Inspiration Elevator #19: Christmas Traditions

You may recall that the purpose of the Inspiration Elevator challenge group is to take our scrapbooking to the next level, to stretch our creative process and to mature as artists by embracing challenges that make us think, work and grow. You can view all of the challenges at the Inspiration Elevator Blog. 

We are thrilled to welcome guest artist Christy Riopel to Inspiration Elevator this month. You may recognize her work as she is a regular contributor/write for Canadian Scrapbooker magazine.

December's challenge for us and for you comes from the uber prolific and very talented Laurel Seabrook. Here's the challenge she posed: "My challenge for December. I love Christmas, everything about it. Decorating my house, making gifts, baking - I love it all. My challenge to you is what is Christmas to you? What is one thing that evokes special memories and truly brings out the Christmas spirit for you. It could be a decoration, photo, song, recipe. Perhaps it is a tradition that you did as a child and now your children do. Maybe it is in the 'special' dinnerware that comes out only at Christmas. Scrap it and tell us all about it. Now for those who don't celebrate Christmas, let's hear about a tradition that makes your celebration special. "

Okay here goes, for those of you who know me well, you know that Laurel's love for Christmas is not something that happens here at the Uttley house. Oh, the kids love the gifts ad my Dolly loves all the trimmings, but the rest of us are a bit..Humbug usually.  The commercialism, the excess spending, the work and all the cooking and cleaning. I admit it..I'm more about loving up on my family and friends ALL year round. But this challenge of Laurel's really got me thinking about the things we do treasure about the season. Our little bits of joy that we carry on throughout the years; my favourite ornament from the very first Christmas Rich and I had in 1994 and the day my Dolly goes to Grandma's  to decorate her tree and bake cookies.

The design I created shows another tradition that Dolly and I have each year. We get Rich to drag the tree up from the basement and we spend a whole afternoon decorating the tree, just the two of us. We watch a  Christmas movie or listen to Carols and drink hot chocolate. I love this time when she is so happy ad the magic of Christmas makes her so happy; a little of that magic, somehow, flows on to me and I am happy.

After adding some matching blue and brown splatters to my background ( I think they look a bit like snow!)I pulled from my stash and used CARTA BELLA Christmas line from last year. It's beiges and blues brought out the glitter and glimmer of our tree and Dolly's skin tone. I used my Cameo to cut a snowflake banner piece that I slid under the left side of my layered papers. I also used my Cameo to cut the fonts (Aharoni and Goudy Bold) for my title.

 I added gold RANGER stickles to the letters and as a light gloss over the STUDIO CALICO wood veneer snow flakes. The distressed edges in brown add depth and allow the papers to pop up from the background.

Once again, I was challenged beyond what techniques I am putting on my design. Inspiration Elevator made me put my heart and soul into the PROCESS and make this an amazingly enriching  growth experience. Thanks Laurel for challenging me to the next level.

I hope you will get around to see all the other designers and to see what y friends have been challenged to create.

 Laurel Seabrook 

 Jodi Wilton 

Michelle Hernandez 

 Ann Jobes

 Laura Whitaker 

Lisa Moen  

Christa Uttley (so glad you are here)

Cathy Harper  

Lisa Spiegel 

 Joanne Burton 

 Guest designer: Christy Riopel 

I hope you feel inspired to play along with our challenge this month, and when you do, please share it using the linky tool on our Inspiration Elevator blog and/or our Inspiration Elevator Facebook page. We'd LOVE to see what you made!

Until next time, keep doing what YOU love.