Week In The Life™ 2021 | Special Guest Jennie Rey

Hi everyone, Jennie here! Week in the Life is right around the corner and it is one of my most favorite projects! This year will be my 12th time participating and all of my previous albums are finished, so happy with that! Even though I have a lot of finished albums I do not do a lot of planning before the week starts. I do tell the people around me Week in the Life is coming (so they know what is happening when I am all over place taking pictures!) and I print Ali’s daily sheets (find them here). During the documentation week I just focus on taking pictures and I make sure I write something down every night (during the day I often use the Notes app on my phone to write down some little things I do not want to forget). 

Usually that is all I have when I am bringing it all together but this year I am more prepared than ever! After receiving the Week in the Life products I just couldn’t wait to dive in and try out a few things using photos from last year. And with that I decided on a ‘design formula’ I will use for every day. 

I will start each day with one of the transparencies with a 6x8 photo behind it. On the photo I will have a little cluster of the plastic and chipboard diamonds that were in Ali’s Mini Kit. I might start the week with another transparency and/or a 6x8 photo and I really like the idea of cutting that photo into the shape of a half circle!

On the back of the 6x8 photo I will have my journaling. My plan is to divide my journaling into paragraphs (7 or 8 per day) and stamp a time on top. I often includes times in my journaling for Week in the Life but I am not too precise about it. For example I can tell a little story about our morning routines and stamp the time we got out of bed on top of it, even though the story is about a few hours. 

I really liked those plastic half circles that were offered this year and decided to combine those with the awesome designs from this year’s layered template set. I recolored the days of the week in Photoshop to the same color as the plastic half circles, cropped them to 3x6 inch and stitched them together using my sewing machine (you could also add some sequins between the layers!). 

On top of the half circle I will add one of the die cut circles with the date stamped onto it (I saw Morgan Beal do this repeated stamping and isn’t it the best idea?! – oh and I know I have stamped a 2020 date on this one, my date stamp didn’t have 2021 on it!) and I will tie some twine to it.

I will attach the half circle to the journaling page using a strip of washi tape so it will be a flip-up and on the back I will put a photo of what we are having for dinner that day (well that is the plan… but I tend to forget plans like this halfway through the week so I might have to add something else…). 

I also plan to include large photos cut into a half circle shape. I will glue them back-to back and they will go outside of the page protectors. On top of it I will add another die cut circle with some twine tied to it. 

To continue with the circle theme I decided to fill a 2x2 page protector each day with the quarter-circle die cuts and photos and ‘stuff of life’ cut into quarter-circles. If I haven’t got enough pieces to fill front and back of the page protector I can cut it down to just half of it (and maybe combine it with a 4x6 pocket) or to two columns by cutting one off. I will use the digital kit to create a few more of those quarter-circle die cuts (for example with the designs of the other pieces in the kit) and each day I will add the fabric circle with the day on it.  

I definitely want to use this year’s layered templates so I printed them out on regular printer paper so I will remember to use them. I especially love this one with the speech bubbles: I plan to make notes on this draft one of some things that are said around here! I might not use all of the layered templates but I will use a few (maybe some doubles) and on a day I will not use one of the templates I will just replace it with a 6x8 photo. 

I also plan to use the ‘looked like this’ cards. This year there will be six people in the house during Week in the Life so I will ask them to each fill out one of the cards and, just for fun, I might fill out one for our cat!  

I love love love this project: some of my most treasured photos were taken during Week in the Life. Remember to just have fun! There is no right or wrong and an album with just 5 days in it or with just one photo a day is still a treasure! You can do it!

We are so thankful to have Jennie with us today! For more inspiration from Jennie, you can find her on Instagram

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4 thoughts

  1. AliEdwards says…
    05/06/2021

    This is so cool!!!!

    Reply 0 Replies
  2. achaffin39 says…
    05/06/2021

    Thanks for sharing, Jennie! I love these ideas, and I really appreciate having some direction at the beginning of the week.

    Reply 0 Replies
  3. Nolana says…
    05/06/2021

    Hi Jennie! Really love your ideas as always! I love what you did with changing the colour of the half circles! Did this take a long time to do in Photoshop? Now I want to change all the colours lol

    Reply 0 Replies
  4. michelezh says…
    05/06/2021

    Your stitching on the half circles is so, so good! love the idea of pairing it with the layered templates:)

    Reply 0 Replies