Week In The Life | Thoughts On The Process & Daily Sheet PDF
Next week I'll be documenting a week in our lives.
Seven days of photos and words, chronicling the little things and the big things that happen from Monday through Sunday.
There's so many different ways to approach this project. There's no right or wrong.
- Maybe you'll follow along with me and focus on the theme of time this year. Check out my design plan and supply list here.
- Maybe for you this project will be an attempt to catch just one story per day with words or photos.
- Maybe for you this project will be all on your blog and you won't be creating an album.
- Maybe you'll go all-out and jot down things as they happen on an hourly basis (even doing this for one day during the week is really cool).
If this is your first time participating in this project I highly recommend you read this post: The Basics Of Documenting A Week In Your Life. I've also got completed examples from a couple years available here: 2008 and 2010.
For me this project is about capturing the rhythms of our days over a period of one week. What time are we waking? What time are we falling into bed? What's special about our family right now? How can I pay close attention to (and honor and celebrate) the things that are happening now which likely won't be the same next year?
This project is simply an opportunity to capture the real, the basic, the rush, the slowness, the crazy, the simple, the ups and the downs of a single week. Don't make it more complicated than it needs to be.
Next week my focus is ONLY on documenting. I won't be putting the album together at all. I'll be using my camera and writing things down and just letting the week evolve. The actual bringing it all together will happen the following week.
Week In The Life Schedule
Here's what's happening next week:
MONDAY | The week begins with a special Week In The Life giveaway from the 2011 sponsors. The comments on the giveaway will be open through Friday with the winners posted on the following Monday.
TUESDAY THROUH SUNDAY | Each day I'll share my photos and words for the day. At the bottom of each post I'll include a link widget for you to link to your own blog or site sharing your photos and words. Seeing others photos and reading their words are such a great way to get inspired and to think about other things you'd like to include in your own project.
WEEK OF AUGUST 1 | I'll be sharing my completed album.
Free Daily Sheets PDF To Help Document Your Week
As I was thinking about how I want to approach my content I remembered that when I first taught this class back in 2005 I included Daily Sheets for people to use to document pieces of their day. I created a new PDF that's geared towards what I'd like to include in my album and am making it available for you to download here.
The simple idea is to print out this PDF and keep it with you throughout the week for a very easy way to write things down. It's possible that not everything you write on here will make it into your album and it's also possible (and likely for me) that I'll be writing even more stories on the back on these sheets.
My hope is that this will give you a starting place.
The PDF includes 14 pages - 2 for each day of the week. The first page features time by hours (all 24 hours are listed) and the second page includes a spots for food (breakfast, lunch and dinner), observations, gratitude, favorite memory, and overheard.
Download the Week In The Life Daily Sheets here (3.1 MB).
I hope you're getting excited! Charge up those camera batteries -
So excited to do this. I am looking forward to creating this special album. Thanks Ali for sharing everything and inspiring me.
Sign in or sign up to comment.
Thank you for the PDF files. I haven't scrapbooked in awhile, and decided yesterday that I should start again. So I'm happy I found that you are starting your WITL again this year just in time. I think it's the perfect project to get my creative juices flowing again.
Sign in or sign up to comment.
Thank you!
I will start my project on Saturday, because my spouse gets a day off from rehab for the first time in six months. I think this is important for me to document. Also, this is my third time of WITL, I also took part in WE-ITL and December Daily. This time documents our struggles as an incomplete family and the disability issues of my spouse and how the kids and I manage the life nowadays.
Sign in or sign up to comment.
Thanks Ali for the PDF files. These files actually solidified the thought of just journaling the first week and not trying to put the album together the first week but instead get the stories down. It'll be a 'hectic' week anyway with extended family in town, birthday celebrations, kids returning from camp, preparing for homeschool to begin again, life.
Sign in or sign up to comment.
Looking forward to documenting summer this year. Thanks for the PDF files and the inspiration to do this project again.
Sign in or sign up to comment.
Thanks, Ali! This will be handy! :)
Sign in or sign up to comment.
Thanks Ali. I've never done this before, so I'm excited to see how it goes. Love your awesome ideas! Thanks for the PDF files, darla
Sign in or sign up to comment.
Thanks for sharing these daily sheets Ali. I'm actually documenting this week and have already started using them for Wednesday. They work great, especially to catch all the little details of our daily schedule.
Sign in or sign up to comment.
I see there is a digial 8 1/2 x 11 template set for sale, is there a 12x12 or instructions on how to make the 8 1/2 x 11 work for 12x12 album? -thanks
Hi Debra - the 12x12 will be available this weekend (Saturday) at Designer Digitals.
Sign in or sign up to comment.
Thanks Ali... I was tring to figure out how to easily document all the happening for next week. These are perfect! It will help remind me, while I'm taking ALL of those photos, to capture those moments in words too. This is my first year doing a week in the life and I am soooooo excited! Thanks for sharing such a inspirational (and real) project with us. I can't wait!
Sign in or sign up to comment.
What a great idea. I had never thought of this before and think I will try it next week. Thanks for all the tips and help from your website. I love what you doa nd how you share your life and experiences.
Sign in or sign up to comment.
awesome! thanks ali for keeping us organized. this will be really helpful next week :)
Sign in or sign up to comment.
ty
Sign in or sign up to comment.
thanks for the sheets ALi! This will help me actually start and finish this project!
Sign in or sign up to comment.
hi!! I did TWIL in 2008 and I love the idea of changing season and looking back to the changes in my life since then. thanks!!
Sign in or sign up to comment.
I can only echo what has already been said by so many others. Thank you for this tool that will help ensure my first attempt at a Week in Life project will be a success.
Sign in or sign up to comment.
I've never played along before, because I've always thought I'd get "lost" along the way. The PDF files will SERIOUSLY help me out ... thank you very much Ali ~ I'm looking forward to next week already. x
Sign in or sign up to comment.
Thank you for the sheets! What a simple, yet brilliant idea. Last year, I let myself become overwhelmed with trying to remember things. This will help me stay focused - I am going to put them on a hot pink clipboard that I can keep close by all week. Thanks again, KP
Sign in or sign up to comment.
Thank you for sharing these. I can't wait to give this a try.
Sign in or sign up to comment.
Thank you so much, Ali, for the PDF! I wasn't sure if I would do this because I haven't had time to figure out how I would document it all next week. Now I know! :) I will be including these PDF sheets [completed, of course :) ] in my Project Life Album no matter how I choose to document the week in a final form. Thanks so much, Ali! :)
Sign in or sign up to comment.
I started my Week yesterday . . . I didn't want to mix it in with holidays. (I document each day over holidays as well.)
I am keeping a diary in a small notebook and uploading photos each day. I have to! I get too excited to wait!
Thanks Ali for the sheets and other inspiration. I got your Embracing the Everyday brushes at Designer Digitals yesterday on sale! yay!
Sign in or sign up to comment.
thank you so much for the printables, love them!
Sign in or sign up to comment.
Term break over here next week so not our normalkind of week but perhaps it will be a great week to document our relationships even more! Thanks for the downloads and suggestion to dothis Ali.
Sign in or sign up to comment.
Thanks for sharing these sheets - I'll print them off to be ready for next week. I've decided I'm going to make my album digitally. Last year was my first time for WITL and that album was my first (and only) digital album so far.
This is my planned (instagram) format:
http://brendas-bits-and-bytes.blogspot.com/2011/07/upcoming-week-in-life-project.html
using Cathy Zeilske's template:
http://www.designerdigitals.com/digital-scrapbooking/supplies/product_info.php/products_id/12363
that I thought would be totally perfect for a WITL album when I saw it in one of her recent posts.
http://cathyzielske.typepad.com/my_weblog/2011/07/maam-please-put-your-hands-in-the-air-and-step-away-from-the-iphone.html
On a recent holiday I took a ton of photos on my recently-acquired Blackberry and posted blog entries via email to one of my blogs so that our friends and family could follow our 2 week adventure camping in Newfoundland. I loved how fast and easy it was and am so happy to have all those snippets (6 or more posts each day). When I finally have time to put the vacation album together, it should be a breeze since I have all of the details already typed in and will just combine those posts/photos with our better quality DSLR photos. I thought that my some-what instagram approach to capturing our vacation vacation could work equally well to capture our family WITL album this year.
What a great idea! I loved following your links! On vacation I can take over a hundred photos a day! My family is just short of annoyed with me, but I refuse to quit! In my childhood we just didn't take photos, so now I'm over compensating and will not leave my greanchildren without life documented in FULL!
Sign in or sign up to comment.
And I add my thanks to all the previous others! I do digital design, and create my own kits, etc. but this is a project that I'm making personal to the max.
I'm moving from Australia to Canada in a few days... and my birthday is on the 28th July... so lots of things for me to document, record, photograph and MeMorIse!! :) Starting my new Dream Life!
THANKS
Ramona
aka Ramona Memories
WELCOME TO CANADA! the best nation on earth! You just missed the Royal visit from the Duke & Duchess of Cambridge! What brings you here?
Sign in or sign up to comment.