Update: Congrats to Jenn, Francine, and Molly!! I’ll be in touch to send you your code for 25 free Shutterfly photo cards!
The Christmas portrait time of year!
I will admit that I’m a little stumped this year.
We have done the cactus:
and the big smiles:
We have done the Christmas carol reference (with the boys faking sleep):
and the elves (there’s no way I’ll be able to do that again with a middle-schooler):
Last year, we almost used this card:
but after winning Amanda’s photo contest, we decided to use some of the winning pictures instead:
This year, I’m stuck.
Moody 6th grader meets hyperactive 1st grader?
Should I look to Diary of a Wimpy Kid for some ideas? The Heffley family is quite similar to ours lately.
One thing that has stayed consistent is that every year, we have ordered our Christmas cards through Shutterfly.
There are several designs that I have fallen in love with this year, but I’ll wait to share :)
Not only do we use Shutterfly for our holiday cards, but we also use them for photo gifts, such as our famous (in the family) cookbook. I *might* be getting a second volume together for this year. Funny, because our eating habits have changed a whole lot since the first edition!
After the pool fiasco of 2008 (oh, that’s another post all together) we heavily relied on friends to help us finish our pool. When it was complete, we wanted to thank everyone. Shutterfly’s photo cards were the best way for us to share the news (and photos!) with everyone who helped us.
Fun fact: These photos were taken in December over three days. One day the pool wasn’t heated!
Dying to order your holiday cards yet? I am giving away three sets of 25 personalized photo cards from Shutterfly.
To enter, leave me a comment and tell me your favorite holiday card story. Mine would have to be when we took photos near the cacti (I hate saying that – cactus as a plural sounds so much better, I think). Michael almost strangled Jack while trying to keep him sitting, and Jack was only concentrating on the fruit snacks that Michael was holding in his hand – which was closed tightly to avoid being in the picture. And what mother takes her 5 and 1 year old to a national park filled with sharp cacti?! Not my best Mom moment.
Go up and look at the photo now. I’ll wait a sec.
Moving on…
Three sets of 25 cards! I’ll choose three random winners next Friday evening, November 18th. You know the deal… whenever I pull the kids apart, get them safely tucked in their beds, and pull the ear plugs out of my ears. 8ish?
Good luck, friends!
I was provided with holiday photo cards in exchange for my post. If you’re a blogger and want in on this great deal, go visit Shutterfly and register here: http://goo.gl/DDw7Q
As always, all opinions are my own. I’ve been shopping at Shutterfly since the boys were little for a reason ;)
{ 21 comments… read them below or add one }
I like the beach picture with your feet the best….but they’re all awesome! :)
awesome cards Becca! Our fave so far was when Kaia had her 2nd shot with Santa and was screaming…so we contrasted that to the year before where she was just curiously looking at his face. :)
Oooh I’m with Eileen, my fav was a family shot with Santa where Zac is screaming! SO classic!
Chelsea´s last [type] ..Hunting festivals
I love them all because they are full of my favorite people. And I really don’t want to win. Because you would all be lucky enough to have my puppies (my dog puppies, not MY puppies) and my cats. OMG – I have officially turned in to one of “Those” people. Ewww. So sorry Bec.
Well our experience just happened. We were doing a trail rin Monday night. We just had to see before Sunday how cute Emily was going to be in her red holiday dress. Teary eyed I was amazed how quickly the tears formed seeing her so dressed up. So cute so heart warming so beautiful and then……… Blat the spit up flew out of her mouth projectile spit up right down the front of the dress. Tags still on and all!! We will see come Sunday if she can hold the spit up in long enough to get pics taken in back up dress #2.
I like Shutterfly too! OMGoodness seeing that first card where they were soooo little made me smile! I’d have to say two years ago I decided to do my own photo shoot and so I went to the dollar store to get big snowflakes and ornaments as props and get them all dressed up at the house and had a heck of a time trying to get smiles from them and keep cat tails out of the shot (we have 4 cats) at the same time! I haven’t tried it again since!
Christina´s last [type] ..Second Grade!
Great giveaway! I love Shutterfly, too. This is our first Christmas with a little one, so I don’t have any great holiday photo stories yet. Maybe next year! And I agree, “cacti” is a dumb word.
Melissa´s last [type] ..Not a Non-Mom
I would love to have these, they would make cards much more personal with our picture on them…
I follow your blog from a HS friend Amy. I love reading your post!! your recipes are great and you have some wonderful ideas!
My favorite holiday card story is this.. my husband and I took our 2 boys to the Apple Orchard to shoot the most perfect Christmas card.. Well, both boys were very crabby that day and did not want to be in my very thought out, planned, photo shoot! so with no smiles, i was getting crabby myself so I asked my husband to get behind me while i was shooting to try and get them to smile. The minute he was behind me, there was instant laughter!!!! I was snapping away so excited to finally get some smiles from the boys. After I got the most perfect picture I turned around to see what was so funny.. There was my husband mooning the boys!!! Yep, i thought it was a funny site to see too!! Good thing we were the only ones there that day!! whatever it takes for smiles right???
Our first Christmas Cards as a family will always be one to remember. We went to Tucson gems and took pictures: San Xavier and Pecan Groves.
Kelly @eclecticmommy´s last [type] ..Nature Makes Perfect Scents
Too cute. I love seeing the past Christmas card pics! The first year we had Max in the picture (his second Christmas, though, since he was 17 days old on Christmas and his birth announcement was our Christmas card that year), we had a feeling he wouldn’t cooperate, so we swung him between us so that he would be smiling (he loved that) and somewhat looking at the camera! And it worked, just took quite a few takes as sometimes we got him a little too high and his legs were in front of his face…LOL.
Allison@Slice of Heaven´s last [type] ..Blessed
I like the pool finishing thank you best. Irish contrarian that I am, LOL!
i like the tree fake sleeping one and I love shutter fly!
Love your beach Christmas card. Love the idea. Great giveaway.
My favorite was just after my youngest was born. The four of us went to get our family photo and the baby decided to make a mess in his diaper. We were smiling for the picture but you can tell they are fake smiles!
Sorry! I told you my personal fav :) I guess I can’t follow directions!
My favorite holiday card picture was a random shot of our family just being us in our babk yard. Big smiles, not posed, and lots of fun.
OK, first, a suggestion for your cards this year…what about a cool, urban, downtown photo session with the boys? Train tracks, old buildings… We’ve done it already so I need something new this year, but I love the look. And boys love trains.
We ended up with some fun shots last year that definitely showed our family spirit and showcased my goofy boys, but not one photo of everyone looking at the camera, smiling at the same time…is that even possible? I’m doubting it. And with another goofball boy on the way, I’m guessing I maybe a decade out before I ever get a photo like that, unless a miracle occurs.
Leah´s last [type] ..Before & After: Master Bath
Yes taking any pictures with little ones is sometimes a nightmare. Last yearmy children found some mud right before the pictures. Those were fun pictures.
Erica j´s last [type] ..who? what? where?
Love all your ideas. Mine are pretty typical family in front of the tree. I kept them the same when the kids were little so it was easier to see the changes in them each year. My favorite year was me, hubby, 3 yr old who hated getting pictures taken, 1 yr old who was hating her Christmas hat that matched her too-cute dress, and a 6 month old puppy. Try getting all that in one shot in the 10 seconds that my camera auto-timer lasted. We had quite a few funny pics from that session.
I love Christmas cards with pictures! You can compare them to previous years and see how much the kids have grown.
Two years ago, we celebrated my birthday (a week before Christmas) at Disneyland! I’d always wanted to stay at the Disneyland Hotel and we finally got to do that. Disneyland was decorated for the holidays. We had our pictures taken throughout the park and used one of those to put on our Christmas cards. The card went out late that year, but that was alright. We had such a great time and my beautiful 1 year old grandson was in the picture too! It was the best birthday ever :).