Today, let’s talk foundation pages.  No matter what size album you have decided to use, your next step is deciding on what size of pages you will include in your December Daily.  There all a ton of different sizes that you can add to your book - 12x12, 8x8, 9x12, 6x8, etc.  I love to have a mix of sizes so my books tend to be close to 8x10, so that I can mix in whatever sizes I want to.  Last year, Nicole Jones did her December Daily as a 12x12 project life album, and Ali Edwards is using a 6x8 album, as she has done for several years.  Another great example to look at is Stephanie Bryan, who has been doing a mini album for every month of 2015.  She has used a variety of sizes thus far, so no matter what size you decide on for your December Daily album, she should be able to offer you some inspiration while creating your foundation pages.

Questions to Ponder when Thinking about your Foundation Pages

1. What kind of pages you want to include - Are you going to do 6x8 pocket style or mini scrapbook layouts or interactive pages or a mix of all of the above?
2. How close to finished do you want your foundations to be - Are you wanting to simply be able to stick the photo on and write up your journaling?  Or are you going to add embellishments once that day comes around?  Are you going to date each page before december gets here or leave it blank to give yourself some flexibility?
3. After reviewing your past December Daily albums - What page size really worked for you?  What page size (or style) prevented you from continuing on through your album?  What stumbling blocks did you have last year?  How can you prevent these things for this year?

These are things that you should think about before moving forward.  Instead of doing the same thing because that’s what you have done in the past, maybe its time to do something new.  How can you simplify this process for this year?  Remember we want to be able to actually finish our December Daily this year!    Be open to any unexpected and new ideas that come up while you are making these decisions!

Use Your Foundation Pages to Plan Your Album's Flow

Foundation pages are also a great time to look up sketches for your page designs if your going that route.  If you’re using a variety of page protectors, you can arrange them in a starting order during this step as well and map out the flow of your album.  I like to do this as well, even though I use a variety of page styles.  For days that I know will have lots of pictures I try to have lots of potential for photo mats and photo pockets.  Days like Christmas Eve and Christmas Day tend to have multiple pages and photo mats for me.  Foundation pages are also a good time to plan out your numbers (for your days) if you’re going that route.  I tend to want to leave my numbers off my foundation pages in case I decide to rearrange the overall flow of my pages.

My 2015 December Daily Foundations

For my December Daily foundation pages this year, my foundation pieces consist of my album (which I purchased at Michael's in a pack of mini albums at 8x10), some file folders (to do the Kathy Orta style pages), 6x8 BoBunny page protectors, cards, envelopes, rings for my album, white, black, and green cardstock, and two manila envelopes.  I am using Kathy Orta’s YouTube video tutorials to create some of my foundation pages.  Kathy Orta has three different December Daily YouTube series (December Daily Lapbook 1, December Daily 2 - using envelopes and greeting cards, and Lapbook 2).  I primarily used the December Daily Lapbook 1 videos in the creation of my foundation pages for this year.


One comment on using Kathy Orta’s tutorials, I always alter Kathy’s instructions to make use of page protectors instead of her hidden hinge binding system.  The reason behind this is that I NEED the flexibility of being able to rearrange my pages, which I cannot do with her hidden hinge system.  But the great thing about using her tutorials is that you can often replace her hinge with a page protector that has been cut down to the size of her hinge - and then you can use it in a ring bound album!


My foundation pages may look a lot more complicated than yours.  If this is not your style, a really great example of simple foundation pages is Ali Edwards.  Foundation pages are not a quick process for me.  I think that is my own personal downfall.  Ideally, I would begin in November and slowly adding to my foundation pages throughout the month, so that I would just have to add my journaling and photos through the month of December.  Unfortunately, this never works out in my favor.  Although, I had every intention this year of getting my foundation pages very close to completed before December, I am once again starting December with the bare minimum.  Luckily, I had already planned for something like this!

So throughout the month of December, I will be hosting daily (or every other day) videos of projects that you can do in 10 or 15 minutes that will allow you to embellish your December Daily album, while working on completing our projects this year!  So far I have covered my past December Daily albums and gathering my supplies, check back for the next December Daily quickie!