The time has come: it’s the most colorful and festive season of the year with Christmas trees, twinkle lights, numerous ornaments all around.

I adore the holiday season with its every attribute, but somehow my December bullet journal pages have never turned out good enough, making me wonder why. I was always in the festive spirit, listening to jolly carols while doing the bujo, so why it always ended up quite poor? This year, I finally understood why: I always had my idea of how Christmas art or decorations should be. It should always be full of colors and lots of details, in traditional red-green-golden colors. I constantly put myself in a box, not letting me be free to think or create differently. So, since I didn’t have any expectations for this year’s December (or on the contrary – I expected it to be bad again), I decided to let myself do whatever I like, in whatever colors or styles I’ll randomly choose. Surprisingly, the results were truly impressive and for the first time I liked this month’s layout.

When I look at this page, I don’t think of Christmas, I think of magic. And maybe that’s the change I needed. Christmas is the most magical time of the year, but somehow instead of focusing on the “magic” part, enjoying the dreamy atmosphere, spending time with our loved ones, creating fun memories, we sink into the hustle and bustle and simply stress out. So, perhaps this was the perfect metaphor to forget about all the Christmas related duties and mandatory things we “have to do” every single year, and simply enjoy this wonderful time?

So, the color theme I chose for this month is mostly golden, with orange and green elements. Never would have thought that my header would be in black, but I really love how it turned out, it reminds me of a font from a fairy-tale. What I like the best about this layout, is that it’s quite jolly and colorful, but it’s not too much, there’s a balance between the bright tones and more chill ones.

The orange reminds me of tangerines, which is one of the symbols of winter or december and its smell always reminds me of this time. The golden represents the thousands of twinkle lights we see from every corner, and the green stands for evergreen and Christmas trees obviously.

The letter on the corner is the main showpiece of this layout. I didn’t know where I was going to with it, but it turned out even better than I expected. Letters remind me of antique times, some romanticism and, of course, lots of magic (thanks to letter to Santa Clause and the ones from Hogwarts). Also, can we appreciate the little orange used as a stamp? There are some other details as well, like gingerbread cookies, wreath, evergreen branches, stars etc.

As always, here are some quotes about December and Christmas that I enjoyed:

• “December’s wintery breath is already clouding the pond, frosting the pane, obscuring summer’s memory…” (John Geddes)
• “Fine old Christmas, with the snowy hair and ruddy face, had done his duty that year in the noblest fashion, and had set off his rich gifts of warmth and color with all the heightening contrast of frost and snow.” (George Eliot)
• “I heard a bird sing in the dark of December. A magical thing. And sweet to remember. We are nearer to Spring than we were in September. I heard a bird sing in the dark of December.” (Oliver Herford)
• “The sky lightened suddenly to a dazzling, opaline white and the muddy grounds were revealed one morning covered in glittering frost. Inside the castle, there was a buzz of Christmas in the air.” (J.K.Rowling)
• “Christmas morning broke on a beautiful white world. It had been a very mild December and people had looked forward to a green Christmas; but just enough snow fell softly in the night to transfigure Avonlea.” (L.M. Montgomery)
• “But I am sure that I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round…as a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time; the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely.” (Charles Dickens)
• “At Christmas every body invites their friends about them, and people think little of even the worst weather. I was snowed up at a friend’s house once for a week. Nothing could be pleasanter.” (Jane Austen)