Today I want to share my cover and foundation pages for this years December Daily album. If you are new to my blog, or missed my previous planning posts, I am using
Studio Calico's December Daily kit this year.
The 4x6 album is linen-covered and I wanted to keep it simple, as I have the last two years.
I simply wrapped the cover with red ribbon and tied it in a bow. I cut a
snowflake on the Silhouette from
Powder POW and strung it onto a small safety pin with a white tag. On the safety pin I added a few clear seedbeads (from my jewelry making days) for a little extra sparkle. The white tag was stamped with a Stampin Up calendar stamp and the badge and veneer numbers were part of the kit.
On the inside of the album, I added another
badge to the ribbon with a small jewelry tag, veneer snowflake and rhinestone.
The kit came with an assortment of clear transparency, chipboard and page protectors and I really want to take advantage of the different pages and mix them up throughout the album.
My type A personality wants to do it in an orderly fashion though. So I came up with a pattern that could be repeated to get the best use of all the products.
With 20 page protectors, 10 chipboard pages, 5 transparencies and 5 of my own patterned transparencies, this was my pattern :
clear transparency
page protector
chipboard
page protector
star transparency
page protector
chipboard
page protector
(repeat 5 times)
So the opening page was a clear transparency that I decorated with several layers of embellishments.
Ribbon,
number clips from my stash, veneers, a diecut and mini tag. Here is a closeup :
And the back. I lightly misted the
star with
gold Mister Huey's.
Page two is a page protector. I just slipped the gold polka dot vellum paper in and embossed the 'hello December' arrow in white on white paper.
A little washi, a few enamel dots, done.
And the back.
And the pattern continues. I lightly painted the chipboard pages with
Jenni Bowlin malted milk paint. Just a thin, somewhat streaky coat to add a bit of texture. Right now I'm thinking these are the pages I'll mist on or add more paint layers too. Plus there will be photos and/or journaling to cover up these not-so-perfect pages.
As I went through the album, I added a sticky note so I know which pages belong to which day.
My plan is to do one 2-page spread for the weekdays and two 2-page
spreads on the weekends, when we'll be doing more family activities like
getting our tree and celebrating with family. Christmas Eve and Christmas Day
will also get two 2-page spreads.
I didn't really have a rhyme or reason to which page protectors got patterned paper and which didn't. If I decide to use a full photo instead of the paper, it's very easy to pull out and move around. Right now, this gives me a good base to work from.
I will likely add full photos to the pages after a transparency, like December 17 above, because I like the look of being able to see through the clear page and peek at what's next.
That pattern above repeated until I got through Christmas Day and I have a couple of extra pages leftover. It already looks nice and full.
As the month goes on, if I think it's getting too full, I'll probably cut down on the weekend/double spread pages. 'Make it work' is the theme for this project but I am not afraid of a chunky album.
I am so excited to start! Last night I decided to make some room and I organized my supplies so they are at hand each night when I hope to work on my layout for the day.
I have an
IKEA Raskog cart that I keep my most often used embellishments in. I relocated the items in the top tray so I could put the contents of my kit in there.
On my desk I filled a wood clementine box with my stamping, embossing and misting supplies.
Next to it, I tossed the leftover patterned paper from my foundation pages into a plant pot. As I need scrap paper, I can rifle through there easily. Most of the pieces are 2" x 6" and will also work great for punching and making Silhouette cuts. I plan to use every little bit of this kit that I can!
Before I close, I wanted to share a couple links, especially for those who haven't done a December Daily before. In
my last post,
I got some questions about planning for those 'ordinary' days where you
don't think you have anything to document. These links have great ideas that I referred back to several times last year.
And that's it - I think I'm ready to play! How about you?
Don't know what December Daily is? Check out the huge compilation of links and inspiration on Ali Edwards blog.
