Merry Christmas!!

Journal Your Christmas-December 19

This was about a letter to Santa. The first page is an envelope about a Wishing Tree community service project I did this year. Families in the Ballard school district can write their children's list of needs and wants, then people can take a list and purchase items for them to have for Christmas. I got a list of 3 girls and 1 boy-whew-girl shopping is HARD!
The second page is where LAD got to meet Santa this year and sit in his lap. He's now hooked on candy canes!

Making cookies!

We made sugar cookies last weekend and LAD was a BIG help! I'm not sure how much dough he snitched, but it was probably a whole cookies worth! He also had fun "cleaning up" . View the slideshow over on the right for more entertainment!

Journal Your Christmas

Christmas cards are in the mail...finally... so I was able to complete this page!


















This is a prompt about Christmas pasts, page is done, no journaling done yet...







All about the presents, again no journaling done, but page is mostly done. Might stick on a pic here later after Christmas.

Tree photos

Just a few fun photos of our tree and LAD. He is on the GO so much it's hard to get one of him sitting still!

Journal Your Christmas 12/7 thru 12/11

I was a few days behind, but have finally caught up, basically...with ideas for a couple days I am missing...
12/7 was lists, to do, organization, etc. These days were spent preparing for a B-day party!
12/8 was Do you see what i see, eyes open for holiday changes, etc. This was very fun. I like how it turned out.
12/9 was traditions, which is in my head but not on paper yet!
12/10 was about trimmings, wrapping paper, etc. This was a pretty easy one, except I see the glue i used on my craft wrap paper to stick to the red glossy paper is not holding so will have to reinforce that. but later.
12/11- Happy Birthday LAD- was about the Ole' Christmas tree. This was pretty easy since we just put it up on Sunday. LAD, like the cats, enjoys lounging under it! I like how this page turned out too and the little book thing was pretty neat to do. It has another snapshot of the tree on the back of the second page. I think I'll add a little line around the edges of the whole page here, but later...

Happy Birthday LAD!

Even though his birthday isn't until Tuesday, we celebrated with a party on Saturday. He loved the Lightning cake and did a pretty good job blowing out the candles. See the slideshow to view more pictures. He loved all his gifts and the Lightning McQueen Hideout was the best! Even Harry and Zoe had to check it out. Zoe will probably spend as much time in it as LAD will, but only when not occupied by LAD! The balloons were pretty great too. That Lightning one is HUGE!

Today we colored with the markers he got and he looks like a rainbow! He can get the caps off and back on, which I was surprised about, they're pretty tight.

Now on to put up the Christmas tree, and maybe a _few_ ornaments!

Christmas Memories and Snow and Sledding

Christmas memories, nice and not-so-nice that was todays topic. Since I don't really have any BAD memories of Christmas, i picked "just OK Christmas" memories to journal about. Journaling basically talks about when I moved to Raleigh in the fall of 96 and wasn't able to come back home for Christmas and again in 97 when I had just moved to Ames and also wasn't able to come home for Christmas. I was sometimes alone, but never lonely, knowing I did have family that loved me and were thinking of me as I was them.
The best memories are of the last 2 years. LAD was born in 2005 just 2 weeks before Christmast so I couldn't have asked for a better gift than a beautiful and healthy baby. Last year we were all able to get together at Grant's in Jefferson City and that was very special to ALL be together on Christmas.

We got about 4 inches of snow today, roads were yucky but the scenery was beautiful.

LAD got to go sledding for the first time. Apparently helmets are required. A little hard to do with a stocking cap on, but we did it anyway! Randy pulled and pulled and pulled some more! Then Randy snow-blowed the driveway and LAD stood at the edge of the house and watched the whole time, holding, with both hands, a snowball we had made. Very mesmerizing, the snow blower is!

Embarking on a Christmas ADVENTure

Today's Journal Your Christmas was about Advent, and whether you offically count down the days and if so, how, etc.

Advent (from the Latin words advenio, meaning "to come", "the coming of Christ our saviour") the period of expectant waiting and preparation for the celebration of Christmas.

We never had Advent calendars growing up, that I remember, so this is a new tradition for our family. I guess I’m always aware of how many days are left for preparing for Christmas but officially counting the days and doing something fun or meaningful seems like a good way to bring back the spirit each day of this season.
I’ve been seeing very creative and festive ways of honoring Advent on the internet, but LAD is a little too young yet to really understand what’s going on, so I found a fun downloadable, printable Advent calendar for this year. Maybe next year we can have a more elaborate one and he can help craft it! And we can start creating it in October or November!
Today is the 5th, so only 20 more days to go!

Journal Your Christmas, Dec 3 and 4

Dec 3's prompt was about Christmas cards. Do you buy them, make them from scratch, etc. Since I haven't even started that project yet, I will skip that page until later! Christmas is officially on hold until after LAD's birthday on Dec 11. Just doesn't seem right to start with Christmas yet, well at least decorating, doing cards, etc.
Dec 4ths prompt was about your idea of the perfect Christmas. My idea of the perfect Christmas is pretty much based on happy childhood memories and that's what I journaled about. The light colored paper here flips up to refeal journaling underneath. I hope to create some of the same happy moments for LAD and hope he grows up with happy memories of perfect Christmas's too.
Love this paper from Basic Gray-Figgy Pudding!. Santa is a stamp and the tree is a rub-on. I am going to put clear glaze over the chipboard letters so they are a little shinier and stand out a little more.
Christmas is 3 weeks from today (i'm still on Tuesday, even though it's 1:41 AM. 1:41 AM Holy Cow-off to bed). 1 week until LAD turns 2! Yikes!!!

Journal Your Christmas-December 2

Today's entry was about the weather. Well we've started the month off with a bang in that department. Yesterday we had sleet and freezing rain, but it warmed up to the mid 30's later in the day so it didn't stick to the trees and power lines like it could have. My journaling for this page got a little long winded so I just tucked it into the envelope that I attached to the page.
LAD colored the center snowman, from something that came in the mail. Bird pics are from 2003!
Yikes-where has the time gone!

Journal Your Christmas

Browsing around a few days ago I somehow ran onto this website, shimelle and discovered she is offering a class called Journal Your Christmas. This sounded very fun and a good way to really soak up the spirit of the season. So I thought what the heck and joined up.

Basically it's keeping a journal for the season and documenting what it means to you. Read more about it here. This is the manifesto offered to jump start December's first entry:

I declare my intention to Journal my Christmas. Writing something down every day. Creating a little bit whenever possible. Getting my stories documented for myself and maybe for others to read too.

I hope by taking a little time each day to reflect, to write, to create, I will keep my Christmas alive and well, despite the commercial pressure that exists outside my door. Family, friends and hot beverages will help.

I may meet others taking this same journey. I may share my work from time to time. I may remember just why I loved Christmas in the first place, and that may be a very magical moment indeed.

Here is my first page. I have yet to do the outside of the album, but have something in mind.

Welcome December!!!

We visited Santa a couple weeks ago. LAD was a little shy at first but warmed up very quckly. And of course the candy cane was a big hit! He was a pretty good Santa with very twinkly eyes!

This is December 1st. Sleet and freezing rain. Temps were in the mid 20's this morning, now mid 30's by afternoon, so it wasn't near as severe as it could have been. I think the main roads are beginning to open up and Randy was able to go to Ames this afternoon. Our water heater has been dying over the last week and of course picked last night to finally bite the bullet. So he's gone shopping! Man Shopping!



LAD just playing. Experimenting with zooming the lens during slow shutter speeds.

Learning from the cat?

Not sure who's emulating who, LAD and Zoe both seem to enjoy being IN the baskets. LAD saw Zoe in one of these baskets the other day and wasn't so happy about it. They both like it when you carry them when they are in the basket.

Happy Thanksgiving!

We had a couple inches of snow on Wednesday, just in time for a White Thanksgiving. It flurried all thru today, would have been a perfect Christmas Day! Tomorrow-Shopping!!!
Hope everyone had a wonderful holiday!

The many faces of LAD

Redneck Race Car Fan or Santa's Elf, or

Winning Prize Fighter, or


Sumo Wrestler, or


Pig Wrangler.

Let's go with the Pig Wrangler, there's cold hard cash involved!