Featuring Kelly Purkey │ November release

I cannot believe I almost forgot to share this layout that I made! I absolutely adored the Potterhead stamp set from Kelly Purkey's November release. It was perfectly timed since we had just got home from a trip to Universal Studios Hollywood. My daughter was in heaven and we spent the majoring of our time in this section of the park. It was simply magical and the frozen Butterbear was tasty!

Now I know that this stamp set is sold out but I did hear that Kelly is try to bring this one back soon if she can. No guarantees but watch her socials for updates. That being said, this layout can easily be adapted to use with any other stamp set that you love.

To make the layout I did a print and cut from my Silhouette Cameo to cut my photos into tag shapes. I grouped them and laid them out across my background making sure to leave room for some smaller tags from my stash to add in the stamps from the set. One thing you could do is leave one tag blank and type up your journaling if you wanted to add in more text. I'll probably slip this into an album paired with a pocket page of more pictures from the trip which is why I didn't add in a lot of journaling. I know it will be covered elsewhere.

Kelly also added this adorable Crafty Lady tote bag to her shop last month and its the perfect gift for all of your crafty friends. I know its on my wish list.

Kelly's next release is schedule for December 28th, Noon EST. Perfect timing to spend your holiday cash.

See you soon,

December Daily® 2016 │ Days 8 and 9

Loving the simplicity of these two days. I also really love the pop of pink that Day 8 added to my album. As you'll read in the journaling my daughter wanted a tree in her room and Grandma and Dad helped her make it happen while I was at an appointment.

Day 8

The photos my husband and my mom took were either square or horizontal which is not my normal picture taking routine so I had to make it work in a vertical space. Cropping this way and adding my journaling to the bottom white space is a easy work around. I added in some tiny silver stars from a past Studio Calico kit and called them done. I needed to fill the 6x4 slot and decided to make a card to hold journaling. I added in the white 8 from Ali's kit and it really pops against the pink. The pink Fa La La chipboard was from Kelly Purkey's 2015 mini kit and the rose gold label was from my stash.

Day 9

This page was a quick one to put together. We always hit See's candy for stocking stuffers so we popped in before it got too busy. The journaling card is from In A Creative Bubble, I modified it by using just the title portion for my needs and moving it to the bottom of the card. The base of my number slot is the bags that they give out for single pieces of candy. They are always happy to oblige with an extra bag when I ask. My photo was vertical so when I cropped it to 6 x 4 I lost a good portion of the background but I loved how the piece of candy was front and center. I added in a stamp from Kelly Purkey and a simple gold sequin star to finish it off.

My daughters birthday was yesterday so I know that that spread will take me a bit more time to work on. I'll be back soon with more to share.

Happy Sunday,

December Daily® 2016 │ Days 1 thru 7

One week plus into this project and I'm finally sitting down to share. Its been a crazy first week of December for me. My mom was here for a visit and that thru off my sharing game. We were just too busy for me to stop, make and share. I didn't make my day two pages until this past Tuesday so I'm playing a bit of catch up. I'm definitely totally okay with being a few days behind this year.

Day 1

Our elf returns on the first of December and I don't usually start my album with an Elf pic but I did this time because my photos of Simone with her advent calendar weren't that good I didn't want to make her redo them later. I blame the early morning light. The digitals here are all from In A Creative Bubble. The green stripe card is from Ali's main kit, the red number 1 is from Pink Paislee last year.

Day 2

 I have never been on a holiday home tour before and since this one was happening while my Mom was visiting I thought we should check it out. The weather was perfect to walk the neighborhood to see these six homes. We weren't allowed to take pictures inside which was a bummer but I snapped a few exteriors of the houses I really loved. The stamps I used here are from Kelly Purkey, specifically here Clearly Kelly holiday release. They are sold out on her site but you might still be able to find them out there. They are perfect for documenting holiday city adventures.

Day 3

This is probably my favorite day in my album all year. We always do a little photo shoot outside the day we hang our outdoor lights. This years came out so cute. The paddle sign is from the Target Dollar Spot and it says I've been naughty on the other side. The bring on the cheer digital is from Push Print Studio that I recolored to match. The text paper is from Ali's main kit, the green three is from Becky Higgins and the acrylic love is from Jasmine Jones' kit.

Day 4

This past year my daughter played on a competitive soccer team for the first time and the season ends early December. I was excited to have something new to add to the album and was equally excited to figure out how to fit in such a non holiday event. My solution make the large photo black and white and keep the rest of the spread black and white with some pops of red. The cards on the left are In A Creative Bubble. The joy background was created using a digital stamp from Kellie Stamps, the ribbon was from my stash and the red December sticker is from Studio Calico.

Day 5

We picked our tree in five minutes this year, we were not messing around. While it was being wrapped I snapped these quick shots and we were out of there. The digital stamp and journal card are from In A Creative Bubble. Are you sensing a pattern yet? Her stuff is AMAZING this year. I recolored a few bits to bring in some green.

Days 6 and 7

Our weather here in California is nothing more than cold and wet in December but we had two extreme days right in a row so I decided to make something of the two. Printing instax photos was something I wanted to do last year but never did. Vowing to pull out my printer more this year so I opted to use two here. The frosted acrylic alpha is from Heidi Swapp but was included in Kelly Purkey's kit this year. The number tags were from Ali's main kit last year. I backed them both with my journaling and added some silver embroidery floss which immediately separated the minute I cut it. The silver stars were from Ali's kit last year I believe. The ribbon was from her 2013 kit and that's the last bit of it, so sad, I loved it.

Well, that's as far as I've gotten so far. I'll be back to share more soon. I share as soon as I make over on my Instagram so follow me there for more immediate peeks. You can find me here.

December Daily® 2016 │ The Beginning

Are you ready? I'm ready and I'm excited! This year I'm surprisingly less anxious as I was last year. Perhaps its because we had a good solid week between Thanksgiving and December 1st. I have come to realize I need that week. I need the calm and I need the time to decompress Thanksgiving and get my mind ready for Christmas. I'm also doing very little prep this year. I have gathered my supplies as you will see below and I have made a cover page for my album but that's the extent of my prep. I'm winging it again this year and that's just fine by me. I've really come to enjoy a less hectic and free flow approach the past several years so if it isn't broken, why change it.

One major change this year is that we did not get our tree Thanksgiving weekend like we normally do. For some reason I just wasn't ready, I needed time. We have pulled all the Christmas bins down and we put out most of the house decorations yesterday. I'm so excited to really dive in tomorrow and jump into all things holiday. Our elf Twinkle will return tomorrow so that's exciting and my daughter will receive her advent calendar for the season. I'm looking forward to all of that fun and what I hope to be a pretty relaxed and chill holiday season.

I do want to share what my album and supplies look like this year. I'm using the Jasmine Jones grey 6x8 album this year. It's a complete departure from what I normally do and I'm excited about that. The grey merry's across the front are so pretty. I may do something small to the lower right side of the cover but I haven't decided yet.

For the cover page I used a digital paper from Paislee Press that I modified a bit in Photoshop elements to thicken up the line so I could add some gold foil with my Minc. Because I only have the 6" Minc I needed to mount it to a larger piece of paper that I layered an older piece of Studio Calico gold star vellum to add in some more gold. The twenty sixteen banner is from Studio Calico.

This base page is sized so that it will completely cover the pages underneath which is a style that I like to use in my albums. I don't like the page protectors showing when you open the album which is just a quirk of mine.

The only other decision that I have made for this years album is to use a wide variety of numbers to mark my days versus a consistent style of numbers like I have done in the past years. The main reason I decided to do this is because I have amassed such a large collection over the years I felt it was time to finally use them all up. I've listed the sources below but please note that many of these are pretty old. I'm sure I'll add in some other items as I go along but this is what I have pulled so far to use in my album.

one // an old flip calendar from Target - two // Kelly Purkey 2015 mini kit - three // Jasmine Jones 2016 mini kit - four // Kelly Purkey 2016 December kit - five // Ali Edwards 2016 main kit - six // Ikea - seven // Ali Edwards very first December Daily kit - eight // Studio Calico - nine // Studio Calico - ten // Studio Calico - eleven // Ali Edwards 2015 December Daily kit - twelve // Pink Paislee 2015 - thirteen // Becky Higgins

As far as the rest of my supplies goes, I have pulled out my collection and pulled out only the items that I'm currently loving. I've placed most of the larger items in this bin that sits on my desk. Its a mix of the current kits and older kits and other seasonal items from other companies. I'm super excited to really mix it up this year.

I also have this divided container for some of the smaller bits that I didn't want to get lost in the bottom of the other bin. Again this is a mixture of old and new items.

The last thing I have done is make sure my calendar is updated with key dates and things that we already have planned for the month. I usually keep a running list of what I have done and what needs to be done so I can plug in some generic stories as needed. In this blog post I listed out some of my favorite things to include in my album so I thought I would list that again for you.

1. Documenting cooking and baking seasonal treats
2. Our Christmas card and the stuffing and mailing of them
3. Buying our Christmas Tree
4. Decorating our Christmas Tree
5. Hanging outdoor lights
6. Around the house shots
7. Shopping for gifts and the receipts
8. Simone's gifts and the wrapping paper (I pick one just for her each year)
9. A visit with Santa
10. Simone's birthday
11. Favorite Shows/Movies/TV Specials
12. Starbucks and their yearly cup design
13. Making a Gingerbread house
14. Holiday lights
15. A letter from me to Simone
16. Simone's letter to Santa
17. A self portrait
18. a play list of favorite Christmas songs
19. Simone's wish list
20. My wish list
21. Photos of new items we added to Simone's stocking

You can also peruse my blog posts from the past five years of albums by going to the list over on the right side bar and clicking on each category label.

Thank you Ali Edwards for creating this project, it just wouldn't be the holidays without it and I cannot wait to document another year!

Here we go Christmas!