Around this time of year (before December hits) I like to take stock and look at what's working and what's not for me and memory keeping.
I've enjoyed scrapbooking in 5x8 and making my Blurb books (book one is HERE) but I think I need a change. No matter how much I feel like I've found the best way forward, things always get stale and I crave something new. New year, new projects. I just don't feel excited about doing another year of the same thing no matter how well it worked. Feeling a bit been-there-done-that.
One of the things on my mind lately are stories. My goal for 2020 is to write more so I've been thinking about moving to a larger size for my regular layouts. 5x8 has been fun (and 6x8 before that) but I'm missing the larger writing space.
The other thing I miss is printing my layouts at home as I go, adding some letter stickers or chipboard if I feel like it and slipping it into an album. I know I have talked at length about saving space and photobooks being the way forward for me, but I miss building my album up over the year and holding a page in my hand right away and I miss making hybrid pages. Digital scrapbooking can feel very disconnected. Right now I have around 70 layouts on my computer that are waiting to be printed in book two.
So I've decided to go back to scrapbooking my regular layouts at 8.5x11 and printing from home - it was my favourite size before moving to 6x8 in 2017. I still love the smaller sizes but I just want to see what I can do with a larger canvas. I'm also really looking forward to making some hybrid pages again.
Some spreads from an old 8.5x11 album - still love it.
I've bought an 8.5x11 Heidi Swapp Storyline album (HERE) and a stash of my favourite Ilford Galerie Smooth Pearl photo paper (HERE) so I'm ready to go.
The awesome thing about the Heidi Swapp album is that it comes with an envelope for ephemera, page protectors (which match my We R Memory Keepers stash) and the cool printed Storyline background pages. Looking forward to playing with those. (You can see more at Heidi's website HERE).
Just a quick note about 9x12 - I know it is all the rage right now and I really do love that size, but there are a couple of reasons I'm not going that route:
1) I can't print 9x12 at home
2) I'm not a pocket scrapper so I don't need the photo & journal card-friendly dimensions of 9x12 (it took me a long time to figure out that's why 9x12 existed when 8.5x11 was there all along and they are so similar)
3) It seems like 9x12 is hard to source consistently and that's part of the reason I moved away from 6x8 to photobooks in the first place. I already have a huge stash of 8.5x11 page protectors, photo paper and old albums so I should be set.
So I'm making an 8.5x11 album for 2020 and I'm really excited about it. And I can use my letter sticker stash again!
I'm also thinking of skipping Project Life next year. I might add a monthly recap spread in my 8.5x11 album but I just need a break. I've made a Project Life album (in various ways) every year since 2010 (only skipping 2017). The year I did skip, I made a lot more regular layouts so it all evens out. I might also keep a digital commonplace book project like this one (HERE) for the little stories, quotes, recipes and thoughts that would normally show up in Project Life.
I have a few projects from this year that I'm looking forward to carrying over to 2020. I'm excited to get into my older-stories project Little Life Stories (HERE). I've been jotting down story ideas and going through old photos but I really want to work on this consistently next year.
I've also just started some new Travelers Notebooks for movies, TV and reading so I'm happy to keep those going too (HERE) and will keep going on my 'Year In Food" until March which is when I started it (HERE)
So that's the plan so far. I'm always open to changing things up, trying new things and even going back to old things. Still going digital, still going minimal, still subscribing to Ali's digital Story Kit, still recording our day to day stories, still going...
Just a quick little reminder if you need it - it's OK to change. It's OK to try something new. It's OK to not do what you have always done. It's OK to just keep doing the same thing if it works for you. This hobby of ours is so meaningful and important but it should also work for us and be fun.