December Daily: Dec. 1-10

Here is the second part of my December Daily. Part 3 will be up tomorrow!

Thanks for looking!

December Daily: Thanksgiving?

I think I was a little too ambitious when it came to doing my first December Daily. I decided to start on Thanksgiving and document through Christmas...maybe even until Dec. 31st.

But then we didn't do anything for a few days and the little guy was sick. The show must go on!

I was a little discouraged until I emptied CJ's backpack today. It had a few of his thanksgiving school projects. I added an insert of his art into the thanksgiving spread. I'm still waiting on more pics to be printed before I make more pages.

And without further adieu I present my Thanksgiving pages.

December Daily Book and Foundation Pages

I finally found a book to house my December Daily. I found an 8x8 chipboard album that was perfect. The album is actually more like 10x8 but that size is actually perfect for what I need. I can't use page protectors which makes me uneasy but I'm sure no one except me will look at it anyway. LOL

The album came with a naked chipboard cover and a green fabric spine. I covered the naked chipboard with Santa paper. I folded the excess over the edge of the page and secured with washi tape. I was afraid if the edges were left raw that it would make the paper easier to tear.

This album also didn't come with pages so I took the foundation pages and taped them together. It makes the pages sturdier although I may add eyelets at a later time to reinforce the holes.

Here are the rest of the foundation pages. Some of the pictures are upside down and others are sideways but you get the point. I can't for the life of me figure out how they keep getting turned around.

As of now I am starting my December Daily on Thanksgiving and ending on Christmas. However, I am off the last 10 days of December so if I have time and things to add I will finish out the month of December. I'll just be happy if I start and actually finish the darn thing. A few days will be easy since I have 2 birthdays and a few other events that I know for sure will happen.

Now I need to get my numbers together and cut photo mats, etc.

How to make faux metal embellishments

Yesterday's post showed custom embellishments I made for my 2012 December Daily cover.

The process is really easy and took almost no time at all to do.

First, coat your chipboard in versamark ink. Versamark is a sticky clear ink that leaves a watermark on regular pages and allows embossing powder to stick to the item before embossing.

Yeah, yeah. I know my ink pad is super dirty. I have a clean one I use for clear embossing or to use as a watermark ink. This one is for the "dirty jobs".

Instead of pouring the embossing powder over my letter I just poured a little powder in the lid and dipped my number in it.

At this point I was worried since the powder didn't have very good coverage. The powder melted beautifully over the number once I hit it with the heat gun.

I decided to do the same to my brads. Bad picture, bad lighting. Sorry.

So, there you have it. Custom embellishments!

December Daily Cover

I was ambitious this weekend and pre-cut all of my base papers for the December Daily, or Big D, as I'm beginning to call it. I'm sure I'll change my mind once I have actual pictures to put in it, but whatever. I'm proud to say I "shopped my stash". The papers used were from 2 paper packs from The Paper Studio. The other papers are from an old (maybe 2010) My Minds Eye Christmas paper pack.

I pulled some really old ledger chipboard letters from Heidi Swapp. I inked them up with Festive Berries Distress Ink. It seems like the letters resisted the ink a little so I swiped them about 4 times. I had to put down a strip of temporary adhesive and stick the letters to it. Made inking SO much easier!

I also inked up a bookplate with Festive Berries. I wanted metallic numbers for the year 2012 so I embossed the letters with pewter embossing powder. I had brads that matched the green in my paper but thought that might look odd with the metallic letters so I embossed them as well. Tutorial on that to come later this week.

Here is the completed cover page. I added close-ups to the letters. I was going to put clear crackle on them but thought the distressed look with the ledger underneath was a cool look. I went ahead and inked the edges of the paper with Festive Berries as well.





December Daily Sneak Peek

Last night I went through my stash of Christmas paper to use in my December Daily. I cut everything down to 8x8.

Today I worked on my cover. Everything used was in my stash and has been for well over a year. Very exciting :)

Anyway, it's late and I don't feel much like starting the computer up and uploading pictures so this sneak peek will have to tide you over until tomorrow.

And stay tuned for tomorrow. I'll show you how to make custom embellishments. I took lots of pics!