Welcome to Week in the Life 2013.

If you haven’t heard about Week In the Life before, Week In the Life is a week-long memory-keeping project hosted by Ali Edwards where the goal is to capture a week in your life using photos + words. This year she is running WITL from Monday, September 9th to Sunday, September 15th which makes today Day 1.

I participated in Week In the Life back in July 2011 and I loved the end result so much I’ve been dying to do it again. I’d planned to do it last year in April and even though I wrote up a plan for 2012, I got about a day into it and realized enough time hadn’t passed for me to feel inspired by the project again. I felt like I was taking the same photos and telling the same photos and it just wasn’t inspiring to me at the time.

But now, here we are over two years later, living in a new apartment in a new city and I’m ready to do it again, for real, this time. So here’s my plan for 2013:

My Game Plan for Week In the Life 2013

To prepare myself for Week In the Life 2013, I looked through all of my previous Week In the Life posts here on the blog as well as my 2011 WITL photo book, and I realized something, especially when reading the plan I’d written for 2012:

I don’t want to do things differently for the sake of being different. 

Instead this year I’m going to stick with the plan that worked for me in 2011 using the same Blurb 8×10 photo book size but with an all new, fresh design.

So here are the details of my plan:

Capture Week: September 2nd to 8th – No, those dates are not a typo. SURPRISE! This week didn’t work well with Adam’s work schedule and some other stuff we’ve got going on, so instead I decided to get a jump on things and do all my “capturing” last week.

But I’ll be sharing everything this week so I can play along with everyone else (and may even snap an additional filler photo here and there). Other than my Monday photos being from the Labor Day holiday it should represent a pretty normal week around here.

Album: 8×10 Blurb Standard Portrait Photo Book with Image Wrap Hardcover – This is the size I used for my 2011 album and I loved it. To me it’s the perfect combo of size, price and ease of use. Plus I love the idea of having a little series of WITL photo books that are all the same size but from different years.

Design: Clean & graphic design in the style of my new Life Captured: Photo Book Templates. I will most likely put my pages together in Adobe InDesign so I can upload a single PDF to Blurb. Each day will have between 4-6 pages (2-3 two-page spreads) and then there will be 4 additional highlight pages at the end.

Deadline: I’d like to have my album designed and printed by October 15th. We have some big stuff happening this month so that should give me plenty of time to get it done but won’t give me so much time that I forget everything.

Project Life vs WITL: I’ve seen a lot of people asking how to handle doing Week In the Life at the same time as Project Life and the truth is, I’m not worrying about it. I’m so far behind in Project Life that I think it’s somewhat of a moot point anyway, but if I do eventually get “caught up” (blah, I hate that phrase), I will let my Project Life week be more of a fave photos/highlights from Week In the Life.

Overall I’m feeling pretty good about my plan since I’ve done this before and I know what works for me. But if you’re still feeling nervous/intimidated by the Week In the Life process, here are a few more tips for you:

Tips for Capturing A Week In Your Life

1) Begin with the end in mind

Picture yourself at the end of the week – What stories do you want to have captured? What photos or moments would you be disappointed if you didn’t capture? Make an extra effort to focus on those during the week.

For example for me, people shots are a must so I always make an extra effort to use my camera remote or timer to get myself and others together in photos.

2) Have a design plan in place from the start

So I hesitate to mention this because I know your first thought is going to be “Ack, it’s the start of the week and I don’t have a PLAN!” So before you go panicking on me, haha, don’t worry, there’s still time!

You don’t need to have a photo play-by-play for your week before you get started. But having a general idea of what you’d like your completed album to look like can simplify the capture process by giving you a clear focus on what you need (and don’t need to capture) whether it’s long paragraphs of journaling or full-page photos with plenty of white space for text.

Of course, if you want to get a jumpstart on your design plan, you can always pick up my Life Captured templates which I designed especially for this project.

3) Set yourself a deadline

Most scrapbookers seem to think the tough part of Week In the Life is the capture week. But the truth is – that’s the easy part!

The challenge comes in actually making time to finish your album.

I don’t recommend trying to create your album as you go through the week (although I know some speedy scrappers do) but I do recommend scheduling time to work on your album and setting yourself a deadline for when you want to have it done. If you leave it up to “when I have time”, it’ll just end up on top of the unfinished projects pile.

4) Embrace imperfection & avoid the comparison game

Part of the magic of Week In the Life is that it encourages you to take a close, detailed look at your everyday life. But you know what? Every day life isn’t always pretty and it certainly isn’t perfect.

So this week I challenge you to embrace the imperfections. Rather than focusing on all the things that aren’t “right”, like your bland beige walls or clutter around your house, focus on all of the bits that are amazing. And don’t let yourself get bogged down into thinking everyone else’s life/photos/story/adventures are better than yours. Your life is unique to you so for this week let’s celebrate all the awesomeness you’ve already got going on.

5) Remember the whole is greater than the sum of it’s parts

Finally, say it with me: no single photo, taken or untaken, is going to make or break your album.

Much like December Daily or Project Life, the magic of Week In the Life is not any individual photo. It is the overarching stories all of the photos tell well combined together.

So relax, have fun and figure no matter what you end up with at the end of the week, it will tell the story of a week in your life.

I hope you’ll be coming on this Week In the Life creative adventure with me! I’ll of course be sharing my progress and thoughts here on the Nettio Designs blog.

Looking for an easy but creative way to capture a week in your life?

Pick up the Life Captured: 8×10 Photo Book & Bits & Bytes Scrapbooking Templates here.

 

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