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I know it is controversial these days but from when I was a little girl we always celebrated Sinterklaas and I have the most happy memories about those 3 weeks in the year. The big department stores had made great displays in their shop-windows and the children could visit Sinterklaas there just as it is with Santa now. My grandparents always came to our house to take part. Most kids lost their faith in Sinterklaas when they were between 6 and 8 years of age and you were wondering how it was possible that Sinterklaas was in 2 different locations on the same time and wasn't looking like it was the same person. Sometimes you recognized the person playing the role of Sinterklaas was someone you knew, or you wondered how the presents arrived through the chimney when you lived in an apartment building. But after the shock of finding out, the great fun started, because you were considered old enough to start making surprise gifts for the rest of the family. Most of the time we draw lots with the name of one of the family members for whom you had to buy a present and transform it into a surprise gift which had to be accompanied with a poem. In the poem you could make fun of that person, or comment on something that had happened and you weren't happy with. But never nasty! Later we kept this tradition with our own children until our daughter moved to Switzerland where they don't know this tradition and our son didn't want to go on without his sister and my parents were to old to come because they didn't lived in the neighborhood.

The long-time members know that I started making pics for my gaming group. Once I found the Campus, my creative life took off! My laptop is limping along so I can't make anything new. But I can show a couple of older pics.

I started with PSP to be able to make graphics for our family business, the Warwick Drive-In Theater. I did a logo, which is on a transparent background, so therefore, a .png which I can't show here but I do have a .jpg version.

I wish I could have laid my hands on some of the EARLY photos but I had several from later years to add to the project.

When our Church added on two additions right & left of the original, the ladies in the office wanted to know if I could create a unobstructed view of the whole thing. Whew, it became quite a challenge. I could not get nearly far enough back to get the whole thing because of large trees. I took several picks from the sames location, and some from different places but at the same distance. I finally got it the best I could and they were very happy with it. It has been used many times. (the bricks on the new part are darker so that is not a mistake).

What a lovely memory and a wonderful family tradition. It might not have lasted through the descendants, but it makes for such a touching story.

I've been using PSP9 since it came out, left it alone for a few years and rediscovered it a couple of years ago. This was made during my T-shirt era.

Let's continue this new challenge. We might be the ones taking pictures but we are not the feature of our layouts, so let's change that since we ARE important and have lots to say. Every month or so, the layout will be about YOU, and a prompt will be given. If you have taken the Story Week Challenge, you will find some similarities but it won't be the same. For the December layout, tell us something about family traditions. Most families or communities would have traditions for various holidays or periods of the year. Of course, some are pretty typical like a Christmas tree for Christmas, but what about something that is less typical? That will be something that we want to read about. Something about decorations? About when something is done or how? Who does something and how is that person selected? It can be something major, or not. Little anecdotes are just as fun to read. Remember that if you want to create pages for previous prompts, those threads will stay open. There is no right or wrong order to share about YOU.