Sadness & New Challenges

Here we are.

Time has come to put away our Christmas Tree.

In Italy, Christmas holidays end on January 6 when we celebrate the "Epiphany", the day the Three Kings visited little Jesus and brought Him their gifts.

We usually hang stockings near chimneys or in the kitchen and on January 6 children find them full of sweets and little gift, delivered by the "Befana", an old woman with worn clothes and shoes who arrives riding a broom.

Our daughter being still a little girl, we do celebrate each and every magical occasion we have in this time of the year. When I was a little girl, I did not believe in Santa bringing gifts but I did believe in this old lady riding a broom and I still remember when, at the age of 8, my parents confirmed my suspects that this old lady did not exist.

As we usually prepare our Christmas Tree a bit earlier than the traditional day, we also put it away a bit later than foreseen, the Sunday after January 6. So today is The Day.

I'm sad because I love the atmosphere, the decorations, the lights, all the things which happen in this time of the year, and the corner of the Christmas Tree will be sad and dark tomorrow morning. But Christmas is over, everywhere around us is no more decorated, sales in shops have begun, the school is reopening tomorrow so it's the right moment to put things away.

For our family, Christmas time is really a rich period, with lots of events and - in particular - lots of eating and celebrating.

We start on Christmas Eve when we eat fish at my mom's. Then, we have our Christmas lunch with my in-laws. Then again, December 26 being a holiday, we have lunch at my mom's. Of course, we celebrate the arrival of the New Year on December 31 and we have lunch at my mom's on January 1. Of course, we try to spend time together every Sunday even if it's not an official holiday. We finish with January 6 but these last years we tend not to celebrate with any kind of lunch...

Because... in between December 24 and January 6 we have three important birthdays: our daughter, one of my brothers-in-law and my mother.

Do you understand why I say we spend most of our time eating and celebrating (and buying presents and opening them)?

Sometimes I think it's a real tour-de-force...

To blow away the sadness of these last couple of days, my daughter and I spent some time together painting and creating, so I had the chance to make some cards for the shop and for some challenges.

Today, I show you a card made using a very sweet digi from Bee Crafty http://www.artisangroup.org.uk/page5.htm

Here's the card:

I decided to enter it in two Challenges:

Sweet Sketch Wednesday Challenge # 83, which gave us a Sketch to follow: http://sweetsketchwednesday.blogspot.com/2011/01/sweet-sketch-wednesday-83.html

and

Aud Sentiments Challenge # 19 which says: Only Have Two Words:
http://audsentimentschallengeblog.blogspot.com/2011/01/challenge-19-and-winner-of-18.html

It's the first time I enter this last Challenge!

Well, that's all for today, better go and start putting Christmas things away...

Sweet Sketch Wednesday # 80

Here I am again, with a new card to post for a challenge.

Actually the original idea was to make a Christmas card for my husband, who is still waiting for his birthday card!

I had this lovely digi from Bee Crafty already printed and thought it was perfect for his Christmas card. Once it was colored, I started making the card following the Sweet Sketch Wednesday sketch (http://www.sweetsketchwednesday.blogspot.com/), just to have a trace and possibly post it for the challenge.

It has turned out more a Valentine card with unusual colors than a Christmas card so I'll probably keep it for Valentine's Day or sell it on my Etsy shop. I really love it: I love the sweet digi, the colors, the sketch, everything! 

Well, here's the sketch:

And here's my card:

I really love Sweet Sketch challenges: even if I managed to take part in only one of them, I was thrilled with all the sweet comments I received and looked forward to having time to make another card to post there!

Only three days to Christmas but, considering that in my family we love to celebrate on Christmas Eve, the celebration is starting in two days and I've still some gifts to wrap!

Better go, I still have a Christmas card to make...