It’s been a while since the last PL update. How about a quick glance at the latest pages? (Or maybe not so quick. There’re a lot of photos here!)

Wow! That’s from the end of March. Did you realize it’s been that long since I posted a PL update? Neither did I!

If you follow me on Instagram, you probably saw a few of these pictures before. My favorite has got to be the picture of viola written on the door with washi tape.

The oldest PL supplies I have are cards and stickers from the Turquoise core kit. Man that is an old kit! I used a bunch of it while finishing up the last PL album I did, but I still have quite a bit left. It’s getting thrown in as I remember to use it.

As April moved in, I also started punching hearts, stars and butterflies from scrap pieces of cardstock too small to use for anything else, and adding them to my little embellishment jar. That’s been a fun adjustment to my process.

Sometimes I feel like I’m taking the same pictures over and over again. Kids in front of the computer. Kids at the bus stop. But that’s where our lives are right now.

And then again, there’s always something unexpected to get thrown into the mix, like my nephew arriving two weeks early. That’s a good kind of surprise, don’t you think?

My sister wanted me to come down immediately and take pictures of the little peanut while in the hospital, because I had managed to get a few good ones of my niece the last time. Some of these came out pretty well. But I don’t think I got any quite as good as last time.

And then it was hurry home to celebrate my two May boys. We apparently like to cluster birthdays in this family.

We’ve got a range of subjects, from my oldest’s last concert, to me working in the yard. That weirdly lumpy looking picture on the bottom left is my black dog and my grey cat sleeping together on a dark brown bean bag under my desk. They were too adorable not to photograph, but there was no way I was going to get  a decent picture of them. Not enough light, and no contrast to speak of!

May has ended with some simply beautiful 80 degree weather, so we took the inaugural swim in my mother’s pool for Memorial Day.

With that, I’m just four weeks from finishing a full year of Project Life.

This time around, it has been working fairly well.

Things that have been working:

Printing locally at a nearby Walgreens. I can order prints and pick them up while out running chores.

Having a variety of pocket pages in different orientations so I can choose a page layout based on the photos I have, rather than making the photos I have work with a single page design.

Having an iPhone means taking more daily life kinds of photos. I’m not having to stop and go get my camera to take a picture of the moment, and missing the moment as a result. I’m loving having a camera easily accessible all the time.

Having a small bowl filled with punched shapes and other small things that can be used to embellish pockets. I don’t use them all the time, but they sure are handy!

Things that have been hit or miss:

Writing cards as life happens. I’m usually writing cards in the standard portrait orientation, but I frequently have to insert them horizontally based on the photos for the week. That’s bugging me a little. Since I’m only slightly OCD, I’ll learn to live with it. I’m also not writing each and every day. Sometimes I remember to write something every day. Other times, weeks go by without me remembering to write anything down.

Printing at home. I guess I’m just not a print at home kind of girl. I don’t do a lot of editing, I don’t do a lot of pre-planning of my pocket pages, and I’m not going to any time soon. I use it when I’ve got a few photos to print, or when I’m inspired to do some goofy editing. Other than that, it’s 4×6 or 4×4 photos printed at Walgreen’s. It’s just simpler for me. I’m not really sure why.

Things that haven’t been working:

Getting the rest of the family involved in the story telling. There’s only so much nagging I can do in a day. As a result this is more MY story than OUR story. However, I have fond hopes for next year.

My memorabilia storage sounded like such a great idea at the beginning of this project- a lunch box to hold things, and then each month I’d add what I wanted to a PL page and ditch the rest. Except. I hardly ever remembered to put anything in the lunch box, or take anything out of it. Now it’s just one more place for random junk to live. That’s getting cleaned out soon! Instead of a separate place for memorabilia, moving forward I’ll keep a carefully selected few items in the same place I store the PL cards I write during the month. That way I’ll be able to add that to the chrono-sort I do each time I sit down to put some pages together.

Anyone else keep up with Project Life this year? What’s working for you? What isn’t? Anyone thinking of starting a project? What’s holding you back?