Happy Friday!  I hope that everyone has been enjoying this the second week of December!  I know it is a time that is extra full for everyone…with all kinds of busy.  I know that I’m already feeling as though I could slow time a little bit to really relish all the moments and have a bit more time for the to do lists. And now that we are battling the sick in our house I feel that more than ever.  Here’s to staying focused on what really matters and taking time to pause.

All that said, I was really excited to take a pause from the hub-bub yesterday to scrap today’s Grow With Love: Holiday post.  And so without further ado here is our prompt for Day Five.

I’m really loving these “in their own words” prompts and pages lately and I love the idea of infusing MORE of my loved ones into my pages..not just me scrapping *about* them or speaking *to* them, but sharing more from their perspective in a real way.  Getting them engaged in the memory keeping.  So I had fun asking Bugga about her impressions of Christmastime.  So here we have Christmastime with 4 year old goggles.  What fun it will be to look back at this.  And in fact I’m feeling inspired to revisit this very page each year to see the changes over time.

Here’s where this prompt took me:

And here’s Crystal’s page:

How sweet are they?!  I just know your own pages will have you smiling too!  We can’t wait to see them!

Hope everyone has a beautiful weekend!  Happy Scrapping and Happy Growing with Love! ♥

So remember when, at the close of yesterday’s Grow With Love: Holiday post, I told you to hop over to Crystal’s blog today for Day Two?  Yeah well, the Technology Gremlins had other plans and our sweet Crystal’s internet has been very uncooperative today, to say the least.  So I’m here to happily share {Day Two} of the Holiday Edition with you!

Now that we’ve set the foundation for our attitudes and our perspective in our scrapping for the rest of the project, let’s let ourselves do a little dreaming with the prompt for today:

I have to confess the song that kept floating into my head when conceiving of this prompt was this one by Amy Grant, wherein she sings about her hopes, her BIG hopes her IDEAL hopes for Christmastime.  (incidentally, there have been other versions of this song, including a most fabulous one by Michael Buble but this is the one that I remember from my childhood and so its nostalgia really brought on the extra holiday-y inspiration for me).

Cheesy? Perhaps Completely.  But also warm and fuzzy and full of heart and hope, in an earnest kind of way.  Which is just the recipe for a touching and amazing scrapbook page.  So let your “heart dream” and scrap your Grown Up Christmas List.  It could be on a personal scale..the kind of rarely spoken whispers of your heart: wishes for you and your loved ones.  It could be about your hopes for the world in which we live.  It is where-ever your own heart leads you.  And I have a feeling, in the spirit of this beautiful season, it will lead you somewhere really special, really meaningful.

Here is where it lead Crystal’s:

We hope you feel inspired to share your heartfelt lists…can’t wait to see your beautiful pages!

And with that I hope you enjoy the rest of your weekend!  Don’t forget to swing by again on Monday for the next Grow With Love: Kids prompt…♥

Happy Friday!  And welcome to the first post of our Grow With Love: Holiday Edition. Crystal and I are really happy to be walking along side you in storytelling as we navigate this very special time of year!  We hope that you are enjoying the moments of anticipation and preparation and advent and all things holiday-y so far and that you’re not feeling as though the month is getting away from you yet.  I always end up feeling that way at some point during this season (usually when I’m contemplating my to-do lists).  It is my hope that this project will help me to slow a bit, to pause a bit, to go with the flow a bit more, to smile a bit more and to just soak everything up.

We’ve mapped out the schedule for our blogging {here}…and let’s not get caught up in the word “schedule” or the whole idea of it really.  This project doesn’t need to be another item on your to-do list..in fact we hope, rather, that it will be something you can unwind with as you reflect and as you walk through these holly jolly days.  Remember, this is (as are all the Grow With Love projects) a self-paced workshop.  We will blog (and hopefully inspire) and you check in when at your own pace.  The prompts can be your jumping off point for documenting your holiday in and of itself or in conjunction with any other holiday project.  We can’t wait to see your pages and process as we go along!  So..let’s get started!

Here’s our prompt for {Day One}:

This is a lay-the-groundwork kind of prompt.  It may, at first glance, seem an almost obvious or “easy” something to scrap about…like “well of course THIS is why the holiday is important to me” because the meaning we each find in the holidays is something that is so within us and so a part of our history that we don’t often give it second thoughts.  It’s just a given.

But we really want you to give this a good think.  We really want to get you thinking about what you love about the holidays.  And more importantly, why.  Because it will be the why that will help you stay focused on what you love most and really enjoy everything all the more.  This kind of foundation building can really be a game-changer.  It can turn something “unpleasant” into something appreciated for its blessing.  It can change the way you consider others’ actions and intentions.  It can change the way you consider your own.  It can help give you a fresh perspective on the “old”. It can help you re-focus throughout the busy.  It can really transform and enrich your holidays.

So..whatever it is that you think of, whatever it is that you feel when you consider the holidays, scrap about it.  Get to the meat of it.  For a lot of us, it could be our faith that guides our attitudes and actions and traditions and everything about this time of year.  For others it could be family.  It could be a whole mosaic of things that really give the holidays meaning for you.  Whatever it is, map that out.

Here’s where this prompt lead me:

And Crystal:

We hope that you let yourself get a little lost in the reflecting and have fun scrapping your own “why” and then let it guide you through the holidays..and the next prompts.  The very next of which will be coming tomorrow.  Can’t wait to see your pages!

Hope you have a beautiful weekend!  Happy Scrapping!