This year I elected to not participate in Project 365 or Project Life. I have managed to fill my time with other things, but every once in a while I wonder if I made the right choice. After all, two or three years of the same patterns and behaviour makes it pretty hard to quit and start something new.
I found participating in Project 365 the last couple of years to be overwhelming. Not so much the photography part, I'm still taking at least one or two - if not 20 or 30 - photos every day, it was the uploading in simple upload or blog form that took it's toll.
As much as I admire Project Life, and I especially enjoy the many adjustments participants have made to adjust the burden of the "daily" aspect, I took a good look at my life and realized even with four active kids and so much going on every day, there were too many slots to fill - too much opportunity for blank space! I am not much of a consumer, I do not shop much nor do I care about or collect labels, tags or much ephemera. I spend a lot of time tossing this stuff out of my house, I cannot imagine putting it in a place of honour in a photo album.
(To be honest, for the longest time I didn't understand the difference between the two projects. I get it now.)
I used to get very frustrated with the whole counting. I know, it sounds so simple, but it was frustrating when I'd be posting my July - August - September photos and realized that at some point I had miscounted. Argh. I know a little bit of preparation would have gone a long way and I'm sure it would have taken less time to have manually found a calendar and counted out the days, but I didn't. I tried to find what I was looking for on-line. After all, how hard could it be? Hard.
So the other day, while venturing from one blog to another to another, clicking on links I FOUND IT!! I figured just because I'm not participating in the project doesn't mean YOU aren't so here's the link: Basic Calendar Creator. Now this is the important part:
See the bottom box? Show day number of the year. CLICK IT and voila!
I wonder if I can start again? Or go back and figure where I messed up the last two years?! Time wasted? Worth it?
We'll never know. But I'm happy if I can send someone else, equally as frustrated as I was, in the right direction. I hope it helps and makes life easier for someone else who can't count - I can't be the only one, can I? :)