in the day were my absolute favorite thing about paper scrapping. The Week in Review card is back too. Here is the journaling for week 18:

Sunday was a day at The Farm for the girls. We celebrated Jenna’s wedding shower and enjoyed seeing lots of the extended family. ~ Monday Mom was so burnt out from WITL the week before that no picture was taken, or memory recorded! ~ Tuesday Holly was home from school so we all braved the chillier weather and went to the park. Marie rode the swings! ~ Wednesday was pretty uneventful. Mom spent a large part of the day trying to catch up with her Digital Design class. ~ Thursday a bad storm came through town, making it dark as night in the middle of the morning. Holly had a haunted house in her room with battery-operated candles! ~ Friday was a girl’s night out for mom. A few friends, a few drinks, and a little bowling. Very fun and something to do more of! ~ Saturday Holly was off to the farm to get more dresses and hang with Grammie and Grandpie. Mom, Dad, and Marie enjoyed a quiet house and a BBQ with our neighbors. It was a super fun time!

Right Side:

I was a little tag crazy on this page I can see now! My favorite thing about this page is the princess picture–the girls in our neighborhood are just too cute with their imaginary play. I know that this will be wonderful to look at and remember years down the road.

I am still working on putting together my Week in The Life album. And getting ready for Disneyland in three days. And taking care of a daughter who may have strep throat. (First test negative, but her tonsils are huge so we see an ENT tomorrow.)

Calgon? Where are you …….

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Project Life is a product and a system created by Becky Higgins. It can be anything you want it to be. To learn more about Project Life check out Becky’s Website. The pieces used in my album are available through Jessica Sprague here. If you live outside the US check Becky’s site for more information on sources. View all my posts about Project Life here.

 

This is the week that almost wasn’t!

A Week in The Life was so intensive that it truly burned me out of photos, words, you name it. I wasn’t going to do a layout for week seventeen, but I truthfully should be more worried about week 18. I am not sure if I have four photos of this week–week 18–even taken and tomorrow is the end of “my week!”)

Anyhow, I realized that my since my week runs Sunday-Saturday for project life that skipping a week meant skipping over two very fun things that happened in Week 17–a visit to the new soda fountain down the street AND a date night for Justin and I. Date nights are so few and far between that I thought I better record the event down!!!!

Left Side:

I kept it pretty simple. Filled up the 4×6 slots with photos, and really had minimal journaling. I still have to work on The Week in The Life (WITL) album, better save my “brain dump” of memories for that project!

Right Side:

To save time I went with big 6×6 squares. These were some of my favorite photos of the week–and probably will end up in my WITL album too. I have decided to be okay with that. Funny note–the layout in the upper left hand corner is actually a template. I loved the colors used, so I didn’t even clip any patterned paper to it!! (Talk about a time saver.) Received the template from the digi files at the dailydigi.com–I finally became a member and am BLOWN AWAY by all the product you get for $7.50 a month. Totally worth it if you have been on the fence about joining. I have been spending…well let’s just say I have NOT been spending $7.50 a month on supplies!

Here is the journaling for my WITL recap:

This past week I played along online with an Ali Edwards project called A Week in The Life. At first I wasn’t going to do it; I truthfully had tried to follow along on at least three other occasions without much success. What changed my mind? A blog post I read online that talked about motherhood. I knew after reading that post how important it would be to record every little detail of the week, if for no other reason than to give my girls the confidence and support they may need one day as mothers themselves. I wanted them to know how hard, wonderful, exhausting, and energizing it is to be a mom of two little ones. I wanted them to know that when they cry from frustration or feel so proud their heart doesn’t even feel big enough to hold the feeling in, that I understand. I wanted them to know how much they were/are loved. I can honestly say that although taking pictures and recording moments for seven straight days was really a big project to undertake, I absolutely cannot wait to do it again. 

And that’s a wrap. I am so happy I finished this up, I was a bit anxious all week it wasn’t done. I like my Tuesday deadline–and more importantly the Disney trip is sure to create more hiccups so I didn’t need to get any more behind than I already am. Part of me is curious if all of the WITL stuff gets in an album………

Who knew memory keeping was so much work!?

 

Here we are at week 16. Again, all I can say is wow. It still feels new and fun each and every week! This week was pretty photo heavy again. I am beginning to realize that I tell stories much more with my eyes (aka photos) than words. And everyone thinks I am such a talker! HA!

I had fun “getting scrappy” this week, using both digital washi tape and digital chipboard alphabets for the first time. Don’t feel like I know what I am doing, exactly, but it was fun to experiment. (And I think this is another thing that I am beginning to realize…I tend to be less of an embellisher than I would assume I would be. I love all the stuff, don’t get me wrong, but I often feel very awkward when I try to use it. Kind of like when I try to put on anything other than post earrings.  Just doesn’t look right on me.)

First up, the right side:

On this page I tried to get some more general stuff down, versus very specific “what we did” kinds of things. I took a picture of Holly’s lunchbox and talked about what her favorite things are to eat, and on the bottom left I did a little list of her favorite foods, games, colors, and clothes. (Which are mac and cheese, pirate games, blue, and dresses if you are wondering.) I also did a little snapshot of one of her quirks–the way she takes off her socks immediately after she gets home. What I didn’t write down, and I really should, is what she tells me when I ask why. (She always exclaims, “I am too hot!”)

I took a Facebook status and turned it into a fun story on the top right. This week we signed Holly up for t-ball, and on Thursday we visited the baseball diamond down the block so I could start explaining the game to her. Here is the story:

Schooling my girl on the ins and outs of baseball today. Tried to teach her to swing the bat and what it means to run the bases. In true Holly fashion, however, she was interested in only one thing– “Where are the people going to be watching me in the audience mom?” T-Ball camp? Ha–this girl wants to be on Broadway….

Left Side:

On this page I played with a lot of brushes (I love brushes more than anything) and again did up a weekly review. I must say I am really glad I started incorporating that piece–love how it sums everything up so nicely. On the bottom left I have a picture of Holly and Daddy coming back from a Saturday morning donut run, which is sadly the only shot of Justin this week. I really am going to make a serious effort to get more of him in the book, as this seems to be happening week after week. I know it happens because I am home with the kids all day–which is the bulk of the week–but still. I guess I just need to get the camera out more on the weekends. Good news is we had a date night last night, so there will definitely be some pictures in week 17 of the two of us. (That’s the other thing I noticed when I looked at my pages the other day…him and I appeared in only ONE image together, and it was a little 2×2 instagram at that!) Do any of you also struggle with getting more  of Dad/Husband in your album? Would love any ideas and/or strategies….

Here is my week in review:

Sunday Mom had her weekly WW meeting with a “Panera break” immediately following. Here she realized two things–one it’s time to get serious about weight loss, and two, basil pesto is magnificent! ~ Monday Mom and the baby ran errands, and Mom tried to come up with as many pesto recipes as possible! ~ Tuesday we all took our first bus ride downtown! ~ Wednesday Mom and the baby slept in until 11am, save a brief 8-9am wake-up. Pretty sure we did a whole lot of nothing the rest of the day! ~ Thursday Mom and Holly sprinted around the gym at the rec center, and the baseball diamond outside. Afterwords Mom thought about how her body was going to feel the next day…..and got a little scared. ~ Friday Mom and Marie went to Target and bought big sister her first t-ball mitt and bat. The season starts soon! ~ Saturday started with a trip to the donut shop, followed by a long walk. Holly took a four-hour nap in the afternoon and then played at the Page’s into the evening.

Thanks for stopping by this week. I am signing off…it’s 4:55am on Monday morning, and I’ve been up since 3am. This restlessness thing is getting so, so old. As am I.

I am linking up at The Mom Creative again tomorrow. Because of the whole Week in the Life thing going on this week I thought I better get this post done. It should come as no surprise though, that even with my “design plan” all thought out, I am seriously doubting my ability to keep up already. Ali posted this take on the project over the weekend and I really, really love it. (Seriously, if you didn’t click on that link, go back and do it!) That’s all I need, to rethink it all this late in the game. AH!

***edited to add***I went to Nettio’s site, and wouldn’t you know it–she has a template for her Week in the Life album. And just like that….I whipped out $14….and called it good. (I know, I know, your shaking your head. But seriously–that book is so cool, and exactly the way I would like to tell the story of the week!

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Project Life is a product and a system created by Becky Higgins. It can be anything you want it to be. To learn more about Project Life check out Becky’s Website. The pieces used in my album are available through Jessica Sprague here. If you live outside the US check Becky’s site for more information on sources. View all my posts about Project Life here.