Memories of Christmas Past by Kelly

For the past several years I have not done much scrapbooking during December, except for my holiday album--a mini-book documenting our Christmas activities. I usually make one or two full 12x12 layouts that capture Christmas day.

However, a few years ago, I took Debbie Hodge's class, Your December Story, at Get It Scrapped. The class leads you through scrapping your holiday as if you are the star in a hero's journey across the magical land of Christmas. I love revisiting the prompts in the class each year because I am inspired to document the small details that mean Christmas to me.

I will be following the lessons again this year (there are six), so I knew I needed a small kit with which I could complete the prompts. A few weeks ago I was lucky enough to win the new Classic Christmas collection by Authentique from A Cherry on Top. I chose some patterned papers, a 12x12 sticker sheet, and a small letter sticker sheet from my winnings.

I then went through my stash of embellishments leftover from other projects and picked out anything that I thought would go well with this collection. I added lace, ribbon, die cuts, gold tissue paper, brads, rub-ons, snowflakes, and a copper clip--all of which have the same vintage feel as the papers.

To make my scrapping go even faster, I chose this sketch from Scrapbook Challenges to use for the layout I will make for the first lesson of the class.

The sketch is fairly simple and has room for two photos. Or I could easily use only one photo in place of the two.

In the first lesson of the class, I am prompted to show the early signs of the approaching holiday season that appear in my life. Here is my page, documenting the first appearances of Christmas from last year.

I deliberately kept the page simple--using only stickers, die cuts, and lace as embellishments. Using more decorated patterned paper as a background helped me create an interesting page without adding many extras. Perfect for scrapbooking during this busy time!

I will be keeping this page kit around during the holidays so that I can make more layouts as time allows.

Happy Holidays!