Living in Europe has given us the opportunity to do lots of travel in the off-season, which means it’s less expensive, less crowded, and less blazing hot.

We recently spent a four-day winter weekend in Rome, which meant lots to see in a short period of time, but I wanted to document it all in a single pocket page layout.

I’ve gotten used to this minimal way of documenting – just a few pictures mixed with journaling. For this particular weekend, I decided to select a few photos and include one journaling card with written details for each day.

Here’s the full layout:

And a close-up of the left side:

And the right side:

I’m using the back of this layout, so I had the Design F pocket page on the left (a fave). I wanted to include a title photo with the city, month, and year, so I created that in Photoshop for the one 4×6 pocket and filled in the other pockets with 3×4 photos and journaling cards.

This was a trip heavy on sightseeing for us, so I wanted to document everything we saw. But I wanted to make sure the photos were of our family, as opposed to just these famous landmarks.

I chose a couple photos from each day and used the journaling to fill in the gaps with written details.

3×4 patterned cards provide a background for bits of paper ephemera like ticket stubs and receipts. The cards in this layout came from the Project Life Everyday Edition.

Liz’s photo templates are perfect when you want to include more than one photo in a pocket. They also add some white space to the layout and let the photos breathe a bit.

I always try to include at least one photo of all four of us. Most of the rest are of the boys, but in this layout I made sure to include a couple of us grown-ups. These are our memories, too, after all!

This formula seems to really help us remember these incredible experiences: a few photos mixed with written memories and bits of memorabilia.

Plus, it keeps things simple, which keeps me documenting.

My memory-keeping projects always begin with the photos – capturing the moments, choosing the right ones to tell the story, and editing them (these days on my phone).

I’m creating a mini-workshop sharing my best tips for capturing and editing photos on your phone which will be free for my newsletter subscribers. You can sign up here and you’ll get access to it first!

I’d love to hear how you’re documenting your adventures! Any tips for keeping things simple?

xo, Catherine

Products used: photo templates vol. 6, 3×4 photo templates, pictures + words no. 18, woodgrain journaling cards, Project Life Everyday Edition core kit.