A Quick and Easy December Album
I discovered Ali Edwards' December Daily project a couple years ago (that's three Decembers ago) and fell in love with the idea of documenting the month of December in a special way.
There's always so much going on for us that month: family visits, holiday decorating, gathering with friends and creating traditions.
I take a ton of photos around that time of year, so this seemed like a great project.
Well, I've never gotten around to actually doing it until now.
I'm still putting together my December 2014 album, but in the meantime I finished a December 2013 album, which came together so quickly and easily.
You can read the details on how I did it HERE, but today I'm sharing the album itself.
I used a Snap Album from Simple Stories, which my friend Blair picked up for me at Michael's a couple years ago.
I'm pretty sure it came filled with some papers and these kraft dividers.
Page 1 / Just one photo here of some of our holiday decorations, snapped on the kitchen table as we pulled them out to decorate.
I love the colors and used them as a jumping-off point for the album. I got the Santa badge from Ormolu years ago, but it's since been discontinued.
The card in the lower left corner is a paper from Paislee Press printed on vellum.
Journal cards throughout the album are from Big City Quiet.
Page 2 / I wanted to keep the color scheme really simple so I kept the pictures that roughly fit that color scheme in color and converted the rest to black and white.
I couldn't believe how easy it was to put the layouts together because the black and white photos go with everything! In case you missed it last week, I didn't do this as a "photo-a-day" album.
It's more of a "this is what December looked like" album.
This layout documents holiday decorating and a Thanksgiving weekend slumber party with Ben's cousin.
Page 3 / Tree-trimming and shopping with Ben.
Again, I kept the color scheme really simple using lots of black and white, a simple patterned card and a couple of plain white journaling cards to inject some lightness.
Oh, and that story about Ben thinking Martha Stewart was me?
That actually happened. Not that I take offense - I mean, MS is beautiful! But really?
She's like twice my age (insert deer-in-headlights emoji).
Page 4 / Some miscellaneous mid-month pics here. Me pregnant with Owen, Ben giving Nick a smooch as he heads out for a run, some sweet pics of Ben.
I love that "love" card from Big City Quiet. The "all is calm" text is from Paislee Press.
Page 5 / I love this layout.
Note the really fuzzy black and white pic on the right side. I included this because I love the memory, certainly not because it's a good photo!
The night before we drove up to see our families for Christmas, we went to semi-local tree farm with some friends.
There was hot chocolate and train rides. We had so much fun, and this little photo is a reminder of that night.
And then of course there's the obligatory road trip stop at In-n-Out for lunch the next day.
Page 6 / These pics were taken over a couple of days at my sister's house.
I wanted to make sure I included pics of my nephews, so I put them all in one layout.
Again, lots of black and white and even some transparency.
There's more of the vellum on the left side and on the right, I tucked some metallic twine in a pocket and called it good.
Page 7 / These photos are all from Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.
I included just a little bit of journaling and then a couple of cards that went with the color scheme.
And once again, the photos are nearly all black and white. I can't tell you how easy all the black and white made it to layout these pages.
Also, this 6x8 concept is so much fun!
Last page / I wanted to end with this photo of our family of three (and me very pregnant with Owen).
The page was a little bare so I added this pic of Ben opening gifts at my sister's house on Christmas Day.
No journaling beyond the cards from Big City Quiet.
I'm putting my December 2014 pages in this same album and I actually may go back and do some pages for 2012, considering how simple this was to put together!
Here's a peek behind the divider at my 2014 title page.
Thank you, Rachel, for sending those journaling cards!
They made all the difference when I was trying to pull together what's easily one of my favorite little memory-keeping projects.
Memory-keeping is a process, and I’ve created a resource to walk you through mine.
Download my guide to modern memory-keeping and I’ll send you my complete process including a checklist you can print and use for your own projects, time and again.