My Life, Hour By Hour

via www.ellapublishing.com

On Tuesday I was checking out the latest articles on Ella Publishing's free eZine. I particularly liked one written by Elizabeth Dillow where she made a scrapbook layout that documented one day in her life by taking one photo every hour on the hour.

Great idea!

I am a total sucker for any strategy that documents daily life using a camera. If I hear of some new way to do it, I just have to try it! And I do as soon as I can.

I've done A Week in the Life (Ali Edwards) twice, I've done a month long project in one of Stacy Julian's classes at BPC, I've taken a photo a day for a month using a prompt from the very first BPC class I took way back in 2007 and I'm on my second year of Project 365 (taking a photo a day for the entire year). Oh, and I've also taken daily photos for Shimelle's Journal Your Christmas.

Do my photos ever make their way into an album? Not usually.

Does that ever stop me from trying out the next idea I hear? Nope.

So, Tuesday night before I climbed into bed, I started to prepare. I set alarms on my Blackberry, my computer and my iTouch to give me a warning at quarter to the hour and on the hour 'Take a Photo', they read.

I woke up at 8:15 AM. My youngest son was was up numerous times during the night and was sick for the third day in a row which meant I didn't have to get up at any special time to take him to school. [My husband gets the other two boys ready in the mornings since they leave the house at the same early hour (7:15).]

8:30 AM

The first thing I did was text Braden's teacher to let her know that he still wouldn't be at school.

 

9:00 AM - Still under the weather but wanting to eat, we moved out to the kitchen for breakfast. As a treat I bought these - just for kids- oatmeal packets. He is choosing which two to mix together.

 

10:00 AM - Checking email with a cup of coffee. Still haven't left the kitchen since breakfast.

 

11:00 AM - Heading for the game table/work table to do a layout.

#1

 

#2 Taking some fever reducer at 11:00 AM

 

12:00 PM - We went downstairs to our little import store on the campus of our apartment complex. Had to get food for dinner. Click here to see my menu plan for the week. [Braden was trying to lift the very heavy basket that I had left there because it was too heavy for me to carry around while shopping. The two women in the background are mincing my meat and I have no idea how it could have taken them so darned long. We were waiting a good ten minutes. Luckily, I had other shopping to do while I passed the time.]

 

BONUS PHOTO: I had to include this one. We were riding up together in the elevator and I made some comment about how I hoped the elevator would arrive soon before I dropped my heavy load. My little boy said, "Why don't you give ME some of that stuff to carry?"

1:00 PM - Braden has a snack while Mom puts away the groceries. What I bought: minced beef, C&H light brown sugar (they only had two bags left on the shelf so I bought one because once they are out you never know how long it can be until they get more in - sometimes months), Kettle tortilla chips were on the clearance rack (chips are so expensive I rarely buy and at home we only buy tortilla chips to go with salsa) - Dad made some tasty homemade salsa since no place to buy fresh salsa in Beijing, potatoes, onion, Italian whole wheat saltines, apple juice (Braden requested since he wanted to try the new juice on the shelf - how does one say no to a sick little boy), Taiko brown sugar (from Japan - this is some intense brown sugar, so heavy with molasses, so I plan to mix with the other light brown sugar - my preference is dark brown sugar which they haven't had at our store in a very long time), oranges, apples, Wonder Milk yogurt (strawberry & plain)

#2 - right after I took the first pic, the phone rang - it was my husband (in a way I am documenting two peoples' days, so I gave myself permission to take two pics some hours)

2:00 PM - Taking the opportunity to make a scrapbook page while I am stuck inside (3rd day in a row) with a sick little boy.

3:00 PM - Working on a hybrid element for my page (I'm on the floor because I am too lazy to put my computer back on the desk to plug in the printer, so I sat right down next to it.) while Braden gets some coputer time.

 

4:00 PM - Getting out stuff to make dinner while going back and forth between the kitchen and the game table working on my page.

5:00 PM - My oldest two boys arrive home and head straight for the kitchen for something to eat.

#1

#2 Making an afterschool snack. (Because I am a second born child, I have to include two photos so as not to exclude any one!)

 

6:00 PM - Dinner comes out of the oven. It's ready for when the older boys come home from swimming lessons. Their lesson are just downstairs in the apartment pool. On the menu tonight - Diner Meatloaf Muffins (first time I've ever made meatloaf for the family) and mashed potatoes. Thumbs up from two, thumbs down from two. Everyone loved the mashed potatoes.

 

7:00 PM

Another bonus photo - I took a peek out the window waiting for the older boys to walk home from their swimming lessons that end at 7:00 PM.

 

Photo #2 - Checking in with the progress at the game table - the page is almost done. Just need to paint the stars, figure out how to fasten them down and write the journaling.

The real photos:

Taking Braden's temperature - 99.1 degrees F

 

His recently re-discovered light saber kept him company on the couch all day.

8:00 PM - Bedtime story - tonight was my turn to pick: Frederick by Leo Lionni

#2 Reece is finishing up his homework at the kitchen table. He usually likes to work at his desk, but Nicholas is already in bed with the light off. (With the warmer temps and before the government allows the air conditioners to be turned on, it gets a little stuffy in our apartment in the evenings, so my kids are always taking off their shirts!)

 

PHOTO REMOVED

 

9:00 PM - Downloading my photos since my memory card is full!

10:00 PM - My husband did a little work while he was waiting for me to relax on the couch and watch a little TV before bed. (I took a pic with me too, but the angle was so awful we both looked distorted).

 

THE LAYOUT

Originally I had no intention of putting these photos into a layout right away, however, while in the middle of writing this post and uploading photos throughout the day (very slow internet connection in China), I was catching up with fellow students' blogs from Blogging for Scrapbookers and I discovered that another student from our class had a layout featured in the Hour By Hour article at Ella! I didn't know that when I reblogged the article. In fact, I didn't discover that until just before I was about to publish this post. 

It turns out my fellow student, Kim Byrns, did a digital layout for the page call. And she is generously offering that template as a free download on her blog.

After all the complaining I did at the beginning of this post about never using my photos after taking them, and then having this template practically handed to me, it was obvious what I needed to do!

THANKS, KIM! Now my photos are already in a layout! Project done!

 

 

COMING UP ON THE BLOG

ALPHANUMERIC Blog Hop

*Sunday, April 17 - Alphanumeric Blog Hop for fun! This one is hosted by blog friend, Mel from her blog, I Speak Melsh. Stay tuned for more details. This one sounds very, very interesting...

ONE LITTLE WORD Blog Hop

*May 1 - OLW Monthly Blog Hop (One on 1) - I host this blog hop every month on the 1st. It is a blog hop for students of Ali Edwards' One Little Word class at Big Picure Classes. You can still sign up for the class as well as the blog hop (if you are a student). For the class, go to BigPictureClasses.com and for the blog hop, go to the OLW classroom message boards and there is information on how to sign-up in the Chit Chat section.

FAMILY x 12 Mini Blog Hop

* May 5 I will have a mini blog-hop to showcase my monthly personal project FAMILY x 12. If you are taking a monthly family photo (or would like to start) and would like to join us for a little support, motivation and light accountability, leave me a comment or send me an email and I'll be in touch with the details. (A family photo can be whatever you define as family, even if that is just you and your spouse/partner or you and your cat [dogs count too]!)

 

Comments

[Kim]

Wow, this is fantastic! You're very welcome! I'm delighted to see another layout using my template. :) Yours looks great with the blue patterned paper. I had mine printed a couple of days ago as two 8x8" pages and was very pleased with it. The 14 pt journaling is plenty large enough for scaling down to that size.

Thanks so much for posting this. You made my day!

[Nihao, Cupcake! by Margie]

Thanks for coming by to see it. Its a great template. Im sure Ill be using it again. I liked your idea of a month wrap up. Now, to get it printed...

[Claudia McDaniel]

Great job on this!! I wanted to try to do the challenge when it was issued but knew I'd never pull it off. You did awesome!! And I really like the layout at the end. It's so clean but really lets you in on a day in your life. Lots of great stuff here!

[Nihao, Cupcake! by Margie]

Thanks, Claudia! I cant take much credit. Its Kim Byrns great template. Thanks for stopping by and leaving me a comment.