December Daily – Day 1: Advent

I know that the idea behind Advent is a religious one, but since I am not particularly religious, I’m going to stick with the Advent that is secular in nature.  I found a lot of neat ideas for different advent calendars this year, but I think that we’re going to save those for next year, when little man is just a bit older.  This year, we’re going to do the December Daily/Journal Your Christmas/Countdown to Christmas thing only.  LOL. 
Now it is the first and we’re kicking off December with a spirit of happiness, peace, celebration and magic.  I love the idea of rekindling the magic of the season.  It has been a long year full of ups and downs, frustrations and huge emotional highs.  Now it is time to focus on the magic. 

Jessica bought me an advent calendar at the store.  I am using that for my first picture/page.  We got a big laugh out of it because the chocolate inside is so totally horrible.  It is the size in diameter of a nickel probably, but I couldn’t even eat it.  I think that Dove needs to get into the advent calendar business.  :)

We’ve started planning out our activities and things for December.  It is going to be a month chock full o’ things, and I have to get ready for England (leaving january 7th), so time is of the essence and I want to wring every juicy moment out of December. 

It is especially important this year because it is little man’s first Christmas.  It is so exciting.  I know he isn’t going to understand it all, but it is special anyway, and I want us to have some family traditions that he can grow up with.  Today, Jessica and I looked through one of my first scrapbooks.  It was crazy and made us laugh about the old school page layouts and stickers used.  How ugly things were!  Good ol’ Creative Memories and Mrs. Grosmann’s stickers.  LOL.  Even though it was ugly and embarrassing to see how stupid it looked to me now, it was still fun to reminisce and have those memories.  I want to be sure to capture those moving forward.  I’m not getting any younger.  LOL. 

It makes me sad that my grandma has no scrapbooks or photo albums or anything really from her life.  She has a few photos that she still has (I could choke her for giving away a bunch of them before), and I’ve laid claim to them before she tries to throw them out too.  I want our family to have some history and tradition and if that starts now, then so be it!  We have some minor traditions, but I want to have them be recorded and passed down even if they are no longer being practiced. 

But now... let the countdown begin!

We’ll see…

Manifesto

I am taking part (again) in Shimelle’s Journal Your Christmas.  I am combining it with the December Daily thinking and trying to actually stick to it this year.  I also signed up for SJD’s Countdown to Christmas, so there should be more than enough inspiration to make me forge ahead.  I just wonder what my finished product will look like. LOL.  I’m posting the manifesto given by Shimelle, and hope to post more in the days/weeks ahead.  Jessica and I have been planning to do this and will support/encourage each other to hopefully see it through.  :D

Thinking About Christmas?

This year has brought a ton of changes along with it. I don't know if it is just my age or the fact that time seems to be on fast forward and I can barely keep up, or if it is just that I realize that there are so many meaningful events in life that should be documented, but I really wanted to make sure that this year... this Christmas season... is different.

Two years ago, I set out with my best intentions of documenting the season, but the computer crashed, there were other things going on, and it just didn't get done.

Now, with a brand new nephew, Jessica off in college, Emily graduating from high school, Sam turning 16, Tim with the ups and downs of the banking industry, me heading into grad school, and all of the other stuff in life, I want to take time to slow down and find the really important stuff to hold onto. I'm getting ready to head off to England on New Year's Eve and starting a brand new journey that should be life altering. Nothing will ever be the same again.

This year, since most of the family is struggling financially (along with the rest of the country), we're not focusing on gifts, so it seems like the perfect time to focus on all of the rest. Maybe this will be the start of a new tradition. I certainly hope so.