If you've hung with me up until this, the final post of my 2009 Journal Your Christmas album, then WOW! That's pretty cool, because I almost didn't make it until the end, and I was the one putting the thing together!!

If you're just now jumping in and want to see the other pages, click here for all the Christmasy goodness. :)

Day 34's assignment was to document our favorite memory from the past Christmas season. Honestly, out of all the fun little memories I couldn't pick just one, so I included everything. The photo was taken directly from this post.

For January 4th we were to document things about this Christmas that we wanted to remember for the next Christmas. I wrote to remind myself that I've already organized a bunch of stuff to make next Christmas easier. :)

For January 5th I was back in the attic taking photos of the tree after Darren helped me put it away. I love getting the Christmas stuff out, and then I really love how the house feels so much bigger when I put it away again.

January 6th- finally finished with my album!! It was a fun project, but I was definitely glad to be done with it. So that's mostly what I wrote about.

As a little extra, I put all of the Christmas cards we received in an 8x8 page protector at the back of the album.

In the end, my book was quite chunky- I like it!

This is my second Christmas journal and definitely the more elaborate of the two. I definitely want to do another one when Christmas rolls around again, but I think I will simplify it quite a bit next time. I'm thinking of using digital templates for photo placement and journaling, then printing those out and decorating them with patterned paper and a few embellishments. Ali Edwards has some great templates at Designer Digitals that would be perfect!

Journal Your Christmas: Days 29, 30, 31, 32, and 33

Welcome to the third post during this week of finishing up my Journal Your Christmas album! If you'd like to see what's been posted before today, click here to get the scoop on the whole album so far.

December 29th was a catch-up day, and also the day that I put away all my new Christmas gifts. I took a photo of the pile before I did, and made a little list of who gave me what and stuck it behind the picture.

I love the glitter snowflakes on the back of this paper, so I left it blank. That, and I was just being a little lazy. :)

December 30th's assignment was a year in review. This was easy- I simply used the photos and journaling straight off of this post. This is another case where I added in extra pages. In the end I did decide to consolidate everything back into one book, but because of all the extras, it's really fat!

December 31st was New Years' Eve, of course! It was a very low-key night at home watching Farscape, with a small interlude in the middle to watch the ball drop in Times Square on Hulu. :)

I backed the photo with part of a bag from Starbucks. Unfortunately my Starbucks cup never made it into the album!

You may notice that I actually flipped the paper for this page around- I liked the stripes better as my background. I'm not a big resolutions person, but I did document a couple of little things I'd like to accomplish this year.

January 2. I spend alllll morning on both January 1st and 2nd cleaning out every nook and cranny of my scrap room. And then I photographed it all so I could blog it. :) It was freezing cold and windy and a miserable day to be outside, but at least it was sunny and I could enjoy the light all day through the two big windows in my scrap room.

I can't believe it, but my room is still actually that clean! It's been such an awesome space to work in while it's so cold outside.

I'll be back tomorrow with the final post of my 2009 Journal Your Christmas album. Yay!

Journal Your Christmas: Days 16, 17, 18, and 19

Wooohoo! I'm back for day 2 of my little "Journal Your Christmas" week! Today I have 5 days of pages to share. You can find my previous entries here if you want to take a peek.

Day 16's assignment was to document something I was grateful for this Christmas. After a little thought, my thing I'm grateful for this season was the ability to move back to my little house in the city. I love my big place in the country and will miss it when it sells, but I won't miss the two hours a day I spent driving back and forth. Having that extra time in my day every day has given me time to enjoy all the other things that I'm also grateful for.

Day 17- document that "perfect" gift that you bought for someone. Honestly, I was so selective in what I bought for people this year that I thought that most everything I got was perfect for the recipient. So instead I chose to document a "perfectly" funny story about a gift that I received. :)

Day 18- document Christmas Dinner. It's never been a huge tradition in my family, but my brother and his wife did a phenomenal job hosting everyone this year!

Day 19's assignment was my letter to Santa. This is a very different kind of letter than those I wrote as a kid. And no, you can't read it. :)

Back tomorrow with four more!

Journal Your Christmas: Days 11, 12, 13, 14, and 15

I finally finished my Journal Your Christmas album! Actually, I finished it a few weeks ago, but I'm just now getting the photos of it posted. I hope you're ready for a little Christmas in February, because Monday-Thursday this week I'll be showing off the remaining pages from this project.

Let's get started with December 11 (if you would like to see the previously posted entries, check them out here). This day's assignment was to document the Christmas tree.

December 12 was a bit difficult for me- Christmas past. I remember Christmases past and that they were awesome, but I'm just fuzzy on trying to recall enough detail to write about them. That's one of the reasons I decided to make this journal this year, so that's what I wrote about for the day.

December 13- Christmas music. Ah, Christmas Carols. I have such a love/hate relationship with them. :)

The photo is from my my iPhone- I took a couple of quick snaps during Christmas concert rehearsal at church.

December 14th's assignment was to document how gifts are distributed on Christmas morning. My family had always done it the same way for as long as I can remember, but this year we switched it up! It was fun, and one of those cool little things I'm glad to have documented in this book.

December 15- document the visitors who come to your house. The thing is, we didn't have any! Nope, not a single Christmas visitor. Instead, we were the visitors at our families' homes this year. :)

I'll be back tomorrow with five more pages to show!

Journal Your Christmas: Days 26, 27, and 28

Would it be okay with you guys if I'm still posting JYC pages in March? :) Because at the rate I'm going it may be that long before I complete my album! I have all the pictures and know what I write, but since going back to work I'm having trouble with schedules and time management and just haven't been able to get the thing finished!

Anyway, here are days 26-28. If you missed any of the other days and want to catch up, check here.

Day 26- the Christmas aftermath. :) Mom and I hadn't been after Christmas shopping in a long time, so we had a fun morning out at Kohls and Target. I picked up my Christmas cards and some decorations and wrapping supplies for next year.

I love the dot pattern on this Hambly transparency, so I left it blank.

Day 27's assignment was about sleeping in, which was really funny because I'd been having trouble getting up early the whole time I was off work! Usually if I have a day off I'm up at something like 6:30 in the morning, ready to go, but not this time!

Maybe my comfy warm bed and snuggly down comforter had something to do with that.

Day 28- journal about something you've indulged in this Christmas season. For me, this was definitely peppermint bark. I picked up a bag of the Dove variety at Target on a whim one day and got totally hooked on it and Ghiradelli.

Mom and Dad gave me a bag of the stuff for Christmas, and I used part of the packaging on the back of the page

I hope you're enjoying these pages! There's definitely more to come...

Journal Your Christmas: Days 23, 24, and 25

Yup, I'm definitely skipping around on my Journal Your Christmas pages, aren't I? I went back and looked through my Christmas posts from 2008, and it seems I was working on my December Daily well into the next year then, too! Ah, well, it just extends the magic of Christmas a bit longer, doesn't it? :)

If you want to catch up on my other JYC posts, click here.

The assignment for December 23rd was to create a page about our Christmas stocking tradition. Stockings are probably one of my favorite parts of Christmas gift-giving. My brother and I always got the coolest ones to open on Christmas morning, and Darren and I make them for each other now. I've even made one for my parents the last couple of Christmases!

December 24th was all about Christmas Eve, of course. I included photos of candlelight services at Willowbrook as well as opening gifts with Darren's family in the evening (more photos of that here).

For my December 25th entry I used the chipboard mitten as a sort of cover page for a collage of photos from Christmas day (hmmm, there I go adding extra pages again!).

And I took the easy way out and just used plain (but pretty!) paper to cover the back of the photo group.

Back with more JYC pages and also more of my scrap room tour in a few days!

Don't forget that it's "Get Your Craft On" Tuesday over at Today's Creative. There is some fab stuff being posted today!