An oldie but a goodie... December Daily 2011

In November, I reminded myself just how much I love seeing how much the boys have grown...in something tangible, not on Facebook or online...so I committed to doing the December Daily for our second December together.  As last year's December was a bit more "exciting" than anticipated with Alexander's early arrival...I was excited to refocus and spend a few minutes each day documenting what is happening.

My last full December Daily was in 2010...when we had just one Wee Ski (here are a bunch of pages from it).  I looked at my 2011 files on my hard drive, and realized that I had about 10 pages to finish...and I decided to do just that.  I took my first "free" evening in weeks (since my time at my computer has been nonstop editing and designing for Finian Road)...and made this just for me.

I sent it to Shutterfly, and last night the familiar orange box showed up on my doorstep.

AND I LOVE IT.

They offer lay-flat pages and I upgraded again to the padded cover, and the boys were thrilled to go through things, page by page.  They were pretty confused by how it was John Paul as the baby and not Alexander...so maybe by 2015, I will have last year's done too.  :)  I had read the quote "perfection is the enemy of completion"...and it couldn't be more true than here.  I chose to not worry about missing a day or detail. I just wanted to have it in hand.  I AM SO GLAD I DID. 

This should be a link to the full album. 

It's now a little "blast from the past"!  :)

December Daily: Days 7-9

Life right now.  Hilarious with the two boys, and feels so incredibly nonstop. We have been working over at the tree shoppe, baking like mad, and working our way through our Advent Activities book.

On Friday night, we celebrated my Dad's 65th birthday with a surprise party at the fave Mauss hangout -- Spiro's Pizza and Pasta in Gig Harbor.  It's the place that Jonathan and I had our first date, held our rehearsal dinner for our wedding, and now celebrated Dad's big day.  I made a ton of carrot cake cupcakes (his fave) and we toasted him up.  It was a great start to the weekend!

Here are days 7-9 of the album...enjoy!

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The full album is here.

December Daily: The first five days

Loving how this is coming together.

Was glad that I read a little December Daily primer on this project...was good to remind me that the pages don't need to be perfect, that documenting what's happening is what's most important, and that it's okay to be busy and still take the time to be creative for myself.

One of my biggest challenges of this season is what feels like the never-ending creative juices flowing...for other peoples' projects.  I didn't finish our own family's card until December 1 this year -- and there had been more than 50 boxes of different projects that had arrived via UPS in the previous month.  As the crazy deadlines for holiday orders nears, it's so good to take some time for our own family projects.

Without further ado, the first five days of December:

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The full album is here.

December Daily: A look back

It's incredible to think it's already December.  John Paul is seven months old, Thomas is nearly three years old, and Christmas tree season is in full swing.  In the scope of life on the farm, it's a very busy season...in the scope of this year for our family, life is finally winding down.  No travel is on the books, suitcases are being unpacked and put away, and life is returning to normal.  Well, as normal as life can be with a toddler and an infant.

I had last year's December Daily album printed at Shutterfly in January, and I loved how it turned out.  We kept it out for much of this year.  I loved walking into the living room to find Thomas with the album in his hands, turning the pages and pointing out everything he recognized.  Having a great snapshot of our life during this time last year has been so much fun, especially to be able to compare life as a pregnant mommy to life with two little ones now.  I love that it has the things I love: our family, our routines, slices of our life on any given day, and recipes that I was using. 

I started the 2011 album this week.  As quickly as John Paul is growing, I don't want to miss a moment of this first Christmas for him, and our last Christmas with Maggie.  I'll upload the pages as I go into a new album...but in the meantime, if you'd like to look through last year's album, here it is!

December Daily: Days 10, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 20, 21

Powering through the end of Advent...wanting to get journaling finished before it leaves my mind. And we've also started an awesome January daily project, so I don't want these to overlap for too long!  These are some of the pages I finished this weekend when we had a bit of downtime from selling our Seahawks tickets for yesterday's game.  :)

Loving how this is turning out.  A glimpse into our lives in 2010, before our second Wee Ski is born, and as the first Wee Ski is starting to understand more about Christmas and life on a Christmas tree farm.

Using Ali Edwards' rounded corner templates has been a lifesaver for me to power through the layouts and get them finished...so I'm not creating each from scratch every time I start a new day.

Clicking on the smaller photos will take you to a larger image, if you'd like to read the journaling.  

One funny little factoid?  I finally did the math for all the trees that had been planted in front of our home, off our deck.  The final count of seedlings that had been planted years ago, just in the upper fields of douglas firs?

MORE THAN 30,000.

That's a lot of trees. More deets below!

So excited...just four more days to go before it's finished and I can send it to print!

December Daily: Days 18 & 19

I'm living life on the edge by posting out of order.  But as I'm crossing things off my "to do" list, I'd rather have things checked off at all instead of in order and never finishing.  :)

These pages are from last weekend -- our annual Mausski Christmas Dinner and the last weekend day on the tree farm.  I love that I am actually in some of the images...as both times, Jonathan made the comment that he loved seeing something (below, Thomas helping me in the kitchen) and he grabbed the camera. Thanks, Doc, I really appreciate it.  ♥

The salsa that I made for the prawns was TO DIE FOR. I'm not normally a jalapeno person, but the blend of mango, tomatoes, avocado and jalapenos was heavenly.  I can only imagine how much better it would be during the summer when everything is in season.  Here's the recipe.

The banana pudding was tasty in tiny little cups, and my fave (though there's no photo) was the fruit dip.  Super simple to make and SO incredibly good.  I used low fat strawberry cream cheese, a bit of vanilla and sugar, and folded in cool whip at the end.  Delish.

The last weekend day on the tree farm.  Lots of cleaning up and cleaning out.


Full December Daily album here, new pages added as they're completed. :)

December Daily: Day 8 - The Ski Christmas Card

Since this is now heading out into mailboxes, I can unveil my Day 8 page! 

The cover of this year's card is at the top of the left page, and the inside is featured on the right page.  Santa Thomas in the pool is one of my favorite images.  He was so. incredibly. happy.

...and the inside of the card:

The rest of the album can be found here.  The base templates are from Ali Edwards' Rounded Corner Templates, design slightly modified to pull the designs together.

December Daily: Days 7 & 9

Two black & white days...featuring some of my favorite things: the Brownrices + Thomas. :)

On the 7th, I was so blessed to have Rich and Sandy down.  Thomas had some good time with his Grammy Brownrice, and Rich taught me how to do a handful of projects that I'd had on my "to do" list.  We needed extra copper wire for one of the projects, and Uncle Johnie and Uncle Jerry cautiously gave me a small stash from the tree house, trusting that I wasn't doing anything on my own.  :) 

Rich showed me how to rewire the front porch lights, so we swapped one of the 3 out for a new fixture.  I rewired the other two fixtures on Saturday morning, before heading over to the tree house.  I swapped out all the bulbs for the same CFL tint (bright white) and coming home last night was heavenly.  Bright, crisp light greeting me on the front porch. 

We feasted on chicken & veggie soup with cornmeal cake.  And finished off the last of the candy cane cake.  Tasty goodness all around.


And two pages of Thomas from December 9th.  I feel like every time I turn around, he is stepping on my toes asking for something. Some things he's learning how to get himself (some more amusing than others: the water from the automatic dispense in the fridge), some he still needs help with.

But he has an awesome little dance he does when he really really wants something, and that's the second page photo.  :)



The whole album can be found here.

December Daily: Day 6

On December 6, we had a very special surprise. Though it didn't come in our shoes outside the door, we feel blessed by St. Nicholas nonetheless!

Read through the journaling to find out why...

(for a larger version, click here)

December Daily: Days 1-5

With the speed that that holidays seem to have (from Thanksgiving to my Dad's birthday to Christmas to our anniversary my Mom's birthday to Thomas's birthday in just 6 short weeks), I want to remember this season.

I decided to do Ali Edwards' "December Daily", with the following resolutions: to keep it simple, be flexible as needed, and be OK if it's not perfect or beautiful pages each day. I just want to remember the details of the first Christmas that Thomas is starting to 'get it', the last Christmas with one child before Wee Ski 2.0 arrives, and celebrate it as a family.

I began one early morning around 3 am (as seems to be the daily experience as sleep is harder to come by right now), and am loving how it's turning out.  I don't have a cover design yet, and that's OK. The design is simple to use (especially with the rounded corners templates as a base).  The pages are 8x8.  I'm just sampling colors from the photos in the layouts, so the colors change daily with the images.

So far, my favorite experience is from St. Nicholas's Day (yesterday) for a very special reason, but those pages aren't done yet.  They'll be up soon.  :)

In the meantime, here are the first five days.