Documenting the school years, where to begin

I always knew I would do some sort of scrapbook for my daughter when she started school.  Its a thought that has been in the back of my mind as I sorted thru the many pieces of artwork she has brought home since she started her first mommy and me class when she was seventeen months old.

The how and when and what is still up in the air but as I sat down the other day and sorted thru the pile of papers I had set aside from her 2nd trimester of Kindergarten it struck me how close she is to finishing the school year.  She only has a few months left and I haven't even come close to starting her album.

My approach to saving things so far is to save things that show milestones, things that show progress and things that I think are just cute.  Clearly I need a better and more vicious editing approach because this isn't even the full year and its enough for one full album.  I'm thinking once the year is complete I can lay it all out and do a better job of editing down.  I will certainly be scanning or photographing all the art I have saved to make a collage or something with it all.

I took a quick look around on Pinterest for some inspiration and there is a lot of if out there.  I particularly loved this album using a Studio Calico Handbook and I really loved the page sketches she shared. And come on how cute is that die cut title page!

source Lisa Moorefield

I also hit the Studio Calico Gallery for some inspiration and saved these projects to my Inspiration Book.  Here are some things that jumped out at me for inspiration.

I loved this album idea from Allison Waken, I definitely take plenty of fashion shots of Simone so incorporating that topic into her album will be a must.

source Allison Waken

I love Nicole Reaves' Project Life® approach to her daughters album and I definitely think that a blend of pocket pages and layouts will be part of my daughters album.

source Nicole Reaves

I love the small scale of this flip album focusing on just one year. Plus I totally love the color palette.

source agomalley

This is a perfect example of what I hope to do with the artwork, I love the smaller scale in the pocket pages. It has such a great impact.

 source Laura Kurz

So that's about where I'm at with the planning phase.  Much to do on the actual production phase but seeing as I have enough Project Life® page protectors on hand I should have enough supplies once I get started. I'll be sure to share when I start which will hopefully be very soon!