december daily inspiration

I am one of those folks that like to peruse the internet for hours looking for crafting inspiration.  It's a curse.  I end up getting sucked in and find it really hard to actually get to crafting.  So it's no surprise that I searched Pinterest for some December Daily inspiration.

Here are a few of my favorites:
[If you click on their names, you will be directed to their blog page that the image was taken from.]

Amy Tangerine --  the use of bright colors for a Winter album is so unusual and she pulled it off perfectly.

Deborah Ruiz -- all the texture and layering in this album is so pretty.

Daniela Dobson -- loving all the kraft paper and machine stitching she used here.

 Jenni Hufford -- the different shaped pages and all the layering is just lovely.

 Marcy Penner -- I love how the pages are so simple and the colors are so muted and clean.

Nicole @ Reaves, party of four -- loving all the tags, envelopes and other inserts she used to fill up her album.

Nicole @ Seriously... brains -- the different sized papers and the eclectic feeling of her album is so lovely.

Ali Edwards -- this is where it all started!


Do you have any December Daily favorites?

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prepping for december daily

Recently I have been prepping for December Daily with Ali Edwards.  This is my first year partaking in this project, and perhaps I chose a wrong year to start (with a move coming up), but (a) I didn't know that this move was coming up this quickly when I decided I was going to do this, and (2) I feel that it is still an important project, moving or not.  I've been back and forth about going digital or traditional.  Earlier this week I had resigned to the fact that I would probably have to go digital with all my scrapbooking supplies packed away.  Then I decided against it and figured I could just pack up what I might need for my December Daily project in it's own little container and keep it accessible during the move and settling. 

Last night I printed out all of my foundation pages using Ali Edwards' 2011 December Daily Overlays.  I printed out the red version on Lily White Bazzill cardstock.

Today I worked on adding some patterned paper to the bottom section and figuring out what types of dividers and inserts I want to add to the album.

 

I ended up going with white vellum for the dividers.  I wanted to use various transparencies, but I couldn't get my hot little hands on any.  Since I have a pretty good amount of vellum in my stash, I figured this would be the perfect opportunity to use some up.

The number tags I ordered for the dividers haven't come yet, so I improvised.  I bought several different digital number elements (Musical Strips: Numbers by Katie Pertiet; For the Love of Circle Numbers by Ali Edwards -- I recolored these to match the Pink Paislee Snow Day papers; and Carded Monograms in Red by Katie Pertiet.), printed them out on cardstock, and viola:  I have lots of new numbers for my dividers!  I also used a Jillibean Soup number tag and some American Craft Thickers for my numbers.

When I have better lighting to take better photos, I will show you all the foundation pages along with their dividers and inserts. 

Thanks so much for stopping by today and I hope to see you again soon!

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moving

Our new home is almost complete, however, there is no firm move in date.  That's perfectly fine with with me... I'm just happy we're finally moving!  Those that know me, know that I have been wanting to move for quite awhile now.

It's incredibly difficult to live so far away from civilization.  We currently live almost an hour away from anything worthwhile.  Right now we drive at least twice a week to do activities and we make every trip into a day trip and try to schedule everything on these two days.  Because of this, these days turn into very long days and often times we leave at 10:00 am and don't return home until after 7:00 pm at the earliest.

Our new home is only about 15 minutes away from everything we need.  It's only about 7 miles, but with the twisty roads, it takes a little more time. 

To say I'm happy about this move is an understatement. 

For now I have had to put my Etsy shoppe in vacation mode and plan to start it up again in January.  We should be moved in and maybe settled enough by then.

I plan on posting to my blog during this transition... it's always fun to keep others' updated with photos of our family adventures.  Thanks so much for stopping by and I hope to see you again soon!

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so very thankful...

Our oak and pine trees

THANKFUL to have found a knowledgeable Speech Language Pathologist near home.  Well semi-near home... about 50 minutes away, which around here is about as close as you can get. 

THANKFUL that the kids don't have to leave home to go to school.  If they had to take a 1.5 hour bus ride to and from (3 hours total on a bus!) school each day plus 7 hours in school, there's no way we would be able to fit in speech therapy, kung fu, horseback riding, and music lessons.  Homeschool is cool!

THANKFUL that we got an appointment with an autism specialist.  Even though it is still a couple of months away, I didn't think we would ever find a specialist even remotely close enough to drive to.

THANKFUL that Matthew has found an extra curricular activity (besides swimming) that he is excited about.  He very rarely gets excited about things that don't involve Legos or video games -- so this is a huge break through for him.

THANKFUL that Fall is truly here (although it feels more like Winter).  Leaves' colors are changing and pine needles are falling.  Also a time to start fires in our fireplace.  Ahhhh....

Our first fire of the Season

Thank you so much for stopping by here today. Hope to see you again soon!

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halloween at our house

Halloween weekend for us started on Saturday as we got ready for the Illumination of the Jack-O-Lanterns in a local Gold Rush Town near us.  It's a fun little "contest" for kids to carve their gourds and bring them to the town square to win awards.

For some odd reason, my kids don't believe in drawing on their pumpkins before carving, so after cleaning the pulp out of the pumpkins, they got directly to cutting out their gourds. 

Saturday evening we brought the finished products to the town square to be judged.  (It's not really judged per se -- there were more than 20 awards to be handed out and no child was intended to feel left out.)

Anberly's jack was a dragon that was mistaken for a bat at the contest.  She won the Most Haunted Award.  (Sorry about the blurry photo... no tripod.)

Matthew's jack was Jack.  Teehee... Jack Skellington that is.  He added his own little touches to make it more Matthew-esque.

The rest of the weekend I furiously worked on their costumes to get them completed.  Anberly's costume was nearly done by the weekend, except for the sleeves on her jacket and her top-hat.  The sleeves were completed on Sunday and the hat was not completed until moments before going out the door to trick-or-treat.  Whew!

She was (what we called) a Steampunk Chick.

Matthew's costume was started and completed on Halloween day.  I was actually fairly impressed with myself!

He was a Black Hand Assassin from the game Elder Scrolls IV:  Oblivion.  This costume was really last minute... he kept changing his mind about what he wanted to be and only on the Tuesday before did he finally settle on this. 

We all had a lot of fun this Halloween.  Much more fun than last.  I am so happy to have had this experience with my children.

Thanks you so much for stopping by!  My plan is to update next time with a Project Life post and maybe a shoppe update so I hope to see you again soon. 
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