Happy New Year...

Wishing you all a Happy New Year! :)

Christmas Album 2011 | Day 8...

A few quick and easy page for a busy day. I have talked in the past about how I make our Christmas cards. How I make a prototype in advance etc...

I always include that prototype in my Christmas album that year and this is the one from this year. As I said, it's only a prototype so not quite like how the final card turned out... but still it's fun to have it documented in my album :)

The Happiest Of Holidays Card...

[Supplies: Copics and Glitter + Colour In Christmas - Kate Hadfield, Photo Frames No 7 - Jenna Desai, Frosted Grunge - Fruitloop Sally, Cheerful - Tickled Pink Studio, (all from The Lilypad)]

Another card featuring another bit of happy Copic colouring - yay. *smile* Oh and I went a bit glitter mad on this (as you do of course!). Maybe not so obvious on this smaller version of the photo, but in the full size one the camera has REALLY picked up the glitter. As in waaaaay more than in reality even...!

I love the digital Christmas stamps that Kate Hadfield created so I just had to use some of them on this card. The full kit comes with 6 different ones and I picked 3 to use for this card.

Seeing you soon with another page from my Christmas album :)

Merry Christmas...

Wishing you and your family a very Merry Christmas! Hope you get an amazing holiday!

Holiday Seasons Card...

[Supplies: Glitter & Copics + Deck The Halls - Kate Hadfield, Kim Jensen, Santa's Helper - Kaye Winiecki, December Stories - Designs By Lili, Washi Tape Strips - Sahlin Studio, (all from The Lilypad)]

I really really enjoyed making this card. I don't know exactly why. I guess I'm just a happy girl when I get to sit down and colour with my Copic markers maybe :) And Christmas trees always make me happy, real or not :)

Christmas Album 2011 | Day 7...

My first page with no photos in this album so far! See the little green page in the pocket with the "gifts" tab? Well that's a list of what we have got everyone for Christmas. But of course it might not be the best idea to pull out the tab/page and photograph it...so I left that inside as I took the photo of today's page.

Oh and that canvas pocket that I have used... it is sooooo old!! By L'il Davis, which I don't even exist anymore. I got two packets of these pockets (two different sizes in each) in a scrapbooking kit ages and ages ago. I never knew what to use them for. But I never gave them away/threw them as I just KNEW I'd find a use for them one day :) 1 used, 3 to go LOL!

Christmas Card...

Another little break inbetween the pages in my Christmas album on here and time for a hybrid card that I made as part of my Creative Team work for Kay Miller:

[Supplies: Glitter + Christmas Is Coming - Kay Miller (from A5D)]

It's that time now... getting busy, busy, busy for Christmas. So I'm going to keep this very short today :)

Got some more cards to show you soon!

Christmas Album 2011 | Day 6...

...and here's the back of the transparency page that I used for Day 5:

It's easy to always take photos of your tree standing next to it. Inside. But we kept coming home (in the dark) and I kept seeing how cosy it looked day after day from the outside...

And one day it just dawned on me "why not take a photo from the outside?!" Can't believe I have not thought about that before LOL! Anyway, the camera came out from the handbag and this is the result. I'm pretty pleased as it's only a point and shoot camera and I had no way of using a tripod either :)

Christmas Album 2011 | Day 5...

This page was rather a tricky one to photograph. I tried holding it in my hand but it made no sense. So instead I decided to put it down and photograph it on my cutting mat like I have with all the other pages...

The base of the page is a transparency but thanks to the snowflakes in the opposite corners I think it makes it pretty easy to see where the page starts and ends. And funnily enough this turned out to be the perfect page base for the day as we had our very first snow. Okay, so being from Sweden, that's not really "snow" as I'm used to it (more like "powder" LOL!) but nevertheless it was indeed our first snowflakes and I love to document that occasion every year :)

Can Not Wait... For Christmas...

I thought I post a few different things in between the pages from my Christmas Album just to make the blog a big more varied :) And yes, don't worry, I'm still working on my album LOL! I have just printed out photos for today's page...

Anyway, onto some digital scrapping :)

I've been working with this super cute Christmas kit by Lliella Designs (well, actually she kinda ONLY makes super cute kits as that is really her style!)

[Supplies used: Merry Little Christmas - Lliella Designs (from SSD)]

Right I'm off. Got a pile of birthday presents to wrap this afternoon and some CT work to do where I get to play with my Copics. *happiness*

Christmas Album 2011 | Day 4...

One of my favourite Swedish Christmas traditions! The one of celebrating advent on each of the 4 Sundays before Christmas Eve. Lighting one candle each Sunday (in a special advent candle holder with four red candles) and having Glögg (kinda like mulled wine) and gingerbread cookies. So special! :)

This of course, going back in time, was something very religious. Today most families in Sweden still celebrate the advent Sundays with the candles, glögg and gingerbread without it really having any religious meaning to most of us anymore (I guess just like most of us celebrate Christmas).

Looking forward to tonight and the 3rd of Advent :)

Christmas Album 2011 | Day 3...

Time to make Christmas cards. I always make cards for close family & friends and the rest get bought. It's a happy middle ground. :)

Already after the summer I start playing with card ideas in my head. They evolve, they change, they get abandoned... I just let whatever happen with my thoughts happen. Then I make a "prototype". This might get slightly altered by the time we make the batch of cards but it's pretty much what we stick to. If I haven't made the prototype by the end of October/early November I get stressed about it. And I always get stressed about it LOL!

Anyway the prototype got made late November and at the weekend we sat down and made out cards. And yes, I said we. And yes I get help by my other half! It's kinda become a tradition by now. He's quite happy to help as long as he gets "jobs" to do that doesn't involve very much previous crafty skills. Punching (loved the corner chomper!) and other rewarding jobs are always popular, but I even got him to quite happily colour with Copics this year :)

(And NO we do not have a giant snowflake on the wall LOL! I realised it looked like this when I saw the photo of this page. In reality (looking at the page) it's very obvious to see that it's a kraft snowflake embellishment with glitter which I have added on top of the photo. It made me giggle when I saw the photo though :))

Christmas Album 2011 | Day 2...

It's interesting you know... when I start making my Christmas album... Usually in November, making the pages and often the album covers too, I never know how my album will turn out. What I mean is that I never really have a plan as to how I want my pages. Just photos? Just writing? A mix of both? BIG photos? Lots of small ones...? I never make a plan...

Yet only a few days into my journal and it always seem to take on a certain style of it's own. This year (without making a conscious decision) I'm definitely heading for a more photo based album with a little writing to go along with it. I think I will mix smaller and larger photos and more or less tell my story through those.

On both my 1st and 2nd day, approx 3/4 is taken by the photo(s) and only approx 1/4 is used for journaling. So that's looking to be my general theme for this year. Something that I'm happy with as I love Christmas itself and Christmas photos :)

Christmas Album 2011 | Day 1...

So it was the first day of my Christmas album for 2011 and I was really excited! On top of that I had the perfect photos to start it off with. The photos I took at the Christmas market we went to :)

There wasn't a specific photo that really stood out for me. So rather than printing one big photo, I decided to print lots of small ones to try and capture the general cosy feeling of Christmas. This makes me so happy. Twinkling lights make me very happy! :)

Apart from that I have not used very much on the page. All "old" stash. A journaling card from last year, a printable from last year and some snowflake embellishments.

Right I'm off to make Christmas cards :)

In Progress...

Last night we went to the Christmas market in Manchester. Or you could almost call in marketS as it's spread out over several different streets (a small distance apart), open spaces and squares. And WOW was is busy! At one stage you really had to push yourself through the crowds! But it was still nice, very cosy and I'm glad we went :)

Above is a photo of what my desk looks like this week. Major preparations for Christmas cards making :)

And on top of that? Today = December 1st and the start of my Christmas album. Hope to work on that a little later today :)