Done. Finished. Over. — An Elegant Sufficiency

My fifteenth Christmas Journal is finished. The last few pages have taken me far longer than they ought to have done, but once we put Christmas away for the year, I lose interest. Quite how some manage to put it all together in July, I have no idea! My real goal would be to complete it in December, keeping up with the days as we go. At the start of each year’s project, I am filled with good intentions but usually fall behind from the second or third day and I spend the rest of the month trying to catch up.

It seems a long time ago since we were in Nashville, but that’s where I kicked off this one.

My first story was choosing the tree on December 1. I actually redid this page early on, because I’d included the tag from the tree (I like to save information like the price we paid and so on). I had left it hanging loose and every time I opened the book it dropped out. So, it’s firmly glued in place now, underneath all of the rest of the things and if at some point I need to know the price, then I will have to do some careful peeling back.

I also like to collect the stamps from cards as they arrive, especially those from faraway places.

This year, I remembered to collect examples of our own Royal Mail Christmas stamps too, though I left it too late to buy a set and had to rely on those which arrived on cards - just the first and second class ones then.

One of those “We were unable to deliver a package” cards made a good page for those.

Another page from a Caffe Nero coffee cup. Every time I see that spelling of “cosy” I squirm, though.

Did you notice the trend away from glitter and sparkle this year? Though the shop windows were really cute and very attractive, they were a bit grey!

I usually include some details of wrapping papers and so on. We had so much paper left from last year that I didn’t buy any this time round and my brown paper plans were put on hold. I made a new batch of tags using old photos of the recipients (as I have done for a couple of years…I need a new trick!) So, imagine my smiles when Amy gave us presents wrapped exactly as I had dreamed of doing - I’m not sure I could have created such elegant labels and trimmings though!

There’s usually a point somewhere around here when I start to run out of sticky numbers. It’s only then that I remember I have a Silhouette machine and cut out a few more! This year, I had bought a pack of sparkly paper from Tiger which worked really well - it wasn’t the gritty and glittery sort that clogs the blade of the machine and leaves bits everywhere and I must remember to buy more next year as soon as it appears (it disappeared pretty quickly as good things do in there).

My main food shopping list is in the pocket and if I come across the receipt (which I think is here somewhere) I’ll tuck that in there too.

There follows a few pages focusing on the fun of Christmas Eve, when cheese fondue is our tradition, moving on through opening stockings on Christmas morning and then the main event, Christmas lunch.

This year, Father Christmas had brought everyone, young and old, a sheepskin for their chair, their bedside or wherever. For now, they added a cosy touch to the Christmas table setting.

I finished my journal with my usual reflections and a picture from a Christmas past - this year, one of me sitting beside my Nan and Grandad at a Christmas dinner in, I guess, 1970 or thereabouts.