WE'RE DOING DECEMBER! Whether you pre-plan your December Daily or create as you go along in the Christmas month; make your own covers or decorate ready-made ones, use Project Life style with plastic sleeves and pockets or create your own pages. Maybe you havent made one before and ask 'I cant think what I'd fill a page with everyday?' We'll help with that! Whatever your style we'd love to see it! Here you will find a seasonal blog open from 1st November to 31st January each year. We hope that this will become a wonderful resource of sharing, prompts and inspiration. What is a December Daily? Its a mini-album recording your daily memories capturing the spirit of December. Bring it out with your decorations each year and remember Christmases past. Scroll down on the right side bar and you will find past December Daily albums of each Designer. Check their 'journey' link too, this will give you some great tips and scroll a little further down and you will see the albums categorised into types for easier searching :) Now - 'Let's December Daily'!

Friday 8 January 2016

Let's December Daily 2015 Design Team's Albums Completed and Afterthoughts

Weeeeell, all said and done for another year of December 'Daily-ing' for
2015
http://letsdecemberdaily.blogspot.com.au/

Our Design Team shares thoughts.... 
what have been.........
 learned,
 un-learned,
 wise words, 
 not so wise words..... 
what will, won't, maybe,  do again, go back on word......
 and might have planned.... 
for 2016
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  photo 5771ac68-11d3-4a7a-9dea-6a8da6e02d44.jpg

What a process this 2015 album was! 
It's so different from my 2014 album (altered vintage book)
This one was made from scratch and I loved all its possibilities!
Mainly made from 7dots Yuletide collection...it also has quite a few old Hambly transparency pages too.  The size of 12"x6" was perfect for the kind of scrapper I am - I like to include a lot and am so happy with the space to fill!  Spreading outwards, kinda stopped it from spreading upwards (chunky)!


 Sewn are 14 pages with spines of black denim plus the covers...
Large eyelets and bendy large screw bands to hold it together. (metal jump rings just didnt work well)



 What I cant believe is even with the thickness of the spines and large eyelets, it actually
remained fairly flat - but I didnt really 'scrap flat' so somehow the constraints took it on board
and afforded enough room thickness-wise, even with pompom trim and all!


 What I did miss was the inclusion of  'lists' of everyday smaller detail of things.
Last year I worked with a separate smaller vintage book -  December 30 Day's of List's
and thought that this year instead of working it separately, I'd include it somehow...
I forgot....
until Deb had included a list in her December Daily
 so smacking my foreheard with the palm of my hand
realised it was too late - I'd gone too far to include it throughout!  
Oh well (shrug) next time!
One thing I did do now its finished was went through with the Dimensional Magic and put a lacquer of it on anything that was a cardstock label, glitter (whether it be stars, numbers or outlines etc) and anything that needed a subtle standout of some kind.....
Yes, even Dimensional Magic-ed my deer on the front cover!



What's next for 2016?  Not 100% sure, but I do have a few ideas swirling in my head...
like.... maybe a black paper bag album - I could include my 'lists' well into this and even more use of transparencies!  I want to do more stamping and embossing with enamels too!
   We'll see, who knows what products/techniques might turn up yet
 throughout the year that might be worthy of December Daily-ing!!  :)
 Whatever it is, there's never a definite goal (other then finishing), just a heap of ideas that take twists and turns throughout the process and all I can do is cross my fingers that it might turn out!
 
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My finished December Daily for 2015.   I've added some ribbons to the rings and a black elastic band around the side because.......

as always my December Daily has ended up chunky AGAIN.


I purposely pulled the spiral binding away from this Heidi Swapp album hoping it would give me more room/flexibility with rings.  Flexibility, yes - I was able to  remove and use the beautiful shaped/patterned pages how and where I wanted and completely change the album to make it my own.  I'm happy with that.

I must say though, after having a complete change in 2014 with my "art journal" December Daily,  I thought I would be ready again this year to get back into more of the "usual" type of December Daily that I was used to doing.  Not too sure I enjoyed the process as much as 2014's big change.   2016 needs to be different again for me I think..........something that I haven't done before.   Maybe vintage - upcycling - a different format.   Right now I don't know EXACTLY what I want to do, but I have all sorts of thoughts going through my head as to what I can do to make this year's (yes this year's -2016) a little different again.
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Here's my finished 2015 December Daily. I found that I didn't need to go back and do anything more as I created most of what I wanted on the days as I went along.


Although it has ended up fanning out a bit chunky even though I scrapped pretty flat it's not too bad, so I decided to leave the spiral on. Otherwise, I was thinking of lacing it with ribbon.
  I really loved the bits poking out of the side of the book, the tags and ribbons. I think I would like to do more of that next December Daily.

This format of December Daily I found great although wish to have done more with mixed media, but I found mixed media very time consuming and as it got closer to Christmas,
I was becoming very time poor.
I would definitely like to do this format again in the future. Scrapping flat was appealing, so maybe a flat book again or maybe back to my Project Life style with more
homemade pages and shaped pages.
I will also make sure that I get someone else to take some photos of me at Christmas time opening presents, baking, cooking, creating etc. and not just the posed photos with family members. (oh and to try and include photos of my camera shy 15yo son.)
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YAY! I finished my 2015 album and kept it updated each day through December and stayed calm - well relatively - with sharing the process here at LDD.


I added a gold elastic tie round the album to keep it tidy - it's a bit bulky and I did begin to wonder if everything was going to fit.  And I made a little charm to hang from it.

A close up of the charm.


The last pocket in my album contains a collage of photos which didn't make it onto the main pages as the quality was not the best. I often use this method to include those wobbly, but favourite photos, the small format seems to disguise the imperfections.


And my final page is a simple goodbye to 2015.


 Here's my completed weather chart which is tucked safely behind the goodbye 2015 page.

I really love my golden album and the PL format was so easy to keep on track and not get overwhelmed and fall behind during busy times. I also loved that so much of the pocket contents could be made in advance or during quieter times.

Looking back over all my December Dailies I realise that, although all very different, they have one thing in common - every page is the same shape and most the same size. So maybe 2016 will be the year to break out of this format and go for something a bit more random. And I've also got my eye on some papers with a blue & brown colour scheme.


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 http://letsdecemberdaily.blogspot.com.au/
 So with all these great last words from the LDD girls......
Thanks so much for coming along on our 2015 journey for the third year with us here at
 'Let's December Daily'.

We four, all had a very different outlook, purpose and end result.
Its been both a pleasure and a joy.
The blog is now going to 'sleep' until the beginning of November this year when it will 'wake up' again for our 2016 December Daily journeys!
 
In the meantime:
 Dont forget to become a follower and put us in your bloglists so you know when we will be back up and running .....November will return sooner than we think!
It seems to be in a 'blink of an eye' these days!
 
We are sure this site will be used as a wonderful resource all year..... especially towards the end of the year along with your contributions in Mr Linky (only open for your submissions till the end of January 2016) for everyone who visits to see, and visit your blog too....

You can find some more information with our members and visitors sharing 
with Mr Linky below
We love seeing them!

Thursday 7 January 2016

Jane's Days 27, 28, 29, 30 & 31


 Day 27


 Simple page following my format.


Day 28


A double page of photos as my three grandsons exchanged presents today.


I added some stickers to the number card and digital sentiments to the photos. Up there with my favourite moments of this Christmas.


And since I had the stickers out I popped some on the outside of the page ptotectors too! 

Day 29


Another straightforward simple page - the time for creativity is waning as I enjoy and entertain my grandchildren, but that is exactly why this PL style suits so well.


Day 30


Day 30 also is a simple page - Christmas money was burning a hole in this 6 year old's pocket!


Day 31


I made a charm to hang on the number card to make this last day of December page a little bit unique. I glittered up a wooden star and threaded it along with a large heart paperclip onto black ribbon which I stapled to the number card. I also jazzed up the journalling card with black glittery gems and golden stars.


We would love to see how your December Dailys are shaping up.
'Completed Pages' link .....

Hope to see your 2015 pages!



 And you can link your pre-planning or stash photos up

HERE....

And if you have your Covers done....
upload them  HERE 

And you can even share your  previous December Daily's
HERE

We'd love to see them!


Wednesday 6 January 2016

Bec's Days 25 & 26....................




 Day 25...........
I had quite a few photos of Day 25 and I knew I did when I was doing Day 24 so made it a double spread.
On the left I had Christmas morning with some photos of unwrapping presents, but I wanted a photo of the 'after' with all the wrapping paper and presents everywhere. Just to document the fun that was had. 


I used a background sheet of patterned paper and some washi tape to stick the photos down. A photo of each person in our family. (Other than me because I take all the photos.)
I also adding a chipboard word 'Christmas Morning' but left it raw to flow with the Kraft paper.


I cut out some holly leaves from patterned paper and bent them up a little for dimension. I also drew a black line around the edge to help them stand out.


On the other side of Day 25 was the afternoon. Describing what was happening with some tiny alpha stickers and washi tape to adhere the photos. I also wrote our names directly on the photos with a black sharpie to add some interest.


Day 26......................


 Photos mounted on black card and the background was splattered with the red spray. The photos are a story like sequence with alpha stickers used for the description and a tag for the journalling.
.





 There's still plenty of time for you to upload your December Daily's

Share them with us!
'Completed Pages' link .....
Hope to see your 2015 pages!
 And you can link your pre-planning or stash photos up
HERE....

And if you have your Covers done....
upload them  HERE 

And you can even share your  previous December Daily's
HERE
We'd love to see them!
http://letsdecemberdaily.blogspot.com.au/


Tuesday 5 January 2016

Deb's Day 26 and back cover....



Day 26.

This is the final day for me in my December Daily.  Super easy page, photo matted on a 3x4  card
and then matted again on black cardstock. 


and on my back cover, I have added in some little extras. Popped a couple of Christmas cards in the pocket as well and a couple more tags that I had previously made and thought they could hold some extra photos on the backs of them.  Also to the pocket itself, I have added some extra cut out words, a butterfly and some gems to the stockings and stars on the banner. 

I was a little worried that the tags I had put in the pocket may fall out so I glued and stapled the ends of the twine attached to the tags,  to a circle die cut and then attached that to the back cover 


so if they fall out they are still attached.  

So for me,  my 2015 December Daily pages are completed.  
There's still plenty of time for you to upload your December Daily's

Share them with us!
'Completed Pages' link .....
Hope to see your 2015 pages!
 And you can link your pre-planning or stash photos up
HERE....

And if you have your Covers done....
upload them  HERE 

And you can even share your  previous December Daily's
HERE
We'd love to see them!
http://letsdecemberdaily.blogspot.com.au/