December Daily - Day 3 - Jingle Mingle + bonus

My plan for Day 3 was to document the Myriad Gardens "Jingle Mingle."  This is their annual Christmas party for donors and members.  I love the gardens and the party.  It also is a good date night for Brent & I in December.  Just as we were leaving though this "bonus" story happened.  You may recall from Day 1 that I forgot to buy E an Advent calendar.  One of his Godmothers heard about it and used her amazon magic to send him a farm Advent Calendar.  It was a great surprise and he loved opening it. (Thanks, Chrissie!) 

 I added that story on this little insert page.  I really like having pages of different sizes in the mix and this was a perfect fit. I just wrote it out on a card from the kit and a little heart.  Today was full of hearts. I also added a little gold embossed "3" to try and make it clear that these are both from Day 3.  It wasn't really necessary, but it adds some shine and a little balance to the page, I think. 

 When the small page is open it looks like this.  The backside of the present story is a photo from the Jingle Mingle event that I actually found on twitter. I didn't have my phone or camera (which was not a good situation), but I loved this photo and "borrowed" it.  I added the ampersand, in part because I love them, but also to connect the two Day 3 stories.

This is a bit closer and to see how the different pages and transparencies lay together.  I added a small "joy" tab on the outside.  If you try that, make sure not to staple the tabs on until you are happy wit the items in the pockets. Also, one bonus of taking these photos is noticing the hearts were all wonky in the first pocket.  So those are fixed below. 

This is the full page spread about the Jingle Mingle.  The photo was tricky as it was taken with Brent's phone and the red flowers plus my fuscia jacket created a lot of red in the photo.  I messed with editing the photo, but this was a clean as we could get it.  The text is hard to read, but describes the lovely event, literally wandering smelling flowers with my husband, snacking, etc...  Able & Kari were there selling spices too so it was a family event.  That said, I also learned during the event from Able that our Grandpa was doing worse.  It makes the holiday season hard because I'm off celebrating while my family is sad and worried.  I ultimately decided that I needed to keep living, keep finding joy, and keep being present in the season.  Sitting at home and being sad or going to events and mopping isn't going to help anyone.  So, I tried to set it aside for a bit and just appreciate the beauty around me and time alone with my spouse.  It was a good event and I love the gardens as always. 

 I also noticed that this little transparency bit ended up working well.  The December script ended up right over the gold glitter hearts and white paper, which I really like.

One more crafting close up on the card.  I felt like after the small cluster and transparency it was a little "bottom heavy" so I added some sparkle coming down from the top.  These are just dots of glitter stickles.  I like the "feel" of it and having a bit more sparkle.  I don't really use stickles (aka glitter glue in a variety of colors) all year, but come time for December Daily the glitter is on.  I like it!