Before the car had even left the driveway for our multi-state camping trip back in the 1980’s, I was the kid in the back seat eagerly scribbling the states in alphabetical order on a piece of looseleaf paper attached to a clipboard!! I’d add in the capitals and then my eyes were peeled to cross those states off my list. I love lists. LOVE them. Once I would get through the states I would see if I could find all colors of cars and then billboards for KOA campgrounds or basically anything. As I got older, I would get the whole car involved with my scavenger hunt lists that would include all kinds of things to look for – a motorcycle with 2 people, a pink billboard, an RV with a car attached, a car with 4 bikes, a sign with a “z”, a train, etc.
This year I’m getting back to basics with my boys and we are heading down List Crazy Lane!! We are making an album for our summer adventure story, which will include a traditional scavenger hunt list for our car trips and other lists that are specific to spots we are visiting. But I’m going to add something different this time. I’m going to include dedicated spots where we can do some quick journaling about a great book we read or a hike we took or a special place we found.
I knew I wanted to get most of the legwork done before the kids were out of school. I know what usually happens with summer albums and me…. I want to do them, but never have enough time to “organize” it. Summer doesn’t officially start here until June 20th, so I am determined not to repeat past mistakes and I’m getting it all organized and will have it ready to hit the road with us.
The first thing I decided was format and I went with a standard letter-sized (8.5×11 inches). Many reasons for that….my boys write big, its easier to find supplies, you can quickly add any normal letter-sized sheet like an email….all you have to do is bring a portable 3-ring hold punch and you are scrapping on the road!!
Next I chose the kit I would use for my pages. This was easy. I am going to use Laura Passage and Amanda Yi’s Summer Bucket list Printable Planner. There are some great templates and printables to plan your month, make lists and then awesome papers, elements and stamps included in their Summer Bucket List Add-on: Travel Collection to put your album together. The other thing I loved was a mobile font and stamp set by Laura Passage, Summer on the Go, that I could use to add to my photos so it would be easy at the end of the summer to print my photos and add them in….already scrapped!!
So now for our Summer Adventure Story…..
I’m including our bucket list as the very first page insert. We are all coming up with this list together and our plan is to have it all filled in by the last day of school in two weeks. No changes allowed to the final list!! The section following the list will be the “proof “ that we completed the items with either a scrapped/journaled layout, a photo collage or maybe even just an email of the item/event.
NOTE: I’m using one of these fantastically durable binders from Mead. Yeah, I know they aren’t the hybrid sexy, BUT they are durable. This binder is going to camps in three different states and will be living in a car for over 2500 miles heading up and back to Nova Scotia. I don’t want to be worried about throwing it in the backseat of the car. This is real life and real life scrapbooking and I’m more interested in telling our story than how it looks on the outside. NOW….come September I will tidy it all up and add photos and layouts…THEN will be the time to find a pretty little home to shelter our summer adventure stories.
Right after the bucket list, I’m going to include five pocket pages with some of the everyday activities we are planning to do throughout the summer. This is the stuff that isn’t on our bucket list, but we still want to “talk” about: books we are reading, biking and hiking and s’mores (good thing we will be biking and hiking!!). Also included one pocket page for just random places that we find and LOVE. The boys can journal a quick card or we will include a photo later or get a business card.
My next section is going to house our Summer Road Trip to Nova Scotia. It will include our scavenger hunt lists and maps of our trips and all that good stuff that comes with a road trip. I’m making various scavenger hunt lists including the drive up to Nova Scotia (shown below), sights and sounds of the small towns we will visit and one just related to presidents (with a stop in Boston, I hope we can get those founding fathers checked off!!).
The last three sections of our album includes a calendar for June, July And August that I will be filling in by hand throughout the month. The bottom section of the page will include a favorite thing that happened that day, current event, or weather forecast…something one line quick.
For each month, I’ve included different inserts depending on what is happening that month. For July, I added in page for my boys to journal about their Boy Scout camp that they will be attending together.
I also included a 6×8 pocket page for my older son’s orchestra camp. He will then add copies of his music to the binder. I did another pocket page for younger son’s week with the grandparents. My idea is that I can then add photo collages or maybe a layout about a particularly spectacularly event (like the final concert at orchestra camp).
Another reason I love this binder is these pockets. In them I can include receipts, business cards or whatever. One pocket will include various 3×4 journal cards (these yummy ones are called Pocket Essentials created by Scotty Girl) for us to grab and use whenever we find something we want to remember.
Thank you for sticking with me through this all…I think you can tell I’m excited!!
We are ready to document our adventure story!! I’ll be back in the Fall to show you how it went!!!
Stay tuned……
About the Author: JennV is a stay-at-home Mom, part-time photographer and SO READY for her kids to be out of school. 10 days left. She’s excited to have them home, but sad for her fantastic progress in keeping current with Project Life….as computer time will be precious for the rest of summer!!