I completely my December Daily this week which brought with it a huge feeling of satisfaction. I also felt quite proud that I’d taken on what proved to be a much bigger task than I thought, and actually finished it unlike so many other projects I take on.

I want to share some of my thoughts about approaching a December Daily album which will also be great advice for myself when I go to tackle it all again in 11 months time.

Keep it Simple

I had a plan. I didn’t keep to my plan and ultimately this dragged out the process. Perhaps my plan was a little rigid, and in hindsight I think I’ve created a more fluid album that is representative of our December, but I did over complicate it which brings us to the next thought…

Give me all the supplies!

I went from having a few loved supplies which were blogged about on my original plan to having so many supplies I felt overwhelmed. I belonged to a DD Facebook group and several times a day people would post pictures of supplies they’d bought, and of course they were things you just ‘had’ to have too. Suddenly you have several paper pads, piles of stickers, snowflakes, glitter, ten different tapes.. and that’s not counting all the digital stash both free and bought that is so easy to accumulate. You don’t need every awesome seasonal collection in the world to have a nice album. Fact.

Life happens

Sometimes curve balls come flying in and disrupt the nice routine you were in. For me, it was landing in hospital the weekend before Christmas. Not only did this mean we couldn’t attend some of the events I was looking forward to scrapping, but it also meant there were several days of no pictures other than hospital themed ones. I put them all in though as that is what happened. Elijah had also had a cold for a week which stopped us getting out and about. When these things happen just fill the gaps in with some nice photos of your home to keep the week looking festive, but authentic.

Find the balance

On Christmas day I realised I was so eager to capture the perfect moments for my album, that I missed a lot of the moments. It’s very easy to start seeing Christmas day in ‘third person’ if you’re focussing too much on capturing great photos. Live in the moment, capture the photos you can, but know that you can journal all your thoughts and feelings from the day. It doesn’t matter if you didn’t catch the exact moment your child opened their train set, what matters is that you were there, enjoying that moment.

You will always need more pockets than you thought.

• I ran out of pockets and had to wait a week to get some more which then dragged my album into February. For my album I found I used a lot of;
• ? pockets
• ? paper pads
• ? glue
• ? sparkly tape
• ? freebie filler cards printed at home
• ? alphabet stickers
• ? die cut embellishments
• ? Digital templates and overlays
• Things I didn’t use as much as I thought I would:
• ? washi tape
• ? physical overlays
• ? glitter
• ? paperclips
• ? tags
• ? string
• ? stamps
• ? stickers

Conclusion

All in all I really enjoyed putting my album together. I admit it wasn’t everything I thought it would be, but then sometimes when you set out to make something you realise that what you pictured didn’t really suit your personal style and something different evolves. I am thrilled that it’s done though, and know that it will be a wonderful memory for us all in years to come. Bring on December 2014.

Supplies

• They really are too numerous to list, but the main ones are:
• ? Sn@p 6 x 8 inch album and assorted pockets.
• ? Basic Grey 25th and Pine range
• ? Ali Edwards templates
• ? In a Creative Bubble journal cards (they look to be unavailable now)
• ? Susan Ko overlays

I could list everything but it would take all afternoon! I was very lucky to receive some surprise things in the mail too from both friends and strangers that are now safely contained in my album. Thank you!

Have you blogged about your DD? Leave me a link in comments as I would love to have a look!