My favorite tool for creating simple and stylish pocket page layouts is a photo template kit. I generally use more than one in a given layout, but lately I find I’m using one or two digital kits to incorporate great design while keeping things simple.

When Liz posted her recent digital releases – summer vibes and scenic route – I knew I wanted to use them in a pocket page layout. A summer road trip to France with a friend and our kids provided the perfect opportunity.

Photo templates from kits like these add so much to a layout: design elements, clean lines, white space, and just a little bit of journaling. And these two kits really blended well to help me quickly and easily assemble and cohesive layout that helped tell the story of a fun summer vacation.

Here’s the full layout:

I started putting it together by scrolling through my photos and moving the ones I wanted to edit into my “favorites” folder. I then edited all the photos on my phone using A Color Story app.

From there, I could play around with the photo templates on my computer.

Sticking with two template kits kept things moving along quickly. I love the bits of graphic text, handwriting, and minimal design elements. And I’m always a fan of incorporating a good amount of white space amongst all the photos.

I also knew I wanted to include a couple of collages. I’d taken a ton of photos in a series of the boys and I really loved how they turned out, so I edited six of those pics and put them in a template.

And for our day on the French Riviera, I selected four photos and placed them in a simple grid using this set of 4×6 photo templates.

Once I’d printed the photos, I added a couple of journaling cards to fill in the gaps and include some of the details of our trip and itinerary.

I’ve found that keeping things simple definitely keeps me documenting our trips while we live in Europe, but the most important thing is actually sitting down and making the time to do it. It’s always worthwhile in the end, and the more you do anything, the easier it becomes.

Of course, having some beautiful and simple digital tools in your kit doesn’t hurt!

What are your favorite digital tools to use for your photo and memory projects?

We’ve been able to travel a ton while we’ve lived in Germany, and I take all of our travel photos on my iPhone.

If you’re curious about how I take our family photos and what specific editing tools I use, then sign up for my free mini-workshop. When it launches this week you’ll get instant access to the first lesson.

In the meantime you can find me on Instagram or see what’s inspiring me on Pinterest (still a fave for me!). Happy documenting!

XO, Catherine

Paislee Press products used: summer vibes photo templates, scenic route photo templates, 4×6 photo templates vol. 1, 4×6 photo templates vol. 3.