For a number of reasons, I’ve decided to call it good enough: I’m finished with my Christmas journal. Some of the ending prompts were leaving me a little cold, and I woke up ready to be done with this project.  The decorations got put away yesterday, and I don’t want this project hanging around waiting to be finished for weeks, when I ought to be moving on.  I had a moment’s guilt for not finishing all the way to the end of the entire 37 prompts, but it was only a moment.  It’s my journal, it can be whatever I want it to be.

So:  I did two more layouts, rearranged some of the date tags on the pages I did yesterday, printed out and punched the last pages, and am calling it good.

First up is a retrospective of our sightseeing in New York City.

The words around the edge read:  Statue of Liberty’s nose * Fogged up New York City Skyline * Not as big as expected, but she is still quite impressive * Madison Square Garden (a Godzilla Landmark) * Mood Fabrics — Wow! * Empire State Building (another Godzilla landmark) * Rockefeller Center  Christmas Tree * Penny Harvest (a million dollars in pennies!) * Colin, watching the ice skaters * Will and Dad skating in Central Park * Oh, and there’s Joe, too!

Journaling my Christmas has been a fun experience.  It’s brought back fond memories of the past, given me the opportunity to learn a little bit about how to scrapbook using my computer, and best of all:  given me a very special reminder of this year’s Christmas experiences.

I’ve tried to think about anything in particular that I want to remember for next year.  The main thing is that I do NOT (I repeat, DO NOT) need to buy wrapping paper next year.  There is MORE than enough Christmas paper in the box to last for several seasons.

There is more I could say about the holidays, but I feel like it is time to be done with this project.  I look forward to other journal and scrapbooking adventures in the coming year, and look forward to doing this all over again next year.

I thought about trying to make notes about what I might do differently next time, but honestly:  too much will change between now and then, that I can’t even begin to predict what kind of an artistic challenge I might be looking for when Christmas comes around again.

The cover itself was done several weeks ago.  The album is made out of 2 pieces of acrylic.  I found the metal tags at Hobby Lobby — they were self-adhesive.   Those are adhered on the outside of the acrylic, and I fussed around with the design of the cover page so that the tags would fit over top of the center strip and look nice.  The pages are all held together with 4 metal locking rings.

I had also purchased some ribbon to maybe tie on the rings for further embellishment, but in case you haven’t been able to figure out:  that doesn’t really suit my style.  My style seems to tend more toward the restrained, simple and uncluttered.

So how is it that my artistic style is uncluttered, but my office and studio are……disaster areas?

There you have it.

What’s next?

Suzanne

Most of the rest of my journal pages are going to be about the text — I wrote a lot when I was at my sister’s!   When I copied and pasted the text, I found some typos.  I’ve fixed my original, but the image below does have some misspellings.   Joe was looking through the printed journal one day and found at least one typo that I missed.  I should have him and Will check the whole thing for me!

Christmas Morning — not having our luggage seemed to put a damper on all of our moods. I have discovered that we didn’t
manage to take a single picture in the morning. Colin was up early, but everyone else slept in. We opened our stockings, and the
presents from Santa and the Ellsworths. Colin opened “Rocket” just about first thing, and after that he wasn’t interested in any-
thing else. He played with it and the four “guys” for hours! He did manage to help unwrap the rest of his gifts, but after care-
fully pulling the paper off and handing it to his Dad a piece at a time (Here you go!) he went right back to Rocket.

The boys especially loved the remote control helicopters that Santa brought, and buzzed those around our heads for most
of the day.

Debra made Cinnamon Streusel Coffee Cake and it was quite yummy. Most of us ended up taking naps while we continued to wait
for our luggage — which finally arrived at 12:30. What a relief it was to shower and have our belongings. We didn’t even bother
wrapping our gifts at that point. We just handed them out as we opened suitcases and started digging through them.

We managed to draw Colin’s attention from Rocket for a little while — we had gotten him a toy John Deere Backhoe Loader,
which turned out to be the same exact model as the real one that he could see out his window at the construction site next to
the condo.

The boys tried to go to Liberty State Park and play outside, but it was colder down by the water than we had thought it was,
so they pretty much turned around and came right back. Mark had not been feeling well in the morning, and by the afternoon
he was quite sick, running a fever and feeling generally miserable. He ending up sleeping a lot.

Debra made a pot of mashed potatoes to go with the Honey Ham for supper — it was quite yummy.

Except for the helicopters, it was a very subdued day.

Sunday the 23rd was “Christmas Day” at our house — the boys got a Nintendo Wii from Santa. They started playing at 10 AM and
quit at 5:30 PM. No lunch, no drinks, and only a few quick potty breaks. They were VERY crabby afterwards, and we were pretty
well convinced that their behavior afterwards was good evidence that too much video game time rots your brain.

The 20th says:

Just a few weeks ago, I wouldn’t have believed that I would have a picture of  my boys with their Smeigh cousins to put in my Christmas Journal.  David’s phone call telling us that he and his family were coming  — all the way from Tunisia! — to spend a few days at our house while they were in the States was a huge Surprise.  We had an awesome visit, and were so sad to see them leave.  Joe wants to go visit them in Tunisia next year.

The prompt for the 21st was to take a picture of your house right NOW — was it ready for the holidays??  Was it a mess?  Well, the pictures I managed to take that day all had to do with the family that was filling up my house, so that’s what I decided to go with for the day’s entry.

If you are interested in the credits for the digital elements, you can click on the picture(s), which will take you to Flickr, where you can view the entries larger, read the credits, and see past entries as well.

And with that, I really am signing off.  We were supposed to have visitors today, but with the weather, that didn’t work out:  which meant some unexpected time today to get a few of my journal entries caught up.  After this, though, I’ll be taking notes and pictures, but not doing the actual entires until my return.

TTFN-

Suzanne