Digital Scrap Booking: Photo Journal

I've been thinking about what I can do to help my husband feel like he is still here when he goes to boot camp for 6 1/2+ months. I thought about writing him letters every day {I still probably will} or sending him pictures everyday or updating my personal blog everyday. All of this is really ambitious for me. I want to do it all; but, the facts are I will be a single mom the whole time he's gone & I'll be running my own business. I need something a little less time consuming for the day to day & I can sit down once a week and update the blog {bahaha ~ maybe!}

One of the blogs I follow is doing a thing called Project Life. I love reading her posts because she is so creative and crafty & her scrapbook pages remind me of what mine would look like if, well, if I were as creative& fun as her! So for a few months I've been watching her post these cool pictures she created for what she & her husband {and now baby} did through out the week. SO COOL! I finally decided to Google this Project Life thing & see how I could get started. 

When I start researching I tend to go on information overload & sometimes forget where I started. Honestly I forgot all about the whole Project life thing until I sat down to write this post. Project Life is bascially a scrapbook kit that comes with everything you need sans the pictures to get started on your very own scrap book. 

Did I mention before that I'll be a single mom while Sean is gone who is also running my own business? As much I as I love this woman's weekly posts, I needed to find my own way to journal our life while he is away. I need something that isn't going to create a huge mess {I have a 10 year old & a 17 month old who already do a fine job with that} and isn't going to be as time consuming as physical scrap booking. I decided that what I am going to do is create digital scrap book that is going to be super easy for me to complete in 10 minutes a day. Another nice thing about digital scrap booking is since I want to create a daily journal, I can reuse the same templates over & over again! And, if I wasn't going to use the same templates, I could use the papers & embellishments over & over again!

Here is my plan:

1. Find A Super Cute Digital Scrapbook Kit That I Love      {DONE}

2. Create Several Templates To Use In My Journal                {WORKING ON IT}

3. Keep My Camera In A Safe Place & Don't Lose It                   {I HOPE I CAN DO THIS!}

I created 2 pages in 1 night; so, I figure that I can have 10-12 page templates ready to start filling in by the weekend. Since I think this will be really easy, I think I can start on it now. I've been feeling the need to start keeping a journal; but, I always get overwhelmed when I sit in front of a book full of empty pages. I always think I need to start at 

"Well, back in 1988 my mom used to send me to school in jeans that looked like crayons had melted all over them. . . and I loved it!" 

and try to work my way forward. I'm ok with starting where I am today in my life & adding little bits to the prologue of my life as I go on. Plus pictures make all journals {and books} more interesting!

So for step one, I Googled 'Free Digital Scrap Book Kits' and feel in love with Spontaneous Delight by Carrie Stephens. Look at all those pretty colors, how could I not love it?!?!?

Here are the page templates I created so far for step 2:

 

I still need to figure out to label the dates on each day in a creative way, and create a few more layouts.

As for step 3, I have no idea how I am going to keep track of the camera. Maybe I'll get a special box that it goes in & put it out of reach of the little ones. . .

In the next post, I'll show you how you can create your own digital journal and page layouts!

Happy crafting

:)