Project Life: Week 4 & Catching Up

I can honestly say I have never been so busy in my almost twenty one years of life.

I'm enrolled in 9 classes, which is 21 credit hours. (Meaning I spend an average of 21 hours in class a week - not counting all the homework and studying I do outside of class).

As an elementary education major less than a year away from student teaching, I'm beginning practicum experiences and spending a lot of time in elementary schools. This semester, I am required to spend 80 hours in three different classrooms. 20 hours with a reading specialist, 30 hours with a special education teacher, and 30 hours with a general classroom teacher during the subjects of math, science, and social studies. Thankfully two of my placements are at the same school and the other school is nearby, but, 80 hours is A LOT.

Prior to starting at my new college this school year, I worked part-time at two libraries. During my winter break I picked up some hours at one of them and was asked if I would like to continue working one Saturday a month, since I'm home all the time. Of course I said yes! Not long after that, I was asked if I would be interested in working weekend hours at the other library because they are undergoing some major changes and were in need of immediate help with someone who did not need very much training. So, I am back to working two jobs (which I love, don't get me wrong) and traveling home every weekend. It's only an hour and a half drive, and I was coming home pretty much every weekend anyways. I am so thankful for the opportunity to work again at two places that I absolutely love and enjoy.

In the fall I also started teaching Copic marker classes and I am continuing to teach monthly classes at The Scrapbooking Studio in Davenport, Iowa, and also at a store closer to my hometown in Sandwich, Illinois, called Peddlers Den. It is so much fun combining my passion and my hobby. I am on the design team for The Scrapbooking Studio as well, and am also currently designing for Two Berry Creative.

So, aside from all that, I'm also trying to maintain a social life and create some down time for myself. My friends coerced me into joining two intramural sports - something I have NEVER done before and NEVER thought I would be doing - and I am now cosmic bowling on Monday nights and playing volleyball on Thursday nights. Both start within the coming weeks, and I'm both excited and a bit nervous because I'm not very athletic!

I apologize, I didn't mean to write a book! I feel so guilty for not posting as much as I normally do, but honestly my days blend together and I have no idea where time goes. I have amazingly been keeping up with my Project Life pages and working on a few other projects as well. I miss regularly crafting so much! I'm counting down the days until my semester is over at the beginning of May. :)

So, with that all said, let's take a visual look at my crazy life with my Week 4 Project Life spread:

I limited Week 4 to a one page spread because it wasn't a very eventful week. This was also a design team project for The Scrapbooking Studio made with We R Memory Keeper's "Notable" collection (more projects created with this line coming next week).

The two pictures in the center were taken in my Assessment and Diagnosis in Reading and Science Methods for Elementary Teaching courses. In learning how to be a teacher, we often play the role as students so we can better understand how to teach alongside learning different teaching methods. In Reading, we played a word forming game using candy hearts, and in Science, we planted lima beans.

There was also a lot of snow this week and while waiting for the bus (which was over 20 minutes late - ugh) Danielle and I decided to make snow angels in the parking lot. I think we've been spending too much time acting like kids in class!

The January card was cut from a 12x12 sheet of paper from "Notable" and instead of writing the dates of the week on the title card, I used an embellishment to indicate the week on the calendar card.

Here are the products I used from The Scrapbooking Studio:
- Notable "Dated" Paper
- Notable "Memo" Paper
- Notable "Tagged" Paper
- Notable "Captured" Paper
- Notable Chipboard Alphabet Stickers
- Notable "Perfect Day" Die Cut
- Notable Embossed Stickers

I almost forgot - Happy Valentine's Day, everyone! Have an absolutely lovely day. :)

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.

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.

First PL Layout & Exciting News!

Happy Tuesday! Today I am SUPER excited to announce that I'm the July guest designer for Heartstring Designs! This is my first time working with a kit club and so far I'm loving it! 

If you've never heard of Heartstring Designs, they're a monthly kit club and provide an awesome kit every month for great price! You can read more about them on their About Us page, and even visit their brand new Ning site, where you just might learn a little about me, too!

Now, on to my first guest designer project using July's Summer Lovin' kit! A few of you may know that I'm planning on starting Project Life next month when I move. My poor Jade collection kit has been sitting all alone waiting for me to start playing with it! This weekend I finally got to do that when I put together my FIRST Project Life layout using a few cards from the Jade edition, and lots of goodies from the Summer Lovin' kit!

Here's an overview of the whole layout - I'm really proud of it! Even though Project Life is made to be simple, I've seen so many great pages that the thought of making my own was a bit intimidating, but I'm really happy with how it turned out! Now for some close-ups... 

I used the striped Simple Stories card from the kit to document the weather for the week, we're headed into a bit of a heat wave! I printed off a screenshot from my iPhone and added some Thickers and a chipboard embellishment from Simple Stories. 

I documented one of my bike rides (something I've been doing a lot of this summer) using a bi-fold card from the Jade kit and a chipboard bicycle also from Simple Stories. I even got to use my date stamp for the first time, woo hoo!

I journaled a tiny bit about an ice cream date with my sister using a Jade card and a cute little ice cream cone chipboard embellishment from Simple Stories. 

The polka dot card is from Simple Stories (love it!) and I took a picture of my book and sunglasses out on the chair where I read on our patio. The fabric tape and the chipboard sun are from the Summer Lovin' kit, and I used more sparkly Thickers to spell out 'relax.'  

Putting together this page has got me feeling super excited to start doing this on a weekly basis and sharing my layouts with you! I'm hoping to have a regular Project Life feature on my blog towards the end of August. :)

Check back next Tuesday for another guest designer project using more awesome supplies from the Summer Lovin' Kit by Heartstring Designs!