A couple Project Life customers shared with us how they’re saying THANK YOU to special coaches + teachers in their life, now that the school year is wrapping up for so many.

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Terri in Texas created this End of Season Mini Album and had this to say:

I wanted to share with you the books I made as a thank you for my daughter’s soccer coaches. The team is going to present them to their coaches tonight at their banquet. I used a mini album and photos I took during the season. Each player as well as parents wrote a short thank you note to each of the coaches (there are 2) on blank grid cards. I love the way they turned out and I think the coaches are going to love them! I thought I would share with you another idea for using the mini album. I love your products!

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Sarah in Florida made this End of School Year Mini Album and shared this with us:

Just wanted to share a project I did with your mini albums. I made it for my son’s first grade teacher. I had each kiddo draw a picture on a 4×6, and I also had them write a thank you on a folded 4×6 that I put behind their name. The rest of the book was filled with photos I had taken throughout the year. The kids loved looking through it and the teacher loved receiving it.

If you have completed – or are currently working on – some sort of gift for someone using Project Life in any way, we’d love to see! Anyone can email photos to submissions@beckyhiggins.com. Be sure to include your first name + city + state and a brief description of your gift/project.

From Kimberly in Australia:

I am a Canadian living permanently in Australia and recently had my mother come for a 4 month visit. My youngest was starting kindergarten so Grandma needed to be here. We had a wonderful and very busy visit. One of the things I wanted to do for her for this trip was to give her a mini album of her time spent with us so that when she went back home and everyone asked how her trip was she could show them immediately.

We ended up doing 2 full mini albums and she couldn’t have been more happy with how they turned out and getting to see her photos straight away instead of waiting until she got around to printing them. We finished up  the albums the night before she went home to make sure she had every last moment in them. She was so surprised at how quickly they came together.  I can’t wait to hear the reactions from her family and friends when she shows them. I just wish the mini albums were here when she came two years ago and we could have done the same thing. She still hasn’t done anything with the pictures from that trip.

Here are a few of our favourite pages. [ Project Life cards are from the Cherry Edition. ]

Jennifer in Illinois shared with us what she did with the Cinnamon Mini Album (20% off thru April 5) + the Wellington Mini Kit. Keep in mind that the Wellington Edition was designed to be a “Childhood Mini Kit” – and you’ll see inspiration for that childhood theme soon – but there’s still enough flexibility on many of the cards, so I’m really thrilled to see what she has done. Jennifer wanted to do this for her husband’s birthday.

In Jennifer’s own words …

Our dog (really his dog) Maggie passed away in February and I had long been planning to do a photo book to celebrate her life. Shortly after her passing my husband started asking me questions about scrapbooking and said he was thinking about doing a scrapbook for her.

I immediately thought that Project Life would be the perfect solution and far better than a photo book. I printed 78 photos and assembled the album with the Wellington cards for him, so it’s all ready for his stories of Maggie. There were only a few cards in the Wellington kit that were too “themed’ to use, so it was the perfect design and kit size for this project. Even though it is bittersweet, I am so excited to share this homemade gift with him and my stepsons.

Hi there. Happy Friday (and for some of you it’s already Saturday)!

I realize most of you reading this are in the United States. Hello to you too, of course! Feel free to keep reading, but this post really is particularly directed to our customers, readers, friends outside the U.S.

That’s really my main message today. Why? Because I know you sometimes feel like you “miss out”. Sometimes we have a giveaway that is limited to U.S. shipping addresses only, for example. Right now our products are sold on Amazon (for a million reasons) in the U.S. and that makes getting “prizes” to other countries very challenging.

I want you to know, first and foremost, that we truly do recognize and appreciate your support. It has been so much fun to sense your enthusiasm for Project Life, from many corners of the earth. I don’t think you’ll ever know what that has meant to me over the years, and continues to mean to me – and to us.

You know, when we started this little company 3.5 years ago, the idea was that we would just offer a kit – or maybe two kits – each year. That’s it. So much for that simple idea! Now with well over a hundred different items, and things happening + growing faster than we ever anticipated, we are doing everything we can to “keep up” with it all, and so naturally there are frustrations, lessons learned, and growing pains along the way.

As we continue to grow, and as we work toward our goals of being better, smarter, more efficient, and more generous – you will see that we continue to make efforts to make our products available to everyone in the world. Our partnership with American Crafts is proof of that. They are able to get the product into retailers around the globe, where we weren’t able to do that on our own before. In May, when products are sitting on shelves in many, many more countries – doing giveaways without having to exclude non-U.S. addresses will be way more possible. We’re so happy about that, and we know you are too!

Again, please know that we love & appreciate you. Here are two fun things for you – our international friends:

GIVEAWAY #1. We will NOT exclude international customers from the Instagram #MiniAlbumCrush giveaway happening right now. If you missed that post yesterday, check it out so you can be sure to get in on that possibility of winning a Mini Album + Mini Childhood Kit! It’s officially open to anyone – anywhere. Remember: This giveaway happens on Instagram, not here on my blog.

GIVEAWAY #2. In light of my “international love fest” today, I’m announcing that we are giving away 10 FULL Digital Project Life collections! That means 10 of you who will be randomly selected will get to choose any collection you want (already on ACDigitals.com – OR – you can even choose one of the editions that has yet to be released!). The only rule? You HAVE to live outside the U.S. for this one.  : )

To enter for a chance at winning a full digital collection of Project Life, simply leave your first name + city + country + the edition you prefer. We’ll announce those 10 winners here at the bottom of this post on Monday sometime.

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Updated 3.18.13

I am delighted to announce the following 10 winners! Please email kari@beckyhiggins.com with the digital edition of your choice.

Jolanda - Heteren, The Netherlands

Jeanet - Slagelse, Denmark

Tine - Lillehammer, Norway

Camila - Curitiba, Brazil

Sandra - Brisbane, Australia

Kate - Auckland, New Zealand

Megan - Calgary, AB Canada

Thea - Manila, Philippines

Julia - Basel, Switzerland

Kylie - Durban, KZN, South Africa