We’re taking a trip down memory lane and re-visiting the way I used to scrapbook 10-15 years ago. Join me, won’t you?
I truly do love our old scrapbooks and want to emphasize that my personal evolution in scrapbooking is the result of my personal experiences. Some of you may completely relate to my approach while others will feel very differently about how to organize and document pictures and stories.
I love that scrapbooking is such an individual, customizable thing. Do what works for you. And allow yourself to evolve along the way.
For the transcript, click HERE.
Tags: album, christmas, memory lane, nostalgia, scrapbooking
So True. Thank You, Becky. Evolution is part of how we live; But life is about the day-to-day. You really gain a new appreciation for the life you have when you begin Project Life. (Or begin thinking about project life 2011 and what it will look like for you… as you daily check the blog & amazon.com for it’s much anticipated release).
I have the same exact retro scrapbooks from the 90′s!!! I am looking forward to starting project life in 2011
I agree with most of this, although, I still, and always will scrapbook the “old” way. Glad that project life works for so many, but it’s not for me. I never filled half a scrapbook with vacation pictures, so it’s all good.
I love you Becky, and all that you share with us! I hope you have a very Merry Christmas and I wish yo all the best and much success in the new year.
This is too funny….in 97 we went to San Diego for vacation, we went to the Zoo and Balboa Park and so on and I now have a complete album of our trip too. Yes, we have come along way! Love Project Life!
Thanks so much for sharing. It would be fun to see your project life book from last year to compare and contrast.
So, What happens to all those photos that I know you still take on a vacation but don’t make it into your project life album layout??????????
I add an insert into my PL that is A4 sized – useful for stuff like AWESOME school reports (well done my boys) to extra photos to the wrap paper the kids created for Dad this year to memorabilia I can’t bear to cut up. And if the item is slightly (or a lot smaller) than the A4 pocket, well, that’s where the 12*12 sheets Becky includes in the kit have come in very handy.
The inserts I use are just from the office supply shop, what I would use if I was still at school to hold handouts and stuff.
Hope this helps!
We took our 2 year old son to Orlando. I still wanted to add all of our photos from Disneyworld, seaworld, beach, etc – so I made a 12×12 collage in Picasa (free download) and had it printed 12×12 at Costco. Then just added it to PL for that week. I did this for his birthday photos and am going to do it for Christmas as well. This way you can still add all your great shots and dont have to choose between just one or two!
Some of the days throughout the year where I had more than just one photo on a day – I made a smaller collage of 2-3 pics and still printed it out on a 4×6.
what a GRAND idea – i dont know if i can get 12 x 12 photos in New Zealand, but ill look into it now, cheers
Aren’t those old (retro?) scrapbooks a hoot? However, back then, they were “cutting edge” with all that cutesy stuff. We really have come a long way. Thanks for sharing…what a treasure you have!
Could not agree more with the evolution. I just looked through a 1999 scrapbook to find a photo for a project for my 13 year old daughter. It was great to see the pages, but I was always so stressed to make it look cute, creative, perfect enough.. So stressful in fact that I quit scrapbooking for a number of years. (tear) 2011 will be my second year of Project Life and even though sometimes it is tough to get a photo every day.. it is way less stressful and much more encompassing of our life! Thank you for sharing.
Thanks for sharing your album. I agree that I love those old albums but am SO SO happy we’ve evolved. I really love that I don’t have to scrapbook every.single.picture. I love that I tell stories and capture memories. It”s not about product or using the most stickers (in a lovely sneeze pattern). I love today’s scrapbooking!
For a second I wondered if you’d grabbed a book off of MY shelf!!
I too am SOOO enjoying the liberating feeling of evolution! Bless you for giving us the tools to simplify the way we preserve our life history & memories!
Thanks for the video, Becky! I’m laughing because my album from ’97 looks SO MUCH like your album, the style, the size, the Mickey Mouse die cuts (we honeymooned at Disneyland at the end of ’96). I have an ENTIRE album of a weekend trip to Texas in 2001. After my kids were born and my albums were getting longer and longer (because each “event” (and an event could be a bath in the sink) needed a 2 page spread… and the bigger events like birthday parties needed more than 2 pages) I realized by the time my 3 kids are 18 I would have something like 100 12×12 albums at the rate I was going. I got totally overwhelmed and just quit. I still have all of my stuff, but I haven’t actually scrapbooked in at least 3 years. Your ideas behind Project Life are really getting me inspired to pick up again, keep it simple, and get it done.
Hilarious! I used to scrapbook like that too! Making sure that every picture got on the page and not caring about the story behind the photos and with no journaling what so ever (that took way too long!) Thank goodness for change cuz I only made it through one album like that until I gave up and shoved all my photos in boxes while saying “I really need to scrapbook that”. Now I even scrapbook stories and photos that don’t even match! Capturing daily life is way more important than scraping every photo! I am looking forward to taking the Project Life journey. I think that’s what Santa is leaving under my tree this year! Thanks for such a fun video!!! =)
I have been wanting you to do this for sooo long! You can share stuff like this anytime. I love to look at other people’s scrapbooks. I am the same age as you and I have a scrpbk from my senior year. It is so fun to have it even though it isn’t how I’d do it now.
The whole point of scrapbooking is to look back at where you were at any given time. You had more time then and those type of pages were what you did. In my case, I enjoyed what I was doing with the pages and I’m guessing you were too at the time. I love all the “work”. It didn’t seem like work to me and it doesn’t now. I realized in about 2005 “it is what it is” and made that my golden rule. Seems kind of simple but really my whole point in scrapbooking is for my enjoyment – creating or reviewing. Whether I spend 2 hrs and get 5 pages or 1 I’ve enjoyed myself. I just have what I have and don’t worry about what isn’t there. Thanks for sharing your process!
Hi Becky,
For years I have wanted to scrapbook but the thought of die cuts, sheet protectors, etc. all of it used to make my head spin! Fate brought me to Project Life and I am so glad for it. Now, I can document my life and most importantly, the little things that mean so much to me. Thanks so much!!!!
He he. I remember those days of scrapbooking too! In fact, I was going through an old box in the basement and recycled your first couple of books and some early editions of CK that I still somehow had! EVOLUTION is great!
I would love to see a video tour of the inside of your house. I bet it’s just so cute!
Thanks for all the fun videos and ideas, like always!
Becky, you are just too adorable! I love all the little comments you add to the video. I wish I had a story to add that my album from 1997 looked just like yours, and I’m sure it would have had i actually completed one!! Looking forward to doing a Project Life Album in 2011….maybe i wont feel so gulity at the end of the year. thanks again for sharing.
I’m sure this has been answered somewhere, but do you still keep individual scrapbooks for your children?
We do take many pictures but feel bad not using all of them (I mean is there a law that says we must do just that). Have PL and plan to do a page per month (a resolution for 2011). I do have a problem, And a question for you, we have been saving our pictures by date ie. 2010_12_15 because I thought It would be easier when I remember the events by date (silly me), so how do I catch up or start a better system. No pressure.
I still do all the photos!! Maybe I need to delve deeper into Project Life!! I started a picture a day twice and got to March!
hilarious!! i only started in 2007 but i imagine in over 20 years it will look so dated too.
love that you shared this.
It brings back many memories for me, too! I can’t believe how tacky my scrapbooks looked. Kind of like looking at your high school pic and wondering why you ever thought your hair looked good. I love your videos!
Won’t we be laughing at the picture of last night’s pizza – 10 years from now? Why mock the past? I don’t get it.
Amber, in ten years I’ll love looking back at what we documented in 2010 … just as I enjoy looking back at this scrapbook from 1997. Mocking the past? Not at all. Appreciating that we constantly evolve in our approach and our style? Absolutely. I love scrapbooks … from the 80s, from 1997, from this recent year. I love it all.
What I was trying to communicate was that I’m so glad that my approach now is so much more about the PICTURES and STORIES and less about the embellishments and techniques.
“simmer down with those pages” – too funny. and seeing that creative letter — that made me laugh out loud — i totally was a fan of those lettering classes and books.
i still love to meddle in the new techniques and lovely embellies — it’s an outlet for me. but discovering Project Life and it’s simplicity is freeing. i often would sit to scrap some and just feel guilty and overwhelmed at how far behind i’ve gotten.
and i agree — that is what is so amazing about scrapbooking. i love that there is no “right way”.
thanks for all you continue to do to inspire us!!
Becky I just love your videos. They are real and you are soooo hilarious! I laugh at the little comments that come up on the screen
Thank you for sharing.
LOVED THIS! I totally agree with all of it. I can’t wait to get my hands on the Amber edition for 2011 — and I have 3 boys. I’ve done a POTD for the past 2 years. In 2011 I’m going to do monthly layouts instead.
Oh yeah…Club 33?!? Woo Hoo!
that is my thought too, Debbie, because I see that I used a lot of the same type of pictures in the second year as the first just because we do the same things. If it is monthly I may be able to find those few things that are more unique or different from what I took pix of the last two years. Glad to know someone else is taking that approach too.
im changing my approach too. LOVE my 2010 PL. but next year i plan to just journal the truly LITTLE things as my 2 wee ones grow up fast. so maybe 2 cards one day and then nothing for a week etc, but just having it all set up and the cards ready to write on, means i know it will be manageable :>
As much as I love how I used to scrapbook, I lost motivation for it really easy because it was so overwhelming! I’ve never felt that way with Project Life! I completed a layout each week and I would actually finish! I have even bought extra albums so that I can put older pictures in them and it has made me feel so much better to not have all those extra pictures laying around because I would NEVER get them scrapbooked!
Hilarious Becky!
I have to say, P365 changed my life in 2009 when I only had 2 kids! Now, a year later, twins to add to the mix means Project Life is just a lifesaver.
With 4 kids under the age of 6, who has the time to try and do the 30 pages for one vacation? I was so glad to see you shared that one! How true – I actually for a laugh this afternoon went digging to find my most over-scrapped event or trip. It had to be my oldest daughter’s Hello Kitty birthday a few years back. Just before it had come back into Vogue. Also, just before it was available everywhere. I guess I did 11 double paged layouts for the party to ease my conscience for the $450 I spent on the decorations I had to order in from my local party store.
Although I am not on Facebook, had to laugh at your comments about the laundry. After having the babies, we bought the biggest capacity front-loaders money could buy and they are running at least 2 to 3 times per day. The joke is that with any multiples in your family, laundry is probably the most difficult task to stay on top of. So true! You get what you think is close to being “caught up” only to find that it’s bed change day and there are 3 sets of bedsheets and 2 sets of crib sheets to do and once that’s done, a quick check of the hampers in everyone’s room and yep…you’re just back to square one!
Eagerly awaiting Project Life! I have to admit, I do miss the odd creative page here and there, but it is just not possible for me to go back to that old way of life. Your album count made me count mine. Oh, wow – I have 97 albums. That have not been touched (added to I mean) since I was about 7 months pregnant with the twins, about 2 weeks before they were born prematurely. I have never looked back.
I have to be honest, I don’t know how I would feel about saying goodbye to traditional scrapbooking if maybe I only had one child…I’ll never know. I just feel so happy that I still feel I am doing something for all of us and it is just fun and no stress. Us Mommies out here don’t need any more of that!
Thanks Becky for all you do!
I am soooo with ya, Becky! I had to laugh out loud when you were marveling at how many layouts you created for one trip. Me, too! Except I wish I could enjoy mine. I don’t! They drive me crazy. I finally had to take them off my shelves and put them in a tub in the basement. I felt better immediately! I only keep out my most recent books…the last 6+ years or so. Funny thing is, I used to live and breathe scrapbooking but somewhere along the way, I lost the desire. I SOOO enjoy Project Life. Liberating was the perfect word to describe it. You mean I don’t HAVE to scrapbook every little event creatively? So silly I needed “permission” for that, but I got it from PL and have no plans to go back.
Hi Debbie,
I love your video! I am very new to scrapbooking. Can you make a video where you share your “Project Life” album from this year? I would love to view your album, as I am seriously thinking about purchasing your 2011 kit.
Thanks!
What a fabulous wee trip, I was just having giggles about some of my old scrapbooks the other day, I have evolved as well to more simpler methods of scrapping but I still scrap a 12×12 of a favourite photo in the full on embellishment overload style.
Thanks for the transcript, being hearing impaired its awesome to be able to read what you are saying *hugs* from down under!
1997 was the first year I started scrapbooking. My 3rd baby was on the way and I didn’t my have a baby book finished for my second daughter. Someone at work showed me some scrapbook pages of her daughter”s recital and I remember thinking “I can do that and do it better”. The next year I went to a scrapbook show in Atlanta and met Lisa B. and this other lady who told me that she was on QVC but her product didn’t sell very well. She showed me her scrapbook pages and she titled them “going down on QVC”. All these years later I wish I could remember her name.
Thanks for the trip down memory lane.
So much fun to see your old scrapbooks- i think ALL of us have books like that. Which i love, by the way, because they give a great view of how our lives (and scrapbooking styles!) where back then. I do Project Life and still scrap traditionally, but have learned to not want to scrapbook EVERY picture. Thanks for sharing, love your video’s!
[...] top of that, you only scrapbooked the BIG moments/events/vacations/holidays. [NOTE: Go watch Becky Higgins' 7th Day of Christmas video for a humorous look at retro scrapbooking.... What about the day-to-day things that make you who you are? Those are the pieces that are [...]
Project Life has changed my life! As a 58 year old photographer whose family is of most importance, I have been “evolving” with photo memory keeping for the past five years. The system that works best for me now: Project Life for monthly layouts of the 14 or so photos that best represent that month of living for me and Stacy Julian’s Library of Memories for separate albums with layouts of multi pics and “Photos I Love”…tight organization along with time effecient creativity. I will also utilize the BH page protectors for those LOM albums.
Such a relief! Such a time saver! At my age I have decades of memories to place in my albums…thankfully, with Project Life, I am able to do this without a dreaded sense of time pressure. Becky Higgins…you are a genius!
I am so eager to start Project Life 2011 next year. I started Project LIFE this year, but unfortunately my computer died three weeks ago (along with all my pictures from August through November….so I won’t be able to complete it) I’m so bummed!!! Next year I will be sure to upload all my photos to Shutterfly IMMEDIATELY instead of getting busy/behind. Thanks Becky!
I have done P365 and PL both years and love the results. But I admit I do get tired of a picture a day but, in the end it was worth it. I am really looking forward to giving the digital version a try in 2011.
I still don’t want to give up my traditional scrapbooking though. Geez – I have enough product to last me 10 lifetimes after all! I admit I am more of a chronological scrapper. So I have figured out a system that works for me. I allow myself only one double page spread for the bigger events of the year (holidays, birthdays, little trips, etc.) So I definitely pick only the best photos for that. Plus I have a travel book where I make a few more pages if it’s a big trip, like a cruise or Hawaii or something special like that. And I make a book for my little grandson each year so we can watch him grow, using one double page spread per month. I just can’t seem to limit myself to one 4X6 picture to cover the big stuff where you take lots of photos. No one, including myself, wants to sit and look at photos on the computer only. So, for me, PL and traditional scrapbooks allow for the best of both worlds. The day to day stuff of life and the fun pages with papers, stickers, ribbons and all that fun, creative stuff I need to keep my brain active. I am retired and need to have something creative to do.
Thanks for all your fun stuff on your blog, Becky.
Let’s not forget that it doesn’t have to be all one way or nothing. That’s the beauty of binders. You can insert more “traditional” pages if you feel inspired to give some photos special treatment. I’m working in some strap bound albums I once hoarded (to cheap to ditch them) and I often do layouts that are more in the style of PL on those pages along with some artsy technique filled pages when the mood strikes. It’s all good. Have fun, tell stories.
I’m kind of glad that I procrastinated when I first started scrapping, and I didn’t do too many pages of “those” kind of pages…lol
But really, without scrappers like you, willing to share, I might not have evolved as quickly. Sometimes I need to hear or read it before it really sinks in.
Thanks!
That was a lot of fun to see. I love how you have simplified things. I would love to see some of your recent layouts from your children’s albums. They always looked so timeless.
Thanks!
Although I enjoy the ideas you share, I have to say that that video was too much of a plug and commerical.
I think that is some great advise for a busy mom of 2 kids who wants to capture thier every move. thank you!!!