Season of Gifts

Yesterday I wrote about the various projects I did in December alongside the various ways I participated in Advent this year. My final project for December is the Season of Gifts which is the current theme in the Get Messy Art Journaling community. Throughout the year this community offers a variety of themes, giving its members a weekly set of art and journaling prompts to choose from for inspiration. The challenge is to create an art journal page from the prompts  once a week for the duration of each theme. I have yet to complete this challenge for a particular theme. But that is going to change in this current season! Below are the first four pages for the Season of Gifts:

Week 1 - a favorite quote about gifts

Week 2 - a favorite Christmas song

Week 3 - use something from a gift you received...and glitter

Week 4 - Gift wrap a page ..I wasn't ready to leave behind the Christmas songs just yet!

Two weeks left of the Season of Gifts. :)

We are heading to my sister's today for our final family Christmas celebration. Wishing everyone a safe and happy New Year's Eve!

December Art Journaling

Since I devoted the first 25 days of the month of December to daily Advent art journaling posts, I thought I would share the other projects I tried to fit in. Since I had started my Advent art pages in October in preparation for guest posts and daily December posting, by mid-month I was able to add some other projects into my art time.

I really wanted to do the December 30 Days of Lists challenge since I love making lists. But that project did prove to be more than I could handle early in the month alongside Advent prep for my blog and for the blog at church. The pages I did complete were a lot of fun!

I'm not totally ruling out that I may do more of the list prompts in the month ahead. Since I am so driven by the calendar and deadlines for my job, I have made a rule of giving myself permission to be more free-flowing with my art time and projects. I do strive to finish the projects I start, but the higher value for me is simply practicing creativity and enjoying the energy and refreshment it provides.

Caylee Greyvenstein from the Get Messy Art Journal community had a class that began on December 16. The start of this class coincided perfectly with school beginning its Christmas break on December 15, and my schedule slowing down. So, I jumped right into it! I am taking my time working through the project and enjoying the tips and techniques that Caylee and the other artists provide. I used an old cardboard photo folder from my dad's hometown as my journal cover. I then  added sewn in pages from a variety of materials, such as watercolor paper, vintage map pages, end-papers from old books, etc.

I have one more project that I'll save for my next post.

Advent Day 25

Merry Christmas! This is the final day of Advent. The One we have waited for has come! 

“The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel” (which means “God with us”). Matthew 1:23

I have totally enjoyed this journey through Advent and through Kris Camealy's book, Come. Lord Jesus: The Weight of Waiting. You can follow Kris at Kriscamealy.com and at gracetable.org. Thank you for traveling this journey with me! May you enjoy the favor and presence of Christ today and through the new year.

Advent Day 24

"Let’s not hurry through this night. Let us sit awhile beside the manger, in the muck of the stable, in the mess of our actual lives and soak in the glory of this truth. Immanuel. He is here. Even as we wait for His final coming, He is present. Sit still for a few minutes where you are. Can you feel Him beside you? Can you sense His mercy for you, can you hear the love He sings down over you? Listen — His life is in you, let the rhythm of your heart fall in sync with the pulse of heaven."

~Kris Camealy, p 118

Resources:
Come, Lord Jesus: The Weight of Waiting by Kris Camealy. Available at Amazon.
Come, Lord Jesus Advent Book Club at Creative and Free.
Visit my church's website where we are offering a weekly Advent theme devotion and resources on our blog: Grace Church 

Advent Day 23

"We wait for Jesus, and yet He has already come. His presence, through the gift of the Holy Spirit, our invisible helper, remains with us, not only with but within those who believe. Jesus told His disciples, “and I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever,even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you." (John 14:16-17).

He dwells with you and within you, but still, we wait for His coming. This is not an easy idea to understand, and this is what we mean when Christians describe living in the “already and not yet.” We are encouraged here not to grow weary, not to let our hands go limp and weak in the work that God has given us to do in the meantime. He has tasked us with a purpose, go therefore and make disciples–go, tell people about Jesus. Invite others to open their eyes to the story they too are living in, whether they acknowledge it or not. Our King whom we wait for is already in our midst. He is currently at work, writing the story that’s already been written. Our prayers, our worship, and our outreach are one of the ways we get to participate in this fantastic epic unfolding. The Lord is  in your midst (vs. 15)–Heaven touching earth". ~Kris Camealy, 110-111

Resources:
Come, Lord Jesus: The Weight of Waiting by Kris Camealy. Available at Amazon.
Come, Lord Jesus Advent Book Club at Creative and Free.
Visit my church's website where we are offering a weekly Advent theme devotion and resources on our blog: Grace Church