catching up with project life...

Hi again :) I've been pretty good with keeping up to date with the day to day happening this year but my 2014 album is quite a different story, so I have been trying to make an effort to go back and fill in some of the blanks which I never got around to doing last year. 

 I shared this layout over on the PL Junkies blog today with a few tips for making the catch up process a little bit easier. 

Catching up on previous years can seem a little bit daunting at first, which I why I highly recommend keeping a record in either a diary or your phone of what was happening in your life from week to week. Having some brief notes is a great way to help you to remember what you and your family where doing throughout the year and it makes the task of playing catch up a lot easier.

One of best ways to simplify catch up process is to keep your pages simple. This doesn't mean you need to change your style, but rather just create a simpler version of your own style and get those pockets filled!  My style is pretty clean and simple to begin with, but I do like to add layered embellishments and print my journaling directly onto my cards which can take up a bit of time so to simplify this, I decided to print my journaling onto one sheet of card stock which I cut into simple journal strips to document the details and opted for just a few wood veneer accents and small embellishments for a bit of extra colour, although I did still sneak in a few extra layers onto the title card ;)

Another time saver for playing catch up is to pre-select a colour palette to compliment the photos you are working with. Sorting through all your cards to try and find a perfect card for each photo will take up a lot of time, so instead I like to use a palette that doesn't necessarily match the photos but still works because it picks up a few of the colours featured the pics.

Working with the aqua colour in a couple of the photos, I selected a mix of cards from the 'Happy' core kit and combined these with a few bits and pieces from the Elle's Studio 'Cienna' collection that had the same water colour look along with a couple of extra cards from my stash. I deliberately chose filler cards that featured white text and matted all the pics with a white border to give my pages a consistent feel which also worked well with the journal strips.

 I hope that some of these steps will help you fill up your pockets and tackle a few of the pages you may have missed. The past 6 months has flown by so fast and this is my final share for the PL Junkies team -  it has been wonderful to share my layouts and tips along the way and I have really loved the experience of working alongside such a talented mix of crafters. Thanks for stopping by xx

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going back to my 2014 album...

Although this year's album is very up to date, I still have a lot of blank spaces to fill in my 2014 album and am trying to work my way through these which is why I went all the way back to October to create a layout for the PLJunkies blog.

I faced a few challenges when working out how to put these pages together -  the first being that I didn't really have enough photos to fill a double spread using my weekly format and the second being that there are no people featured in any of the photos I had from this time. 

To tackle the issue of not having enough photos I simply condensed what I had and documented two separate weeks onto one spread. I made the pages flow together by repeating the same colours and elements across both pages using a mix of Simple Stories goodies that was featured in the first kit from the PLJunkies Kit Club and I really liked the way the red, blue, green and yellow combo worked with my random mix of photos.

The lack of people featured in the photos, which usually help to determine the mood of the pics, didn't meant that the events from this week should not be documented. I used a mix of little word tags and embellishments to set the mood in each of the photos, while also helping to visually tie all the pockets in together across both pages. 

Journaling onto vellum and adding a few embellies directly over one of the photos helped to set the tone for the weather photos, and adding memorabilia such as a simple business card also helped to establish what was happening in the photo. 

Thanks for stopping by xx

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summer fun...

Hi again :) I created a summer themed layout for the PL Junkies blog featuring some exclusive 'Summer Themed' items from Craft Paper Scissors.  

My {scrAp this!} Summer Fun Polaroid Frame helped me set the tone for the entire layout and it was from this that I was inspired to use a series of frames to highlight certain details on both my photos and cards. 

I really like the way the frames draw the eye to certain parts of the photo without overwhelming it and adding a cluster of small embellies to each frame helped to anchor it to the page. The Polaroid also helped me determine which accent colours to add to my layouts and I used little pops of gold and yellow throughout both pages.

The fun wood veneer exclusives added a lot of texture to the page and were great for continuing the summer theme and telling the story in some of the photos.  

Thanks for stopping by xx

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choosing the right colour combo...

Hi, I've got a project life layout over on the brand new PL Junkies blog to share. 

I 

I put together a fun colour combo for this layout and would love to see how you would use it on your projects!

You will find close up details as well as a few tips that help me select a colour combo

 for my layouts over on the original post. 

Thanks for stopping by xx

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