december 9th and 10th

more updates on my 25 days of december album. still coming along nicely and i'm thinking that i might need to get some bigger rings to hold the pages together!

december 9th....just a simple snapshot of blake and paul playing on the floor....typical evening sight....the photo is a little blurred but i still like it....



december 10th. today was a big day because we went to visit santa at the mall. i had a lot of journaling to include and a picture that i wanted to cover a page so this one ended up being a two page layout with some "filler" stuff included....

december 6th (redo), 7th and 8th

i'm still here and am still keeping up with my december daily album although i am running a couple of days behind. i'm not letting that stress me out though - no stress allowed! i am really enjoying this project and my album is coming together quite nicely. definitely something i will want to do in the years to come.

i've included december 6th (redo), 7th and 8th in this post. these are all relatively simple pages, but they do tell the story so i'm happy with them.

december 6th is actually a re-do of the page i orginally posted here. the more i looked at this page the more i just didn't like it. i also did not like the fact that the original page did not contain any journaling which i later decided was necessary. so here is the before....



and here is the after....much better don't you think??



december 7th. this photo was taken while michael and i were at home depot running errands. i turned around to find him checking out all the christmas wreaths. it was a funny sight as he was really checking them out. i like how the photo turned out as its actually quite festive...even though you can't see his face...





and december 8th. this is a very simple layout featuring a photo of our christmas tree....

december 5th and 6th

december 5th - i decided to use the pictures i took on our trip to pick out the christmas tree. i really like how these pages turned out - they may be my favorite pages so far!









and december 6th - today was the day that we finally decorated our christmas tree and put up all our decorations. michael got pretty bored with the whole tree-decorating thing but blake loved it. i ended up just giving him a bunch of our small wooden ornaments to hang on the tree and he was so proud of himself. he was also really into the nativity sets - especially the kid one that i let him play with. he kept asking me what everybody's name was (mary, joseph, baby jesus) and now he calls the three wisemen "the wildmans".

december 2nd, 3rd and 4th

well i am managing to keep up with my twenty-five days of christmas 2009 album, even if it does appear that i have given up on blogging! i haven't given up i've just been really busy, busy, busy around here lately. but i'm not letting all the activity get in the way of enjoying this special time of the year....

december 2nd - i previewed this picture here and wanted to show you how i incorporated it into my album.



december 3rd - just an ordinary night at home after dinner and homework....





december 4th - the big event for today was cleaning out the playroom and having the boys go through their toys and decide which ones they wanted to donate to charity. for some reason when i said "give to boys and girls that don't have many toys" michael assumed that we would be sending the toys to africa. i heard him say several times "oh yeah, little boys in africa would really like this!"





back tomorrow for more....

playing catch up - project 365

so one of my tasks over the thanksgiving holiday was to catch up on my project 365 journaling. i talked about being a little behind on this piece of work in this post, and i'm happy to say that i am officially caught up! yeah for me! i had six hours in the car and some down time in the evenings at my in-laws to catch up. i just took the pictures i had already printed out, a pen and some paper. when we got back home i typed up my journaling and printed everything out. side note: i'm not sure why i'm going to all the trouble to type up and print out the journaling as it would be much easier to capture my journaling in my own handwriting....but i guess i just think it looks neater printed out.

it started like this....



and ended up looking like this....













this was the first year that i've done a photo-a-day project and i can definitely say that i will be doing it again in 2010. it's such a great way to capture all the things going on in our family over the course of a year. one photo a day and a couple of lines of journaling - simple as that. and now that i'm already in the habit of doing it why not continue.... i am thinking about the how i want to do my 2010 project. i used becky higgin's project 365 kit this year. have you seen her new - project life?? if not you've got to check it out. this is a definite possibility for 2010, but i am very interested to see the digital version before i make a decision.

are you capturing a photo-a-day this year? if so, are you going to do it next year too? what is your documentation method?

december 1st and 2nd

below you will find the first couple of pages in my twenty-five days of december 2009 album. this first post actually ends up being a couple of pages because i wanted my goals for the album to be included up front and i also incorporated a picture and some short journaling for the day. i've also included some detailed shots as well.









and some of the details...



and here is a preview of my pages for december 2nd. i've gotten the pictures all ready to go but haven't put the pages together yet. at this rate it's looking like i'll be a day behind (i.e. putting december 2nd pages together on december 3rd, etc) but i'm ok with that as long as the photos are taken and my thoughts are captured....

journaling: the countdown has begun around here. this is the first year that we've done an advent calendar and michael is really digging it. i'm not sure blake understands what it's all about, but he knows michael is excited so he is too. my goal is to try and do something holiday-related every day. yesterday we read a christmas book and tonight i gave them a christmas scene to color. both were big hits. other things i have planned include making christmas cookies, going for a drive to look at christmas lights, writing letters to santa, watching some christmas movies, going to the youngsville christmas parade, donating some toys to charity, shopping for each other's christmas presents, more coloring (they both really like coloring right now!), more reading christmas books.....you get the idea. it's just a little something extra each day to celebrate the season because christmas isn't just about december 25th.

christmas confessions

hello december. around our house the thanksgiving pilgrims and indians are gone, the fall pumpkins on the porch got thrown away, the turkey flag got folded nice and neat and put back in its spot. fall is over and its time to move into december. and i have to say that i'm a little disappointed - for two reasons actually. first i really like fall - all the gorgeous color, pumpkins and scarecrows, both my boys have birthdays, halloween, the state fair...all kinds of fun stuff.

and second...i'm sorry to say that since i've gotten a bit older i find myself not so much looking forward to christmas. as a matter of fact last year i caught myself telling someone that my favorite part of christmas is when it's over. what?? i know, i know. i find it hard to believe myself because as a child i always loved christmas. and i still do like the idea of christmas and what it represents and what it celebrates. but as i've gotten older and am now a mom i find that this time of the year becomes just so stressful and so not about what it is suposed to be about. there's just the mad rush to get everything done in such a limited amount of time in addition to the normal, everyday stuff....food to plan, purchase and prepare for holiday parties...attendance at said holiday parties - both work parties and two kiddie parties...gift giving to stress about - the perfect gift for this person or that person, where to get this gift or that...

you get the picture...and really i sound like a whiny little teenager who is mad at her parents because she got a used BMW for her 16th birthday instead of a new one....i really have so many blessings in my life. but it has been bothering me that i've become this person that just doesn't like christmas.

so this year i've decided to take back my christmas! my goal this year is to rediscover the joy of the season. to enjoy it rather than let it run me ragged. to remind myself to be present and to pay attention and not just rush from one thing to the next. to look and listen and truly see and appreciate the stuff going on around me. to have fun and to remember the reason for it all.

and that is where my december daily/journal your christmas album is fitting into all this (i originally wrote about this here and here). it may appear to some that i've just added another project to my to-do list after whining about all the stuff i have to do already during the month of december. point taken. but for me scrapbooking (taking photos and journaling) makes me more present, more mindful of my everyday life and the things that are going on around me. it helps me pay closer attention and focus more on what is important to me and mine.

so for december 2009 i am choosing to be more mindful and to be more present. i am choosing not the let the hustle and bustle of the season make me a big ball of stress and anxiety and make me wish for january. i am choosing to like christmas again!

so here goes...wish me luck...here's to a great christmas 2009!