Mini Book Set Up!

Have you guys been following along with Shannon's "Making Ourselves" series on her blog and instagram? I am so into it. She's pretty fantastic and a very positive person.

She's inspired me to admit that I'm trying to make some changes in my life: taking better care of myself, more fresh air, taking a bit more relaxed approach to creating, trying to relax a little bit more in general, balancing life & work, making new friends, etc. 

I've been wanting to try a different way of documenting my daily life and how I'm trying to incorporate my changes. I love Project Life but I'm struggling with making it more personal! 

When I saw that Tina had a e-class about making mini books I jumped on it SO FAST. I've never taken a Studio Calico class- so far I'm really enjoying it! I love how it's set up. It has video tutorials made by Tina, they are well organized and I love hearing her thoughts about her process. I'm always inspired when I hear someone I admire break down their process, it makes me step back and think "aha! that totally makes sense- I totally *get* you now!" 

I used my CalicoPoints to get the dedicated kit for the class. It doesn't look like it's available online any longer but it's really, really, really cool! Filled with so much good stuff. I think that's what I like most about Studio Calico- they seem to curate their kits really well. I'm also using a ton of stuff from my Project Life monthly kits, every so often someone will come across an older blog post and ask if I'm still getting them- YES! YES! YES! I love the anticipation of a new kit arriving, I love looking at all the stuff in it, getting ideas and often I find just the kit itself to be inspiring- there have been times when I've scanned a card and saved it in our file of "cross stitch color inspiration".

One of the neat things the class kit came with was a 4x6 pad of paper that made me think immediately of Carolyn Friedlander. I'm totally into that- I love that minimal aesthetic but I can rarely personally pull it off, it'll be fun to journal and use this paper. I liked buying the class kit especially because it's outside of my comfort zone and it's making me want to work on the book because it's SO different.

Tina encourages the use of 4x6 Project Life cards, I feel like I have a million cute ones saved up but I rarely use them in my album. I borrowed a hole punch and put holes in a bunch of my favorite ones. I'm going to add stickers, stamps, etc to them. I love the look of really layered pages. I went through all my 3x4 cards and started putting holes in them as well. One neat thing is she takes photos of all the pages in her book, there are so many fantastic details in it. She also teaches two photo transfer methods that I'm really excited to try.

I found this little weather card in my stash and it is perfect for one of my current obsessions- Weather Underground! It's probably a little batty to be obsessed with an app about the weather but I'm all about enjoying little things in life. I like knowing things like the pollen count, sunrise/sunset and it's nicely designed app!

I never know how to handle bad days in Project Life! And often I'll just skip them all together. Which is kind of cheating, lol. I found this awesome lemon paper from a previous kit and it was perfect for last week! My mom took pity on me, came over and cooked us approximately a million meals. She baked some lemons, juiced them and mixed the juice with honey. I've been having it with hot water. The sticker is really cute and I like the metallic edge around the little tag. I liked being able to document the memory of my mom coming over.

My favorite part of the class was Tina saying that she just carries her book around with her and sticks stuff in it while she's out and about! That is right up my alley. I found a purple elastic that came with some asparagus and I'm using it to hold everything in my book. I have my pen clipped to it. I think it's in one of the videos,  she talks about using a hair tie! Brilliant! I'm constantly shoving things in my Filofax but now I'll have an actual proper place for them. And how seriously great is that gold lettering on the cover?! eep!

The class came with prompts and they are so good- I have them folded up in my book to work on. I like how chubby the book is too!

Ok! One last page! :):):)

I'm not sure how many pages I'll share in the future because I do want this to be a journal where I can get super personal but I'll definitely post about this project again because I'm really into it. :):):)