December Daily 2013 - Foundation pages part 1!!

Wow, so here we are so fast - it's time for December Daily 2013! I got my Studio Calico kit with Ali Edwards yesterday in the mail and my husband so graciously took care of our DD so I could work on my DD... got that!? I've decided a few things ahead of time this year:

1. I will keep it simple and stick to the kit supplies! Last year I bought extras and added my own stuff in there, and when I think about how much I spent already on the kit and then to add extras, it's too expensive for me to justify, especially now that I have quite a bit of leftover from last year!

2. I will not care or mind that I don't have photos first - last year I waited to do anything because I thought I couldn't make a page without photos, but I think that's partially what made me fall behind. So this year I am forcing myself to just get as much done in advance as possible!

3. I will not become discouraged if I happen to miss a day - I missed a day last year and used a picture from the next day and just explained that I didn't do anything the previous day anyway. I will keep taking pictures and documenting the stories! That helped a ton after day 12 since I didn't finish DD 2012 till last month!

4. I will not give up if I don't finish DD by the end of December or the beginning of January. If I put it away for a few months, that's ok! This year, stepping away from it for many months helped me get excited again for DD and gave me that extra boost to finish it up.

5. Not every page has to be perfect, but I definitely like the look of each page looking holiday-ish even without holiday-ish photos. I did the last half of my last year's album that way - ex. I made a picture of taco night holiday-themed just by not caring what stickers and embellishments I used, and love that look so much better!

Anyway, now that I've made those decisions - here are the steps I took to start filling this album!

1. I mixed up the page protectors and removed the ones beyond 25 page spreads plus cover. I will only attempt to do 25 days, not 31.

2. I counted how many full size pages I had, and set aside that number of 6x8 pieces of paper to use and filled those pages first - except I ended up with one too few, but that's ok I might do a collage or something for the last one!

3. I cut up the rest of the papers in half to leave two 4x6 pieces

4. I knew I wanted to use things like the "25" wood veneer piece on the last layout and "the night before Christmas" premade card on day 24, so I put those specifically on those pages

5. I randomly placed the Ho Ho Ho wood veneer and the transparency cards throughout the album

6. I went through and tried to match up some papers that I thought looked good together and leave some intentional blank spots. I cut some of the 4x6 pieces in half to make two 3x4 pieces and added those where needed.

7. I am left with 2 pieces of 4x6 paper and 8 pieces of 3x4 - so basically 3 sheets from the 24 pack of 6x8 that came with the kit! Next step I will print and cut out the free digital printables that came with the kit, as well as the diecuts, then start doing some light decorating and then put it away until December... if I can wait that long!!

That's about it! Here's a look at the very start of my album!!

First of all, don't mind the swing, the breast pump and the weight to hold down the swing in the background... I have a 2 month old you know! Here's a look from the bottom:

Here's a look down from the top - don't mind the shag carpet either!

And here are the rest of the pages!

Thanks for stopping by!