December Daily 2012

It took me less than a year, folks! I don't think there's a single crafter out there who would consider themselves "caught up". So I'm not ashamed to say I just finished last year's December Daily album. I'm actually pretty proud I finished it before starting on this year's album. I've been trying to make a conscience effort to finish what I start or to stay more on top of things. Planning for this year's December album has already started. I know what book cover I'm using, the paper line has been chosen, and I've started a Pinterest board of some of the activities I want to do. It's actually a good resource since it links up to the original websites so it'll make it easier to check times and schedules for different events. I realize it's only September, but I'm a fan of making lists and I love the joy of the holidays. (If life was a cartoon, this is where I'd be holding hands with family and friends while circling a Christmas tree and swaying back and forth.)

Anyhow, here's a few pictures of my album as proof that I actually finished something. The papers and embellishments are pretty much all October Afternoon. They came out with a December Daily kit last year and it was awesome! It included a 8x8 paper pad, the mini book with pages and covers, TONS of embellishments, and a stamp set. Definitely worth the money.

The cover was just chipboard so I used a brown paint dauber and gave it a wood look.

 

The album came with dividers which I used to separate the weeks.



This day was 12/12/12 so I decided to go big and do twelve Christmas-y things in one day. I had to hustle to fit it all in, but it was fun to do.

A few times I was able to copy and shrink the program from that day's activity for the book (like this one for Christmas at the Zoo). I like adding the interactive element and being able show more detail about what we did.

The "cookies" page was a flashcard from October Afternoon. It was great for adding more journaling on the backside. Plus, it's cute.

This "mini" album ended up being pretty full. I had to replace the rings that came with the book with shower curtain rings. It just goes to show we had a lot of fun during the holidays.

Fun with Echo Park

I love scrapping vintage pictures. It's fun seeing photos of my parents and my grandparents when they were younger, especially my grandpa because I never met him. So finding pictures of him is always a treasure. It gives me a good reason to ask my dad questions about him and it makes me feel like I know him a little. One thing I've learned is that he'd stop whatever he was doing if my dad asked him to do something. If they were at the lake and dad wanted to go skiing, Grandpa would take a break from his project and they'd head for the boat. (My dad will do the same thing for us too.) 

Here's a page about my grandpa using Echo Park's "Note to Self" line. It's nice and masculine, plus looks good with the black and white photos.

 



 

 

This is another page using Echo Park paper (their "All About a Boy" line) more recently. While we were in Universal Studios we went to "Harry Potter World" (that's not it's actual name, but that's what we kept calling it) and my sister bought an awesome Sorting Hat. We had fun when we got back to the condo and took pictures of everyone in the family wearing it. Tara and I had extra fun doing our own little photo shoot while drinking the pumpkin juice she also bought at Harry Potter World. She got a little carried away using my fancy camera for the first time. "This is fun! It just keeps clicking." So I ended up with enough pictures of me for my own page and I'll do another page with Mom, Dad, and Tara in the sorting hat. 

 

 

 



 

And here's a Christmas page using "Season's Greetings". We always make sure to take pictures with our stockings Christmas morning. It's my favorite part of the day.

 



Christmas at the Zoo

In my effort to do something Christmas-y everyday in December, I took Mom and Dad to 'Christmas at the Zoo' one night. It was my first time going, so the top priority was to take lots of pictures (especially when you know it's gonna be a scrapbook page, that way you can make sure there are plenty of good ones to choose from). The coolest thing was how they had all the different lights in the shapes of animals. And being the good sports they are, Mom and Dad even posed by some of the lights for me. Definitely a good night of family fun.

With all the pictures I wanted to use, it was perfect for a two page spread. The left hand page started from a sketch in my 'Page Maps 2' book and then I just carried it over to the right hand page so they'd match up. The papers are from Crate Paper's 'Snowday' line (shocking, right?). This line is perfect since it's obviously Christmas-y, but also because the bright colors of the paper really helped the colored lights in the photos stand out. I tried having them on the cream base alone, but it looked really flat. That's one of the hard parts of taking and using photos for me... it doesn't always look as good as it did in person, or how I remembered it. So by matting the photos or pairing them with different papers, it can really help the colors stand out.

Here's a little detail of my title. All the little pieces are punch outs from the line and the 'zoo' I die cut with a Quickutz font. The string of lights were absolutely perfect and it was another chance to practice my clusters.

Another proud point... these pictures are from less than two months ago and they're already scrapbooked!

Just One Good Picture...

Here's another page I did using Crate Paper. It's a mix of last year's Christmas and "Snow Day" from this year. It was fun looking through the pictures I wanted to use. My Mom used a whole roll of film trying to get a decent picture of my sister and I. According to her, she told us we were going to sit there and keep taking pictures until she got a good one. My sister did pretty good, but I guess I just couldn't sit still. These were my favorite four.