Project Life - Baby Album

Project Life - Baby Album

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Today's post is a share of my son's first year baby album which I am currently working on. He is 6 months now- I can't believe it, but knowing how fast time flies when you have children and how fast they grow up; I have put a lot of planning and effort into documenting Wren's first year and all those special little moments. 
Laec has an album too, but he was my first baby and I was new to scrapbooking so I feel like I left a lot of things out. Don't get me wrong, I'm still glad I kept the pieces I did of his first year and I love to look through it, but for Wren's album I feel like I was able to improve my layout ALOT and I am really happy with how it's coming along.

For my baby albums, I absolutely love using the Project Life scrapbooking system. If you're new to it, it's basically a pocket page album, which means it can be as easy as slipping photographs into pre-made, perfectly fitted pockets to make up your pages. The reason I love these so much is because I take a lot of photos of my kids, and it is a really easy and manageable way to keep on top of photo heavy layouts. 
So, lets get into it!

The first part of his album is all about the pregnancy. I made sure to include ultrasound information with photos, bump photos, our thoughts and feelings about the pregnancy and names we liked. I recorded my cravings and symptoms and photos of the nursery, things we had collected for him, choosing his name, as well as details of our baby shower and various DIY projects that we did for him. 

I also included a family tree page and a spread which sort of introduced him to the family that he was about to be born into! I thought that was a lot of fun, and will sort of enable him to see life before and after he was here, which he may find interesting one day.

I made sure to document any complications during the pregnancy and any interesting details from our appointments.

The next section is for when he was born! One of my favourite parts. The first spread is all about the birth, I included the photo of the first time I got to hold him, his foot prints and birth facts. I also included an envelope full of ephemera from the hospital. Inside I kept my obstetric card, paper tape measure, congratulation cards, his birth announcement and even the hospital lunch menu as well as the information booklet we received when we booked in.

I wrote out my birth story when it was fresh in my mind, perhaps a day or two after he was born and I later typed it out to keep in the album. It is so easy to forget the small details as time goes on! And when I read through it now I can remember it like it were yesterday!!

 

For the next few layouts I have included some details from the first few days/weeks at home and lots of photos too! I wanted to make sure I thoroughly documented him when he was fresh and new because I knew it would pass by so quickly. I included some of his 'firsts' like first birth and first shopping trip and I have done a few full page spreads with family photo shoots and photos of meeting other members of our family for the first time.

The rest of the album is probably my favourite part! It is easy for me to keep up with and I really look forward to doing the layout each month. I find it so fun and relaxing but also, it helps me to really absorb all those fleeting moments I have had with my kids during that month.
For each month I decided to include on a double page spread- my most favourite photographs from the month, a photo of him in the same spot, next to the same teddy to show his growth and a calendar page to show a bit of what we got up to that month. This is an easy addition for me because my son was born on the 29th!

 I also decided to keep my milestone cards in the same position each month so it looks consistent and makes the spread quick and easy for me to do. I do one 4x6 card for a paragraph overview of what's gone on that month and another 4x6 card with bullet points of milestones he reached during that month.

I am only up to month 6, which I will be working on as soon as my photos arrive!

At the back of the album I am slowly adding 3x4 photos of his monthly growth photos onto a one page spread, this will show us clearly how much he changed and grew over the course of the year. And I will probably add a spread of his first birthday along with a letter for him when he turns 1. 

So that's my baby album so far! I am excited to see it when it's finished. But It's really chunky already, (Becky Higgins if you're reading this- please design albums with even bigger rings!) I am a simple project lifer with limited embellishments but I am STILL struggling to keep this into one album! 

If you want to see my album more in depth, I have filmed a flip through/walk through of it on my youtube channel here: https://youtu.be/1e8k0pTtsLc