Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms. ~ 1 Peter 4:10

Thursday, January 7, 2010

December...where did you go???


I hope you all had a wonderful holiday and a great start to your new year! December sure got away from me. We had a wonderful Christmas, but I was even busier than I expected to be. My whole family also caught a nasty cold that slowed things down for a bit. It was my son's very first and he felt his worst on Christmas day. His first Christmas and he felt so yucky; I felt so bad for him! Aside from being sick we had a great time with family coming into town to visit, a surprise snowy white Christmas Eve, a fun visit from Santa, lots of yummy food and special time together celebrating the birth of our Savior, our blessings and sweet family traditions.

I did keep up with my December Daily Album, although I'm not quite finished with it yet. I'd planned to print pictures and post them along the way, but my printer wouldn't cooperate. I finally gave up and just got all of them printed at the same time last week. I hope to sit down and finish it up soon.

This week I need to finish getting the Christmas decor packed up and put away. Do you ever wonder what to do with all of the Christmas Cards you get from dear friends and family? Ali Edwards has a great post about punching out parts of your cards and making a layout with all of them. I have a Christmas Album that I include my family's Christmas photo card and newsletter in along with that season's pictures. I'm thinking I may try this and stick it in as a closing page for each year.
I found another idea for storing your holiday cards in the book Simple Scrapbooks: 25 Fun and Meaningful Memory Books You Can Make in a Weekend by Stacy Julian. Stacy created an entire album for her holiday cards. She keeps it simple and has a section for each year. Within each section she has a place for her family photo and card from that year, a photo pocket to easily store photos she received from family and friends, and a few pages for favorite cards. She also suggests keeping "Letters to Santa" and a collection of Christmas stamps in this album. Cute ideas!!

What do you do with your Christmas cards each year?