Tackling Christmases Past: Done, Done, and Done

Just a little over a year ago, I set out on a mission to tackle 6 years worth of Christmas photos that had never been documented and get them scrapped and in the albums. You can read more about this HERE, if you haven't read it already. I feel like I've repeated a lot of this while sharing each of the layouts I've created over the last year, but I'm going to do a little re-cap anyways! I thought it would be cool to share all of the layouts in one single post.

A quick refresher. I relied heavily on Kerri's Storyboard templates for this project, and created 16 different photo collages, that included a total of 143 photos. These collages covered 6 family get togethers from those 6 years, as well as 3 Christmas mornings with just our little family. In the end, my plan was to end up with 6 two page layouts and 3 single page layouts. Well, it's taken me a full year (and a month, if you want to get technical), but I've finished all 9 of those layouts!

[Post found HERE]

This design was a popular one with me. The full page photo collage, with a smaller collage on the opposite page. I've used this design numerous times for birthday layouts as well. It's just a great design for getting gobs and gobs of photos on the page.

[Post found HERE]

Every now and then, when working on these layouts, I would start to worry that they looked too much the same. With the same basic design, same photo collages, same title placement, etc. I was constantly reminding myself that I went into this project just wanting to knock these layouts off my list. I've mentioned how I don't necessarily enjoy scrapping Christmas's, so I didn't want these to be layouts that I stressed over. If using the same basic ideas over and over helped me tackle something that I don't enjoy, then more power to me.

[Post found HERE]

For most of these layouts, I just dug into my stash of Christmas product to see what I could use up. I did however, dig into my everyday papers as well. This layout is an example of that. I don't believe there's anything on this page that was meant to be a "Christmas" product. I always pull my colors from the colors in my photos, so the photos really dictated my color schemes, even if they weren't the traditional Christmas colors.

[Post found HERE]

Another thing that made these layouts quick and easy, for the most part, is that they're hugely made up of patterned paper, die cuts, and photo collages. I die cut titles with my Silhouette Cameo for every single layout, and on a few of them, I also die cut a few additional pieces for the page. I kept the embellishments super simple, with maybe a few enamel dots, buttons, brads, or pre-made 3x4" cards.

[Post found HERE]

And after looking at all of these layouts together, I guess my love of my scalloped border punch from Stampin' Up really shows! I do love that punch, and it's my go-to border punch when working on projects. I think I used it on six of these nine layouts. I do own other border punches, for the record, so I should show them all some love every now and then.

[Post found HERE]

I keep a 12x12" Iris container that's filled with Christmas themed product and patterned papers. It was so easy to just pull out the box and see if I had anything to coordinate with my photos. I certainly didn't plan on using glittered foam Christmas trees on the design of this page. But as I was digging thru the box, I pulled them out and thought they'd fill in some space on the page. So why not.

[Post found HERE]

I also love that this project gave me a chance to use up some product that I've been holding onto, with only one project in mind. I remember getting this Christmas collection from Chickaniddy over a year ago, when I guest designed for them, and at first glance, I didn't think it was something I would use. But the collection colors worked perfectly with these photos, so I held onto it, knowing I would use it for this layout and most likely this layout only.

[Post found HERE]

This layout looks soooooo similar to the first layout I created for this project, and that's totally fine with me. The beauty of using the same design, is that it saves you time from having to come up with a whole new design, over and over. And because these layouts are all from different years, they're not going to be side by side in any albums or anything. So no one is really going to notice that a few layouts are similar to each other.

[Post found HERE]

I also went into these layouts knowing that I most likely wouldn't include any journaling on most of them. Especially the ones documenting family get-togethers. I don't want it to sound like the holidays are boring and monotonous. Because they're not. However, they usually include the same family members, we're usually at the same house, eating the same foods, opening gifts and doing our pick-a-gift exchange game. So I don't necessarily feel like I need to add journaling to those pages, as it would most likely say the same thing, year after year.

So, what's next? I have Christmas 2014 to do still. I never did edit those photos, so once I edit them, I can get that layout knocked out. And with Christmas 2015 just a few days away, I will have that to scrap as well. I believe I have one more Christmas that was within my "digital years", so that's one more I need to take care of. If I want to continue with the earlier Christmases, it will involve film prints and/or negatives. We'll see how up to that I'm feeling. Otherwise, I'd love to tackle the girls birthday's in the same way, and get those all taken care of. We'll see what I'm feeling inspired to tackle once the new year comes around.

 

Comments

[Dolly]

SO awesome Laura!! TFS

[deneen]

Love these!

[Kathleen D]

It's funny that you mention not liking to scrap Christmas. I'm the same way. I do a Dec Daily album leading up to Christmas and take a gagillion photos on Christmas day when we open presents but don't scrap that event. Haha. Now I just may think about it. I actually like the consistency stretching across these pages. Are you going to put them all in one album together? I also love how you use SIL die cuts on all of them. Thanks for the blogpost. this makes me want to scrap opening presents (maybe, lol ).

[Natalie (QSOgirl)]

Wow, Laura, these are incredible! Congratulations on accomplishing your goal-- it must feel SO GOOD! I think it's really awesome that there's a sort of pattern or consistency to the layouts-- something to look forward to in each year's album: the awesome collage of Christmas photos. I love seeing them all together in this post!! It really is inspiring to me. And, I think I need to start using some photo collages! :)