Hello everyone! It is Andrea here today and I want to share with you a fabulous mini-album/planner that I made using the Domestic Bliss collection from Simple Stories. I am loving this collection and this project because it really helped me to both get organized and also to stay motivated with all the things that I have to do around the house. It is also a great way to document a huge portion of my life.

I spend most of my life at home. By far! As a disabled person, and with the specific condition that I have, I am constantly stuck inside and in bed. I have limited mobility and am constantly in pain, so it is hard a lot of the time to try and get out of the house. However, despite this, I notice that the majority of my photos are from when I do get out of the house and am dressed up and somewhere fun or special, celebrating something, or going somewhere cool. These days that I often photograph though do not represent most of my life.

And while I do document days at home every so often in things like “week in the life” albums and other “daily” sort of projects, it occurred to me that I don't really have a mini-album that only talks about days at home like this and really focuses on life at home, in bed, doing my daily “work from home” work as well as average around the house things like cleaning, organizing, etc. And this is strange, because this is most of my life. It was nice to rectify this situation by finally making an album that documents this kind of thing. And Domestic Bliss is made to document the “home life” so it makes sense to use it for this.

I really like that this album serves both as a piece of documentation and memory keeping that is a scrapbook mini...but also a planner that can help me stay organized...AND also something to help me stay motivated and inspired! That is the beauty of this collection. I like how Simple Stories scrapbook stuff and Carpe Diem planner stuff in collections like Domestic Bliss, can be used together to make a project like this.

It has been hard to be motivated and inspired lately since this month has consisted mostly of me being stuck inside and in bed and in pain. This kind of thing happens sometimes. And on the really bad days, when I can't even sit up at my “bed desk” and do my work in bed (scrapping, planning, writing, designing, etc), I start to feel quite down on myself. I feel like I am not doing good. I feel like I am falling behind and that I am going slower. And I notice things piling up...especially things like laundry and cleaning up. And so I start to get frustrated and feel disappointed in myself. Even though I know I shouldn't and that I cannot control everything.

I think that I am not the only person that does this. I think a lot of us get down on ourselves, whether or not we have health conditions, with everything on our plates and the high standards to which we hold ourselves. Particularly women. And particularly creative women who do things like scrapbooking and planning. Perhaps this is because we are constantly documenting our lives and in that documentation, we compare what we do to what everyone else is doing and also to the perfect picture of how our lives should be in our mind.

My life is beautiful and I love it and I love the work that I do, but for whatever reason, some days I feel down on what I am not able to do, instead of focusing on all that I do actually do. I like this project because the pics and decorative elements in it all serve to remind me of all the great stuff on those bad days and in the moments when I need a reminder.

I don't want to make myself feel bad about not doing enough or being good enough. I want to not feel this way and I shouldn't because the truth is I do a whole lot! Even if I was a healthy person, I would still be considered to be doing a whole lot by most people's standards. So, frankly, I should be proud that I do so much particularly when I do it despite having a disability. And I do feel proud some days, but I should feel that way everyday.

I should be proud of all I do and how hard I work. I made this album in large part to remind myself that in addition to having to do so many things, I am doing them. I am working on so much and accomplishing so much. And just because things might take me longer than I would really like, this doesn't diminish my accomplishments.

I made this project so that I could plan and document the days at home, doing my “work from home” work and also things like chores and other things to do around the house...but also so that I could have little notes of inspiration in there that would remind me that I am doing great.

This album is filled with inspirational notes that remind me to keep believing and dreaming and that I can do anything! I love this project! And I think it is a great idea for all of us to make something like this so that we can all be reminded of how much we actually do and to be proud of it and to keep moving towards our goals, big and small!

I hope you are inspired by this mini-album/planner hybrid project! And I hope that you are inspired to grab your Sn@p pocket pages, pocket cards, album, some stickers and other embellies, and a Carpe Diem planner set in the Domestic Bliss collection, and create something similar! It is important to document our home and work lives. But more importantly, I think we all need to be reminded sometimes that we are capable and amazing human beings who try our best and there is really nothing more impressive than that!