THE END OF THE WHOLE MESS

To quote Stephen King. Scrapbooking can be messy for sure. I will admit to occupying our dinner table  making us eat by the TV several times. 

It is the end of the year, and I also plan to share the end of my December Daily for 2015. All the pages are done, but I will probably make a few tweeks here and there before I make a complete flip-trough video of it.

I rarely use the portrait oriented 4x6 cards in my PL, but they are perfect for using in mini albums. Again all the embellishments are from Ali Edwards' Cheer story kit. 

My daughter isn't too fond of having her hair braided, she thinks it takes too long, but sometimes I manage to bribe her into letting me do it. This hairdo cost me playing five times per board game she recieved for Christmas. (She got three.) Totally worth it! I have recently started a Pinterest board for girl hairdo's, if you want some inspiration.

This year we put their Christmas outfits in their stockings. That was a genious move! They were both dressed within a minute of opening their morning gifts. They also got to pick out a present from under the tree to open. In Sweden we open our Christmas gifts in the afternoon of Christmas Eve. The tradition is to have a grownup pretend to go out for a walk and then return dressed up as Santa to hand out the presents, but this year the kids didn't want that. After figuring out that Santa is infact a dressed up family member or neighbour, they decided they wanted to be Santa themselves this year.

We had no guests for Christmas, so our traditional Swedish Christmas buffé had fewer dishes this year. We just picked out our favorites. I'm mad about the veggie dishes myself, and I totally recommend this kale salad! Cut off the stems of the kale and put it in boiling water for just a couple of minutes. Dress with a classic vinaigrette and add chopped walnuts, sliced dried apricots and crumbled bluecheese. 

I love the wine glasses and plates we had out. My father recieved them at his first wedding in the 1950's. The marriage didn't last (lucky for me, or I wouldn't be here) but the china sure did. The glasses are gold rimmed crystal and the plates have golden prints of triangles and diamonds. So pretty! 

Happy New Year to you all!

/Magdalena

DECEMBER DAILY PART 4

I'm all but done. Just Christmas Eve left to do. I will end my December Daily on the 24th since that is the day we celebrate Christmas here in Sweden. Today I'm sharing days 15 to 23.

For day 15 I went with a photo of one of our Christmas presents. The "So Very Merry" is from Studio Calico and is stamped on the dag. I took the photo before I signed the tag, so that I could add my journaling digitally. On day 16 are the liquorice toffees I make every year. The recipe, in Swedish, can be found here.

On the 17th I took our boy to the dentist. All embellishments here are from Ali Edwards' Cheer story kit.

For day 18 I put the number and journaling on a sheet of vellum. The "Be Merry" is from Kellie Stamps Grinch Moment digi brush set. I told the story of this electric chandelier or whatever you'd call it. My mother bought it with her first pay check in 1956. She was 13 years old and working extra at a local bakery. We still put it up for Christmas every year.

This one is selfexplanatory. :) I'm sure there are many a Star Wars page in the December Dailys of 2015.

On the night of the 20th we had an aurora borrealis over Uppsala. I wasn't up at that time though, so I borrowed this photo from a local photographer named Johannes Rousseau. He's taken so many beautiful pictures of our town. Go take a look!

Last day of schoolfor the kids, and for me of course. Being a teacher has it's perks. This is my ugly Christmas sweater for the year. Love it! I had some fun with the Magic digi brush set by Kellie Stamps, combining it with some old Studio Calico brushes in red.

And the last two pages for this post. Day 22 is another favorite Christmas candy of mine, homemade peanut butter cups. I have shared this recipe before along side a few other favorites of mine, in this post. On the 23rd we went grocery shopping, among other things.

Stay tunes for my last December Daily post - Christmas Eve.

/Magdalena

DECEMBER DAILY PART 3

I've had these pages finished for a while, but the days are so dark it's hard to find a good time to photograph my album.I'm sticking with my plan of one 4x6 photo per day, plus adding in as needed when I have more of a story to tell. 

Days 8 and 9 contains a girl resting after getting three of her fingers caught in our front door, plus a new book by one of my favorite authors.

Day 10 is just a filler photo, and day 11 tells the story of our crappy December weather. 

Day 12 is another fillerphoto paired with a list of 1-10 things the kids love right now. First is Nea's list:

1. Crafting (my girl!)
2. Taking a walk
3. Playing board games
4. Rough housing (with daddy)
5. Play pretend
6. Christmas
7. Eating cake at school
8. Friends
9. Where we live
10. Shopping

And Dante's list:

1. Oskar (his best friend)
2. Playing games (on X-box and iPad)
3. Play pretend
4. Bowling
5. Soccer
6. Waffles
7. Mommy being silly
8. Pizza
9. Daddy being goofy
10. Minecraft

December 13th is Saint Lucia day in Sweden. On the right side is the entrance door to the church Nea's choir did their Saint Lucia performance in.

And a full spread of the choir performing. Faces covered for privacy. The church paintings were made in the 14th century, and the wooden sculpture in the photo below is from 1470.

And day 14 is mailing out our holiday greetings. I found lots of inspiration in the "Artfully Addressed" class at BPC. Check it out!

How is your December Daily coming along?

/Magdalena

DECEMBER DAILY CONTINUED

If you usually have trouble finishing your December Daily project I really recommend trying this approach. One 4x6 photo per day plus a journaling page when needed. A few embellishments and these date overlays from Paislee Press to pretty up the photos. So easy!

Some days I haven't taken a photo, like on the 4th of December below. I picked a non-date specific photo from another day and wrote my journaling about the 4th. Candy cane striped paper cut from a card in Ali Edwards' Cheer story kit. Digi brushes and chip board star on the right are from Studio Calico.

We put our tree up on the 5th. Merry & bright plus December shopping (day 6) is from this digi brush kit from Kellie Stamps. Washi strip from the Cheer kit. Paper clip and word sticker from Studio calico.

I'm ending week one with a picture from the annual advent calendar Tv-show, including a short review. Next is a laminated page with our kids' wish lists on either side. Nea's wishes on the front reads:

• Paranorman DVD
• Rubber bands (for Rainbow Loom)
• Coloring book
• Craft supplies
• A Merry Christmas

Stars and punched card from Studio Calico.

Dante's wishes on the back reads:

• Ipad
• Minecraft Lego
• X-box game
• A Merry Christmas
• Minions DVD
• A small TV
• A new lamp

I will use this gold polka dot vellum as a weekly divider after each Sunday. Cheer chip board piece and kraft word strip from Ali's Cheer kit, the rest is from Studio Calico.

Tomorrow is Saint Lucia day in Sweden and I'm hoping to take lots of photos. Have a great weekend!

/Magdalena

AND SO IT'S DECEMBER

Or actually, it's been December for a few days. As I wrote in my previous post I have decided to make a serious attempt at a December Daily album for 2015. I have one finished album, that of 2011, and two failed ones, 2012 and 2013. In 2014 I didn't even try. BUT, I came across this album by Jamaica Edgell on Pinterest and thought "Hey, I can do it like that!". 

So, I got these templates by Paislee Press. And they're 20% off through the weekend, so GO! If you have taken Jamaica's mini album class at Big Picture Classes you have the basic idea of my album. Chip board covers, 4x6 photos and binder rings. So simple!

I took a discarded box from our recycling bin and cut two 4x6 rectangles. Then I glued patterned paper on each side of the covers. I also cut up some gold polka dot vellum I found in my stash to use as weekly dividers. It will very much be a hybrid album using both the Paislee Press templates and digital brushes from Kellie Stamps and Studio Calico. Last month I got the SC PL ;-)Christmas addon, and most of my embellishments will be from there.

Here's my cover and my intro pages. The Christmas 2015 circle is from the Joy digital brush set by Kellie Stamps, and you can find it here. I used the eraser tool in PSE to remove the little loop at the top before I printed it on smooth white cardstock.

I also wanted to included the First of Advent even though it did fall in November this year. Our daughter performed with the church choir that day. The photos I took were all horizontal so I made it a double spread and added a tag for my journaling. At the bottom of the photo I added a fitting digi brush from the Magic digi brush set by Kellie stamps, as is the "..... days until Christmas" stamp further down.

So far, I've also finished the pages for the days 1-3. On the December first page I had a printing mishap as you can see. The journaling is still readable, so I decided to be fine with it like that.

'Til next time! 

/Magdalena

ART SPREAD CLASS

I've been waiting almost a year for this class, ever since I paid for the Day by Day class bundle in February or so. Catherine Davis is one of my very favorite scrapbookers and PL's. Her design skills are devine!

Week One challenge was to make a PL spread and repeat details on both pages to make it cohesive. I had ran out of PL cards from my SC kit, so I used some patterned paper and some of Ali Edwards Spark kit cards. This is the first spread for the month of November.

The embellishments are from Ali's Black & White kit and the digi brushes are by Little Lamb & Co.

And this is the third page for November, and it is made with my last SC PL kit as a subber.

So I will be attempting to do 2016 without a PL kit sub. There is no way I could have started out like that, but 2016 will be my fourth year so I'm hoping to have enough routine to work from my stash, digital products and Ali's story kits. I'm not sure I will by a core kit since the cards are so thin, and I'm not used to that. I will will probably buy a kit or addon or two from SC during the year as well, but I plan to not go back to subbing. We'll see how it goes!

The Movie Night digi brush is by Kellie Stamps and can be found here. I added a photo of Lavagirl behind the digi brush layer in PSE, and made a clipping mask. I then added the bottom portion of the stamp in black on top. Here's a closer look:

So will you be doing a December Daily album this year? I've decided to make an attempt this year. I succeded in finishing my DD in 2011. In 2012 and 2013 I only made it halfway through and last year I didn't bother. I plan to make a very simple album, close to this one by Jamaica. 

/Magdalena

THE END OF OCTOBER

This blog post was already scheduled before the terrible events in Paris. I was saddened to wake up to the horrific news this morning, and my thoughts go to everyone affected. It is so very difficult to understand what anyone would think to accomplish by such an act.

I will still share the pages I had planned to share with you today. 

As I told you about yesterday I purchased these Halloween printables and these Crisp digital stamps by Little Lamm & Co to use in my October PL album. Here are my last three pages for October.

/Magdalena

OCTOBER PL

This week I'm sharing my fall PL pages, and today it's time for the month of October. It's my favorite month of the year for so many reasons. Nature is beautiful, I get to wear my favorite clothes, the food is delicious (apple pie, soup, hot tea!) and last but not least my favorite TV-shows come out with the new episodes. 

For the month of October I could have wished for a PL kit with more fallish colors than the one I recieved from Studio Calico, but I mixed in Ali Edwards "Black & White" and "Spark" kits plus some awesome printables from Little Lamm & Co and managed to capture the mood of October with their help.

Page 1: The whole family started the month ny catching tonsilitis, and our son added some impetigo to that. Two weeks on and off of being sick, so not many photos was taken at the beginning of October.

Page 2: The celebration of my birthday had to be postponed because we didn't dare invite anyone and make them sick too. The pretty dotted card is from Tina Aszmus' Specialty Winter Card Set.The MMMM! and HAPPY birthday digi stamps are from the GOSH! stamp set by Kellie Stamps.

Pages 3 & 4: I loved Ali's Black & White kit and here I managed to use both front and back of the cards. And ofcourse I had to document the season premieres of Supernatural and TWD.

Page 5: Heart card painted by my daughter and I added the stamping. Two cards from the "Spark" kit here. Me and my daughter have gone perler bead crazy and I have so many fun patterns on my Making Stuff Pinterest board. AWESOME digi stamp from the I am We are You are digital stamp set by  Kellie Stamps.

Tomorrow I'll be sharing the spreads I made with the Little Lamm & Co printables. See you soon!

/Magdalena

KELLIE STAMPS GOES DIGITAL

I am sure many.many of you are fans of Kellie Stamps. She has some awesome stamps in her shop. From now on all her stamps are digital, and with that comes a new creative team. When I saw her callout I immediately applied. I love digital stamping and add a bit of digital to every PL page I make. I was so happy to be invited to join Kellie's team, and I am really looking forwards to working with her stamps.

Here's a spread I made to document a 24 hour cruise I took with a good freind of minein September. The "Love it" heart and arrow stamp is from this stamp set that was just recently released.

Cards from Studio Calico and Ali Edwards Story Kit.Printables from Studio Calico.

/Magdalena

MIX N' MATCH PL

I almost always run out of PL cards (Yes, I will keep calling them that...) by the end of each month. I end up needing to go into my dwindling stash and mix and match those with the more recent cards. I recently started subbing to Ali Edwards Story Kits, and I've loved the cards that come in her kits so far. They get mixed into my spreads as well. 

I've finished both September and October, and am now waiting to have more November photos to choose from. Every year November is the month when I take the least amount of photos. The weather is grey and drab and not much happens during this month. Last year I only had enough photos to make one spread. We'll see how it goes this month, but I expect it will be similar.

I will share most of my September pages in this post. Here you go!

Page 1: I didn't have enough photos to fill the page, so I found an online image of one of the movie posters for the movie we went to see, and then I added our ticket stubs in the same pocket.

Pages 2 & 3: Lots of photos from different occasions here. And yes, that is my husband and Samantha Fox! I love my most recent Etsy buy, and I added the card that came with the t-shirts I ordered. Me and my husband are both huge Supernatural fans and they have some great shirts and posters,too. And not just Supernatural. I recommend a peek at Unicorn Empire Prints!

Pages 4 & 5: A day in the city, a tired girl and a grass hopper. My husband and a collegue built the "Jesus meeting the children" cut-out frame above. It was used in a cultural event in town. They were given the picture by the church, and while building the frame they were cracking up over the weird placement of one of the holes(The one below our son's face). Not sure what they were thinking when picking this painting!

Page 6: A fall photo and a print-out of a silly Facebook conversation I had with a teacher friend about playing dead at work to get out of recess duty.

I have two more September pages to share, but that is for tomorrow! Tomorrow's post also includes some fun news about a recent design opportunity of mine. See you tomorrow!

/Magdalena

SCRAPPING AGAIN

I haven't made a scrapbook layout since I put together my Creative Titles class for BPC. You haven't forgotten to check that out, have you? You can sign up for a free trial right here! There are so many good classes on so many subjects - scrapbooking, pocket scrapping, mini albums, photography, organizing, mixed media etc.

Since I don't subscribe to a scrapbook kit anymore I don't have a steady stream of new products coming in and preassuring me to do scrap when I'm not feeling it. I really like being able to buy a kit here and there, and this time I got Brimfield - the Studio Calico September kit.

I hadn't scrapped our vacation photos yet, so I set to work on those. I collected a whole bunch of them and cropped twelve of them to 2x1,5", and then four more to 1,75x1,5". They ended up on a twopager, like this:

Our son has started taking guitarr lessons, and he is really loving it. We're a creative family not a sporty one, so I'm very happy that he's found a hobby that can grow with him. 

We are also a bug loving family! We have been known to avoid vacuuming in certain corners of our laundry room because spiders live there, and even toss flies into the webs. And how cool is the huge caterpillar I found on the gravel road outside my school? It was the size of my index finger. A friend later told me it's going to be a stag beetle. 

The layout has hidden journaling that comes out whe you remove the arrow paper clip.

As you can see I've added bits and pieces from other kits I had collected, but the papers are all Brimfield.

/Magdalena