Christmas Exploded

First, I want to say that I thought today was Friday, but alas it's Saturday. I don't know how I lost a day, but I did. Perhaps it was because I've been busy doing scrappy, cleany, holiday stuff all week? That or I'm finally losing my mind.

Moving on...

December is in full swing around digi land. The stores and galleries are all a buzz with holiday wonder. I've been festive myself between the kits I've collected, CT work and Your December Story (which I believe you can still register for if you like, but not for much longer). I thought I'd take a moment to share some pretties and you'll notice that I'm kinda in love with gold lately:

First is my homage to my gnomes. This page was my first ever Gallery Standout on the GSO blog. Yay gnomes. Pixels and Co. was our Featured Sponsor last month at MSA, so I got to test drive some product. I fell in love with Creashen's Tomte kit because no one has done gnomes thanks to Elf on the Shelf, which a total rip-off on the ancient gnome thing. My gnome could kick your elf's tail.



Then came (sorta) my page for GIS: Same Print Mixing. I used some photo outtakes to tell the story of our yearly kid-photo-op. It's a tradition and one of the rare times my kid lets me take a lot of snapshots of him. It was a challenge using stripes because I'm not a huge pattern paper (or even paper) user. I like to push the limits, so I found this great golden stripe in my stash and paired it with a diagonal charcoal paper. I also got out the super old alpha I love. You can read my thoughts about working with same prints HERE.




Still with me? Good. Another tree page. Jaimee's contribution to the Dec BYOC included some amazing freaking papers, but no elements besides tape (with the paper), an alpha and tags. I challenged myself to stick (mostly) to her BYOC products. The blue tape is from Merry & Bright. Here's the result:



Really, my hubby kept telling me the fake tree needed to settle before we put lights on it. Gotta love brain damage! It can be hilarious at times.

On now to MSA's yearly holiday kit, Holiday Hoopla: Merry & Bright, which is helpful in stretching the stash and the budget. It's only $5 so if you want it, go get it!  Once it's gone, it's gone for good. The kit has a great mix of artsy and traditional elements and papers, along with a ton of alphas. It's huge a versatile and general enough for daily winter scrapping. Also, I love those lights and the felt ornament. This is another tree page. I have thing for Christmas trees:



Last one, I promise! This was created from Lesson 2 of Your December Story. My son has really been into the holidays like never before, so I'm relishing every moment. Since he's an Asperger's kid, normally the upheaval Christmas didn't interest him prior to this year. Forget watching Christmas movies, baking cookies and decorating the tree. He had to bribed or lost interest after 15 minutes because his obsessive interest du jour was calling. Other than presents, he didn't want to participate. Also, the idea of an Santa always watching him caused him great anxiety. The idea is really creepy when you think literally like my son.

For whatever reason, my kiddo is filled with the holiday spirit this year and he STILL believes in Santa, despite the lack of evidence and naysayers. He also is interested in the traditions and stories of Christmas in our family. He practically decorated our tree this year himself! This page is about that belief and I will do a more in-depth page of text to accompany it later:




This may be one of my favorite pages ever. He's such a cutie in this photo. I need to look at it this page next he tells me I suck.

I'm done now. You deserve to get a prize for reading, but you're not gonna. But, here, have a cyber high five: **HIGH FIVE**

♥ Carrie