Community Spotlight: Simply Project Life

Let's welcome Jenna to the blog today to share more about hew scrapbooking journey, and the awesome Simply Project Life group.

-Melissa

Hello there! I'm Jenna Fortner and I live in Fort Worth, Texas with my husband. We have two young adult children making us proud every day as they make their way in the world! I'm a traditional paper scrapper, turned digital scrapper, turned app scrapper and my motto is "create without comparison"!

Everyone I know in person or online knows I just love the Project Life App. This came about because our family went on a road trip in 2014 and I tried to keep up with our days on paper while traveling. I knew I would make digital pages when I got home and wanted to be able to journal it well. I scrapped that trip with PSE and loved it. But, we were planning on another road trip the next year and I was searching online for ways to scrapbook on the go. While searching, I came across a blog post (spoiler alert- one here!) about the Project Life App. I downloaded it immediately and never looked back.

For a while now I've been trying to find the blog post I originally came across again just so I could say thanks. I could still see the post in my mind but I couldn't ever find it. I recently did another search in hopes to find it and thank the person and I finally landed back on your blog. I just had to tell you this, so thank you for your review of the app when it was released in the fall of 2014.

The thought of being able to scrapbook a vacation while still on it was a dream come true for me personally. I could just imagine journaling a little bit about the day on a Project Life App page while it was still fresh on our minds and then also having the ability to to tweak it later when needed! it was truly a game changer in regards to my scrapbooking. Truth be told that second road trip never materialized, but I've used the Project Life App to scrapbook many others and our everyday life as well. It's my go-to method!

After realizing I was completely in with the Project Life App, I looked around for groups on Facebook and came across one called App Scrappers Project Life and Beyond (now called App Scrappers Over and Above Project Life). I joined and became pretty active there. So much so that in 2017 when the original creators of that group decided to split off another group about only the Project Life App, they asked me and Teresa Carlucci to admin it. We said yes and they left it in our hands. I appreciate that they saw the need since that first group was about all apps and could be overwhelming to anyone new. We have also added Meagan Johnson and Ashley Urie to our team because I am thrilled to say it's become a pretty active and healthy group. The members there are super nice and share all sorts of pages for inspiration and a lot of general tips to help us make the most of the Project Life App.

We do not share about any other types of scrapbooking, only app scrapping with the Project Life App. We add our photos and some cards (the ones in the app as well as cards from other online stores) to the pages, journal and edit our photos within the Project Life App's capabilities, and leave it at that. Simply is in the name of our group for a reason. A lot of us tend to overcomplicate scrapbooking thinking we have to have everything in order first, but that's not true. Just start where you are and we can help you with the rest. We want to see people make meaningful progress with their memory keeping. Using this app makes that happen! But, on the flip side, some really know how to make use of the Add Your Own Fonts and the Freeform Text upgrades to do some beautiful embellishing. The creativity astounds me! This group is the only reason I'm still on Facebook at all!

Last year during the pandemic I started hosting Zoom Crops and those have been a blast! There's more information in the Announcements of the group about those times and dates. In the Announcements section of the group there are a lot of FAQs and tutorials. We've compiled a bunch of tips and tricks there! It can be overwhelming but it is the go to place for any questions.

Page Within A Page

One of the group's most popular tricks is to create a "page within a page". There are a couple of ways we go about this- simply add an incomplete page back into the pocket of a page then align the borders for a new pocket look or leave some white space for journaling. Here are is an example of both ideas. You can see how one is basic and one was taken to a new level!

1) Page within a Page: Template Smash Up
2) Page within a Page

How to Join the Simply Project Life Group

Join the group here for more, we'd love to have you!
Simply Project Life- App Scrappers Group
Simply Project Life on Instagram

Connect with Jenna

Facebook - Instagram - Etsy - YouTube - TikTok

Thanks for having me on the blog, it was great to share about our group and the Project Life App!

Jenna Fortner (aka Jenna Scraps)