December Daily 2015 – Day 12

And here we are for day twelve.

Another really simple page, I know but this one makes me happy, too. The photo is from the doctor’s office where the kids got their flu shots. David didn’t want his photo taken and was messing with me by covering the camera or his face. When I saw this one in the photos, I immediately knew I wanted to add it to my album.

the ordinary moments of my life make me so grateful.

December Daily 2015 – Day 11

And here we are for day eleven.

Today’s story is about taking a rest day and then having it be really busy anyway. I wrote a bunch of all the different things I did today but the main part is about meeting my Young Adult book group and how wonderful it was.

this year’s album is so much simpler than usual for me, but I still love looking through it.

December Daily 2015 – Day 10

And here we are for day ten.

Today’s story is about being in Nathaniel’s classroom. I spent the morning doing circle time with him and it was so very wonderful. I picked the photo I loved the most, cut it to 4×4 and added it on there as a flap.

and the journaling is on the other side with some more photos from the class :

the light here has been really bad but here’s an attempt at a closeup.

December Daily 2015 – Day 9

And here we are for day nine.

Today’s story is about Hannukah. I captured this shot and then as I looked at it, I realized it had a menorah, christmas ornaments and the turkish evil eye so it struck me how it was such a perfect capture of the many sides of my life and identity so I decided I wanted to write about that.

and here’s the back with the story:

I loved the original page 9 page a lot so I left it as is and will do the back for day 10.

December Daily 2015 – Day 8

And here we are for day eight.

Today’s another three little stories, I like this idea quite a bit. Especially for variety. I also like how I can see through some of the pockets to day 6.

These stories are about watching David basketball and how brave he is for showing up and how they won their game in the last 20 seconds. And then another one about a middle school we had to visit for part of the application process and how brave and wonderful he’s being with that, too. and finally a story about coding and how David was so inspired last week at a school that he spent his day and night programming in Python.

yey! 🙂

December Daily 2015 – Day 7

And here we are for day seven.

I liked the layout of this page and thought it was a great opportunity to tell some of the smaller stories from our week, so I made 3 little 2×2 photos and then journaled each of the stories in 3 journaling cards.

Here’s the before of this page:

and now the spread:

a closer look:

The stories I wrote were about how I am now driving on the freeway all the time (and had to on Saturday to take David to this new school), how I’ve been going to work a bunch lately, and how Nathaniel and I had a date night while David and his friends were working on their Tech Challenge (and Jake was away.)

I love having these little bits in my album and am planning to do the same for the backside.

December Daily 2015 – Day 6

And here we are for day six.

No matter how much I tried, the light wasn’t cooperating for this shot. Today’s story is about the Google Christmas party for Geo team. This year’s party was in the city and the theme was San Francisco. They gave us little pins as our entry tokens and I really liked how the before of this page looked so all I added was my journaling and the little pin of Painted Ladies on the left side.

Then I made a page on the right with a vellum pocket where I put the photos we had during the event. I always love having these.

Here’s a closeup of the pocket.

and on the back, I put more of the photos from the event:

and a little origami penguin I got:

and here’s the closeup of this pocket:

For the journaling I wrote about how we almost didn’t go because our sitter wasn’t available but how I am so glad we went anyway and how these parties each year are like special kind of date nights for Jake and me to share.

December Daily 2015 – Day 5

And here we are for day five.

Today’s story is our Breakfast with Santa. We’ve been doing this for many, many years. It’s our neighborhood tradition. This year, as it worked out, David had an appointment at one of the middle schools he’s applying to so we weren’t sure if we were going to make it. But we didn’t want to miss it so we registered for the 7:30 slot so we got to go, eat our breakfast, take some shots with Santa and then leave for the appointment.

We ended up making friends with another family during breakfast, their daughter is also super-into science so we decided to make sure to meet again soon. Then when Santa asked the boys what they wanted for Christmas, Nathaniel said a “science kit” but David said “A quick and easy way to take over the world!” which Santa thought was funny and then asked him what he would do once he had the world. This stumped David momentarily so we all laughed. And then someone suggested he give presents to others and then Santa said then he can sit at home and we all laughed again. Our new friends took a photo of all of us with Santa and then we rushed out the door to make it to the school on time.

I am so glad we decided to go despite it being a bit stressful. I feel like having these events we do each year it something I cherish because I can see how the same event feels so different each year as the boys grow up and our life changes.

December Daily 2015 – Day 4

And here we are for day four.

Today’s story is about David’s middle school application process. It’s been such a big part of our lives this whole year that I couldn’t imagine not putting it in the album. I am sure it will appear several more times. He was shadowing at a school today so I took a shot of him on the way in and then took a photo of the little gift they gave him on the way out.

And then I wrote about how the process has been and my hopes for how it will unfold.

December Daily 2015 – Day 3

And here we are for day three.

Today’s story is the Niles Christmas train that we take every year. I think we started taking this train before Nathaniel was born and it’s one of my favorites. We always have a lot of photos so I wanted to make sure to honor that and added a new page to put the ticket and some of our photos.

on the back is a photo of me with the boys and Jake with David.

and here’s the actual page I had for day three. I love that we have a photo of all of us for once. I wrote the story of how we always take this train and what it means to me.

I also journaled about how this year, Jake had to go to San Diego right after and even though it meant he’d have to drive all night and sleep for 4 hours and drive some more, he still came on the train with us. I wanted to thank him and remember how he did this wonderful thing for us even though it made it harder for him.

I’m so grateful for him and for my boys.

December Daily 2015 – Day 2

And here we are for day two.

Today’s story is the advent calendar. Why this tradition is different to me, why we didn’t go with legos this year and how the kids were excited to have something daily to open.

a simple page but I love it.

December Daily 2015 – Intentions and Day 1

Here we go.

One of the things I did yesterday was finally listen to all the videos Ali had in her December Memories class, and I decided I definitely wanted to set some intentions for my album and for December this year. So I changed my opening page to work with that. Here’s the before and after:

before:

closeup:

after:

I stitched two journaling pages together. The left side says Brave and Kind. The right side explains my goals to be brave this holiday season. To feel and act brave. To do what I know I can. To acknowledge when I am brave, too. And my goals to be Kind. To be kind to myself, to Jake, to the kids, the kids to each other, to everyone I see all day long.

I then changed the back to include a photo of us and my usual beginning of “and so it begins”. The before was day two so I won’t post it but here’s the after:

And finally for day 1, I decided to add a new page and I told the story of these little houses my mom sent me from Turkey and how the lights are one of the most magical parts of what makes this whole season feel so magical to me.

So here goes day 1.