month 03 goal 06

Brainstorm ideas for baby2's first year album.

Check.

I spent some time this last week trying to come up with something different for baby2's first year scrapbook. Something different than Morgan's. Truth is, I really love Morgan's album. What I didn't love was how long it took me to complete it - seven months after she turned one. With 2 kids, I don't anticipate a lot of time to scrapbook in the next year, so, while baby2's album will have a lot of the same content as Morgan's, I think it will be a little simpler to put together.

My first step was to list all of the things I wanted to include in his album, especially from his first days. A sort of Table of Contents:

• story of the day - labor + delivery / Cesarean section, how it all went down...
• his first photos after delivery
• copies of our hospital bills
• our first photos as a family of four
• photos with our hospital visitors
• newborn identification sheet (his footprints, stats...)
• our hospital ephemera (bassinet tags, hospital id bracelets...)
• photos and journaling about the day we went home
• family tree
• 'baby's world' printout to fill out by hand. Includes info like who the President is, popular movies and television shows, famous celebrities and atheletes, the cost of a gallon of gas, postage stamp, car, house...
• 'baby's firsts' printout to fill out his firsts when they happen: smile, laugh, haircut, rolled over, crawled, walked, said 'mama' and 'dada'...
• copy of his birth announcement
• photos of his nursery

Much of this stuff I'll just slip into a standard page protector but the actual scrapbook layouts will be 12" x 12". Because of the mix in sizes, I made a storyboard for each spread, just to make sure I had the right layout on the right size paper and vice versa. I wanted all of my fronts and backs to be covered.I put my page protectors in order and even went so far as to print inserts for each one labeling what I planned to go inside. Can you tell I'm trying to make this the easiest album ever?

Beyond that, my plan is to do a 2-page spread for his first day, first week and then each month - one thru twelve - ending with his first birthday party. The first/left page will be just one photo and mostly journaling about the highlights of that month. The second/right page will be a multi-photo collage. For the most part, I'm going to digital/hybrid scrapbook these layouts. Especially the photo collages. I found some perfect (and free) layered templates on OScraps. I've already downloaded this one and about a half dozen others from Paislee Press, and I also really like the simplicity and options of this Ali Edwards template.On Friday, I spent some of my gift card from the Scrapbook Zone garage sale and bought a 12x12 American Crafts album (Just like Morgan's album. I have a hard time buying anything but these albums lately) and lots of patterned paper. I can't make this album completely digital - I still love to play with paper! Between what I already have at home and what came with the album, I have enough page protectors for the whole year plus all of the extra stuff too.

I'm so proud (patting self on back). I more than brainstormed baby2's first year album, I set it all up. It's now sitting on my bookshelf, ready to be filled. But not just yet...10 weeks and counting.