How do you roundup a month like January 2021?
I think this was the most difficult roundup I’ve ever done. Life has been hard to document over the last year, but this was a particularly scary month in the United States. I couldn’t exactly leave political events off of my recap and I wouldn’t want to do that. I also needed to be sure they were recorded in a way that will be suitable for all viewers of my album. I plan to do more journaling of the events that took place, but won’t be sharing those publicly.
I hope that by sharing my approach, it will make it easier for you to decide how you want to do your own documenting.
Here are the “ingredients” of my page:
Paper designed by me (will be released in a future collection)
Persnickety Prints free timeline - It’s actually grouped in with the 2020 downloads so look there
Graphic from New York Times
Time Magazine cover
This Month card (slightly recolored)
Design decisions:
I decided to go with the black & white (and yellow) version of the timeline. I loved using the colorful ones last year, but felt ready for a change.
I thought a black background would be a good way to have the colors of the other images stand out.
I picked a bright blue for the numbers card because I’m going to include some photos on the opposing page that have bright blues and yellows in them.
With all the information and bright colors, I decided to keep everything else very simple.
Keeping track of what happened:
Can you believe that I decided to start keeping a daily news journal at the beginning of the year? That was a fortuitous decision on my part! It ended up being more work than I intended because of the sheer amount of news that happened in the first few weeks, but I’m so glad I have that information. Now it’s become a small daily habit for me that doesn’t take much time.
We barely did anything and hardly went anywhere so I didn’t have much to look through on my calendar.
Unfortunately, I only took a handful of photos this month. I took a lot of other photos of things I needed to do or buy to use as reminders. I am going to do much better in February!
What are your tricks for roundups?
Do you have any tips or tricks that help you document each month? Do you keep any daily or weekly records? What helps you remember to include events in your roundup?
Is there anything you would like to see me include that would be helpful to you?
Do you have any questions for me?
Feel free to leave a comment or use the contact form to send me an email. Thanks in advance!
