Project Life: Weeks 2 & 3

Wow! Time is certainly flying by. As some of you know, I'm a student studying to become an elementary school teacher (this time next year I'll be student teaching and preparing to graduate). This semester I am taking 9 classes which equals 21 credit hours, and is considered an overload. Since the semester had started, crafting had been put on the back burner for a few weeks while I got settled into my new routine. Now that I have a better idea of my schedule I should be back to posting regularly, although not as often during previous semesters, but I'll make up for it in the summer. :)

This is my first year doing Project Life and I'm loving it! The only thing I'm having an issue with is developing a "style" but I know that comes with time and consistency. Since I didn't get around to sharing a spread last week, today I am sharing both Week 2 and Week 3 spreads.

*Warning: This post is photo heavy!*

Here's a look at Week 2:

Week 2 Highlights:
~ The new semester started two days late because of the extreme cold, with the windchill it was nearly -40 degrees!
~ My friend Danielle and I took some fun "first day of school" pictures
~ My friends and I played our favorite card game (which we call "Sammich") but it's better known as Egyptian Ratscrew (I think)
~ My sister came to stay with me for a night!

For Week 3 I decided to give a black and white layout a try. I really like how it turned out!

Week 3 Highlights
~ Lots of time spent with friends! 
~ Danielle and I had fun (well, as much fun as we could) in night class drinking Capri Suns
~ I got a free sweatshirt which I love, and myself, Danielle, and Ellerie took a "triplet" picture together
~ A group of us played Scattergories, one of my favorite games! Included is part of my score sheet
~ I got to bring one of my stuffed animals to class (oh, the life of an education major) and I chose to bring my penguin, Paulo


I am off to finish a birthday card for my mom (that'll be posted later this week) and then it's back to creating lesson plans! Right now I'm working on a science lesson plan involving a fossil activity. Fun, but tedious! Have a great rest of your weekend.

Love Banner

Happy Thursday! I can't believe it's been almost two weeks since my last blog post... YIKES! I started my spring semester and my 9 classes/21 credits have been keeping me pretty preoccupied! Thankfully I'm getting a routine down and caught up on a bunch of assignments so I should be having more time to craft. My next Project Life segment will be posted on my blog this weekend!

Anyways! It's hard to believe that Valentine's Day is less than a month away! How crazy! Valentine's Day has to be one of my favorite "crafty" holidays, though, as a future teacher, Valentine's Day treats are so fun to make!

Today, though, I'm sharing with you all a simple banner I made for my home using products from Two Berry Creative. 

To make the banner, I cut banner shapes using my Silhouette out of black cardstock and patterned paper from Pebble's "Front Porch" collection. Even though it's not a Valentine line, the theme of the papers worked perfectly!

I then cut heart shapes using my Silhouette as well, and added a chipboard letter to the center of each to spell out 'LOVE.' I lined each of the patterned papers with Red Riding Hood and Hot Pink Baker's Twine for some extra texture and dimension.

Lastly, I used what I thought was ribbon (but turned out to be adhesive tape, which is why it hangs a bit awkwardly) to hang the banner and attached each of the banner pieces using these adorableHeart Mini Clothespins. 

What Valentine's Day projects have you been working on lately? Next on my list are Valentine's goodie bags for my friends using lots of fabulous products from Two Berry Creative!

Thanks so much for stopping by today!

Project Life: Week 1

Happy New Year, everyone! With a new year comes new changes, and boy am I excited about the new things planned for 2014! First of all, I'm starting Project Life, which is something I had the desire to do all of 2013 and meant to get started on the second half of the year, but time slipped away from me and unfortunately, I never was able to get around to it. Now, I'm determined to keep up with it on a weekly basis and share it with you on my blog.

My plan is to create just a one page layout for every week, unless I have enough to fill a complete spread. I'm fearful of planning to create a spread each week because I know some weeks will be less eventful than others, and I don't want to become stressed trying to fill pages. So, I'll stick with a layout a week and if I have enough or if there's a holiday or something else special going on, I'll make a full spread. :) 

To kick off the year, I created a New Year's page and also my Week 1 page. My weeks are going to be running from Sunday-Saturday, and because the new year started this week, I thought I would count this week as Week 1. I finished a little early so I could share it with you this week. 

Now, I have a slight obsession with Project Life Kits, which is silly because they come with SO many cards, but I love having a variety! I personally own the Jade, Midnight, and Seasons Mini Kit, but also have cards from older kits such as Clementine and Turquoise from a few swaps I did. I'm trying to resist purchasing more, but we'll see how long I hold out!

So without further ado, here's my full spread!

(Forgive me as I'm still playing around with how to take the best pictures of these layouts in regards to location and lighting - give me a few weeks and I'm sure I'll have the hang of it!)

Some close ups of the New Year's page:

Close ups of Week 1:

My favorite part about this layout is the 'January' card I created using the Clear Your Calendar stamp set from Two Berry Creative. I've made one for every month so that I can highlight the important dates at beginning of each new month. I'm up on their blog today with peeks of all the monthly cards I've made! Be sure to stop by. :)

Not too shabby for my first attempt! I just wish I knew how to take better photos while eliminating the glare on the page protectors... anyone have any tips? 

If you're documenting your life with Project Life this year I would LOVE to see! Thanks so much for stopping by.