The Christmas gifts...

On the seventh day of Christmas we were supposed to take pictures of the store or gifts we bought.  I was going to skip this one, but since there was no prompt for the actual gifts on Christmas morning, that's what I did instead. 
The big hit this year was the BIG dog!  She sleeps with it as a pillow every night...even on sleep overs!  Her laptop was a real close second...she's so excited she uses it several times a week!  She also really enjoys the new pants jammies (not fleece...she gets too hot!) and a beautiful pink hat with big pom poms (one on the top and two hanging from each ear).  I've even caught her sitting on the couch watching TV in the hat.

This was another fun layout.  I liked making the tag for the title.

Adult fun during the Santa Adventure

On the fifth day of Christmas we were prompted to take pictures at a holiday party.  Nicole told me to take my camera to the office party because that was probably going to be one of the prompts...I did, but I didn't take any pictures.  The VERY NEXT DAY the prompt was pictures at a holiday party.  Fortunately I had some good pictures to use from the Santa Adventure...hee, hee.

While the kids were writing letters to Santa, listening to the Polar Express, and watching a movie, the adults were drinking wine.  Boy, oh boy, did we drink some wine.  Jeff kept running around with the Santa hat saying, "This is as merry as I get."  All the while we knew he was having a blast.  So here is a picture of me on Santa's--I mean Jeff's--lap, and pictures of the men and ladies with Santa...we're such winos!  But we had a GREAT time!!!

Dashing thru the snow...

On the fourth day of Christmas we are supposed to pick a lyric or title from a song.  Keeping with the theme of trying to scrap as much as I can from the Santa Adventure, Jingle Bells came to mind, but not the whole song, just the first line in the song:  Dashing thru the snow.  If I'd have had enough room and letter, I'd have changed it to be:  in an eight dog open sled...

We went on a sled dog ride.  There wasn't enough snow for us to use the big sled for everyone to ride at once, so they took the small sled that only held two people at a time.  Lucky, Erica, she got to go twice...woo hoo!!!  Jeff has wanted to drive a sled dog team for as long as we've been in Alaska.  He kept bugging the musher (driver) to let him do it.  He even told her he'd pay big if she did.  Well, she let him.  Apparently he did a good job, too (or so I'm told).  At the end of the short ride, Jeff held up his end of the deal and gave her $100 to split with the other gal that was helping.  Too bad I couldn't get pictures of him driving...

Holiday Decor...

I'm going out of order and posting twice today cuz I don't really have a story or much to say about the sixth day of Christmas...and I'm really behind!  We were supposed to take pictures of the holiday decor.  Blah...no people and no real stories to tell.  But I do have to say that I like the layout design.  I may have to use this on another layout with a good story!

I guess I could say a few things about our decor:  Erica and I enjoy making the gingerbread house every year.  She begs and begs until Jeff breaks down and buys it.  I'm also a bit of a nut when it comes to the tree.  I like it all to match.  I made many of the ornaments...or I should say, I embellished them.  Most of them are red with silver, white, and gold.  I also made the stockings for Jeff and I shortly after we were married.  Erica's stocking is a hand-me-down.  Jeff's grandma made it for him when he was a boy...and she wants to keep it to give to her little boy or girl.  The nativity set is my first, given to me by my mom.  I can't recall where I got the snowmen...gifts from friends, but I've forgotten who (sorry!).  And I absolutely adore the cute Christmoose Jeff's mom made several years back...it hangs on the INSIDE of my door so I can enjoy it!

OK, I guess I had some things to say about the decor...but how do you fit all that on the layout.  Oh, well...

Dear Santa...

Oops...I have been slacking on my 12 days of Christmas posting.  Not a good way to start the year, sorry.  OK, so here we go trying to catch up.

The third day of Christmas is the Santa letter.  And boy do we have a doozy of a story!  The last night of the Santa Adventure, the kids wrote letters to Santa and then Santa came to read each child's letter out loud.  I read the draft letter, but not the final version...oops.  Erica asked Santa for some .22 shells and clips for "her" pistol.  Santa stopped reading and looked at her.  He said, "I'm not sure I can come visit you...I'm afraid you're going to shoot my reindeer."  Erica laughed and laughed.

Santa Adventure Crafts

Yeah...lots of layouts coming your way in the next few weeks (twelve...OK eleven cuz I already posted the first day of Christmas).  AND, I signed up for another class at Big Picture Classes called TWELVE.  I'll tell you more about that over the next few weeks (probably after I finish the 12 days of Christmas)...but the goal is to do 12 layouts a month for 12 months...WOW!!!  My personal goal/resolution for the year is to really internalize what the class is about and to complete all the layouts.  That will definitely be a challenge!!!  Oh, and I never really did the One Little Word class last year (Balance was my word...looking at my blog and the lack of posts, I think you can see I didn't really achieve it).  So this year's word is Journey.  I'll tell you more about that, later, too!  Whew...lots going on!

But onto the fun stuff for THIS post...and that's the Second day of Christmas.  This day was supposed to be decorating the tree.  Well, I already scrapped those pictures, soooo, I decided to use some pictures of Erica making Christmas ornaments during the Santa Adventure Weekend.  Of course, once I picked that topic, I found I really only had good pictures from the ornament she made at the Museum of the North.  Oh, well...the story is still the same, and that's the important part.  She made four or five ornaments that weekend.,,and for her that was GREAT!  She loves to be creative and crafty.  It's kinda hard to see, but there's holly on the moose's butt...I guess that's what makes it a Christmoose.

Papers and embellishments from Echo Park's Holly Jolly line.

The annual Christmas Tradition

There are few "staged family fun" activities I can get Jeff to participate in...decorating sugar cookies at Christmas time is one I never have a problem with.  Well, that's not completely true.  Usually he wants to get things DONE so he can eat them and I have to slow him down so I can get the "staged" pictures.
So here we are, having fun with our annual Christmas tradition of humoring mama with staged family fun...I mean with decorating our Christmas Sugar Cookies.  Everyone has their own job.  I roll out the dough, Erica cuts them out, Jeff frosts them, Erica decorates them (and makes a BIG mess), I take pictures, and we all enjoy them!!!

Thank you, again, to Basic Grey for the wonderful page layout.  This is one I put together over Thanksgiving and had to wait to fill with pictures.  Now I've shown you all the ones I did over Thanksgiving...but I have a few more I'll be making over the next few months (I hope!).

Happy New Year!!! And Merry Christmas

Whew...what a holiday season we just had!!!  I can't think of anything in particular we did that made it feel so crazy, but I also don't feel like I've had any free time until this weekend...and even that was packed (details shortly).
One of my scrappy friends and I are participating in a few scrappy classes together.  The first is the Twelve Days of Christmas, where each day before Christmas we were given a photo prompt and a list of supplies to gather.  Then, for the twelve days after Christmas, we take those supplies and they give us layout instructions for completing them.  I think it would've been better to get the photo prompts earlier because many of the things they suggested we had already done and had to fit other pictures into the layouts.  For me, it was easy because I had lots of pictures for the Santa Adventure Weekend and used those (woo hoo!!!).  So now for the crazy weekend:  I scrapped the first seven days....YEAH!!!!!

On the first day of Christmas we were supposed to take the Christmas family picture.  Well, I already scrapped two of them during the Thanksgiving Album in a Weekend effort...sooooo, I switched up the Bundle Up layout I last showed you.  Below are TWO layouts, the reworked Bundle Up and the First Day of Christmas (no title on the layout).

First, a build up on the Bundle Up layout...I really should've used this picture for this layout the first time cuz it's MUCH more appropriate.  I can't recall if I blogged about Erica participating in an Outdoor event at the Campbell Creek Science Center in November.  They went snow shoeing and build Quinsey Huts (or something like that...they are shelters made out of snow).  These were outdoor activities and it was TWENTY BELOW!!!  But she loved every bit of it...and when I picked her up all she wanted to do was tell me about all the fun stuff she did.  Thanks to her troop leader, I got this picture of her trying not to freeze :)

 And I've already blogged about this picture...so here's a new layout.  I used the Winter Park kit from Echo Park (what fun...and you'll see lots more from it in the coming days!!!).