Christmas Cards Throughout the Ages

Not really the ages, but since we've been a family. I did some digging and found all 3 of our Christmas cards since getting married. Without further ado, the parade of Christmas cards:

I love this card. I chose a wedding photo because we had soooooo many great ones, I wanted to incorporate one more before our first anniversary arrived and people started getting sick of seeing them. This is one of my favorite wedding photos because it is so happy and festive. I spent big on these at Tiny Prints. It's grainy because I scanned the card stock. 

Our 2nd year Christmas card was tricky. We had just sent out Beatrice's birth announcements the month before so all of the good photos of her were taken. Plus, she was in a cross-eyed phase so most of the snapshots we had were unusable. But more importantly, I was still very postpartum fat and hated all photographs that displayed my several chins. We settled on this. You can detect some cross-eyedness in Beatrice and a hint of multiple chins on me... What are ya gonna do? These were super cheap from Vista Print.

This year's card is probably my favorite because it perfectly compliments our weird outfit colors, it's made of thick card stock, and it is fun. It took me forever to design because there were so many cute, usable photos this year. I think I made a good choice. Nothing says Merry Christmas like pink, red, and cows grazing in a pasture. These were free from Shutterfly.

Paper and stationery are favorite things of mine so I take designing our Christmas cards pretty seriously. I want a thick card stock, the perfect message, and sweet photos that encompass what our year was like. I think each card tells the perfect tale of our little family's history. I look forward to doing this for many years to come. Merry Christmas!

Blustery

We have snow.

Not much, but enough to cancel schools and make driving a last resort option since the roads are slick. When we get snow around here, people strip the grocery store shelves of milk and eggs and hole up in their homes until the roads clear. Southerners don't drive in the snow. At least this Southerner doesn't.

Unless it's to go to Best Buy to get a new DSLR camera. Remember when I got paid to write for a food website? Well, I got fired. Not really, I was told that there were copyright issues with some of the content so the site was ceasing all new entries for the time being. While all of that may be true, I can't help but think the quality (or lack thereof) of my photos wasn't really making me a hot commodity for their site. The editor kept emailing me links on how to take a better photo. I tried to explain that my puny digital camera just wasn't capable of taking high quality photos, but it didn't really matter. They loved my writing but wanted better pictures. It got to the point that it was just embarrassing. So I got a new camera. JD took it over as soon as I got home from the icy conditions. He said that as the man, he felt obligated to learn all about the camera so he could teach his lowly wife. Mmm hmmm.

Look at how high I can jump. JD made me do this at least 10 times so he could master the "action" feature. 

We took Beatrice out to touch the snow. I wanted to lay her in it to make snow angels but JD wouldn't let me.

It was really, really cold. She enjoyed the snow much better from inside the house.

We made cookies and ate them warm from the oven. There may have been some fa-la-la-la-la-ing in between all of the nom-nom-nomming.

The sound of the drip, drip, drip from the faucets paired with the howling wind is gonna make for some good sleeping. The overnight low is 8 degrees. Thank God JD is off tonight. Snuggles are in my future on this blustery night.

Steppin' Out and Looking Wrinkly When I Thought I Looked Good

Our church just built this huge new sanctuary that allows for many awesome Christian artists to come and have concerts. JD and I have been to 3 in the last 3 months and we just love it. Point of Grace performed their Christmas concert last night and it was really fun. I struggled staying awake since I NEVER go out at night, but it was a great, Christmasy date.

Here's what I wore:

Never mind how crazy my eyes look in that photo, I felt like a nerd taking a photo by myself in the lobby of church while people walked by staring. I was trying to tell JD with my eyes to hurry up and take the picture already. Let's just say he was dawdling...


Necklace, Forever 21
Top/dress, French Connection
Jeggings, Forever 21
Boots, Nine West

I was all excited to take the photo because it's the first time I have dressed in an outfit that was cute in a few weeks, but it was freezing in the concert so I kept my coat on and wrinkled myself something terrible. Sigh. Just ignore the wrinkles. I am.

Speaking of POG, Shelley (one of the awesome trio) sang at our wedding. She is a close friend of my sister in law. We love her for that and feel like we are best friends with a real life celebrity. She is writing a hilarious blog while she is on the road for their Christmas concert series and you all should check it out. Seriously, start at the beginning and read all of her posts. She is a riot.

Nana's House Judges Me

My grandmother has one of those houses that is so clean, it makes you uncomfortable. You don't want to touch anything and you surely don't wear shoes indoors, but you panic because you're not sure if she really wants your dirty bare feet touching her spotless hardwood so you stand in the foyer awkwardly taking your shoes off waiting for her to tell you what to do next. Nana needs one of those little pantyhose bootie dispensers like they have at shoe stores at her front door so guests can slip them on and eliminate that awkward should-I-take-my-shoes-off-or-not moment. 

Regardless of the fear of messing something up when you are in her house, nothing compares to the uncomfortableness of having Nana come to visit your house. Panic sets in like no other. Thoughts like "I'll never be as clean as Nana" run through your mind as you pace in circles, not knowing what to tackle first. "I shall make my bed. Nana would never stand for an unmade bed." Then you realize that an unmade bed may be frowned upon, but a toothpaste-y sink is even worse so you head for the bathrooms. Then you realize that if you can write your name in the furniture, you should probably dust. And on and on. Nothing really gets done very well because you are having a near conniption at the thought of grossing your grandmother out at the squalor you allow her only great-grandchild to live in. I have no idea why I'm writing this post in third person but it's happened and now I feel committed to it. 


Nana is coming over tonight to babysit while JD and I go to the Christmas concert at church. And while our place is very tidy, it will never be as clean as my grandmother's house. I have come to accept that, but I still have that anxiety when Nana is coming for a visit. No house is as clean as a Nana-clean house. So I am frantically cleaning toothpaste out of sinks and making beds. Just because our place will never be as clean as Nana's doesn't mean that I shouldn't at least try.

Just so you know, Nana has never judged the cleanliness of anyone else's house. The feelings of inadequacy are mine alone, but that tends to happen to anyone who has visited her house. 

I Say Merry Christmas

In the past few years, I have noticed increased marketing campaigns that omit the word Christmas from its signage. You can see plenty of Happy Holidays and Season's Greetings, but hardly any Merry Christmases. And then I started to notice smaller organizations and companies doing the same. Now, Facebook is filled with status updates from regular people claiming that holiday shopping is complete and to check out the seasonal deals at the mall. It is not popular to say Merry Christmas and the marketing giants of the world are trying to rename December 25th. Christ is slowly disappearing from mainstream Christmas.

I was apart of a debate on this subject that concluded that saying Merry Christmas was simply not inclusive. It excluded those who don't celebrate or don't believe in Jesus as Saviour. Happy Holidays is a more inclusive statement and politically correct, therefore it has been adopted as the official greeting of the Season.

I say bologna. No matter how hard folks want to eliminate Christ from Christmas, He is still at the center of it. I don't intend to exclude someone who doesn't celebrate or believe, but I believe and I am not ashamed to use His Name this holiday. I don't want to offend anyone, but offending someone by using the Name of Jesus is not a new concept (Matthew 5:10-12). It is a phenomenon that has plagued Christians for 2000 years. And this modern day holiday marketing scheme to eliminate Christ from Christmas will only work if you fall for it. Don't be ashamed of the Name of Jesus this Season.

I say Merry Christmas. Will you?

Tour of Homes

Our place is on the market and our wonderful realtor hired a professional photographer to take pictures. They are ridiculous, like so good they feel like we're telling a lie. Our place is nice and everything, but these photos make it look better than nice. I am so thrilled with them that I thought I'd take you on a little tour of our humble abode. And if you know someone looking for a fabulous townhouse in our area, they'll be sure to want to buy our place solely from looking at these pictures so pass them along. Thankyouverymuch.

Living room

The toys have all been strategically placed out of sight in these photos. This is how our living room looked before we had a child. Sigh. 


Kitchen

This feels like a bit of a lie. Our realtor told us to take everything off of the countertops. We did but our countertops NEVER looks this un-cluttered.  Unless you want to buy it, then it always looks this nice. Wink wink. 

Dining room

Foyer

Master bedroom

This is where we make the babies. Unless that grosses you potential buyers out, then we just sleep here. 

Master bath

Nursery/second bedroom

Nursery bath

And that's where we live. In all honesty, it really does look like this most of the time with some toys here and there. And everywhere. Kidding. Now somebody please buy it!

I Need Mistletoe

JD and I have this game where we kiss each other in unlikely places. Not unlikely places on our bodies, unlikely places in the world. Sheesh. We I want to kiss every place we go. It started when we were dating as a joke. If we found ourselves in a place that didn't warrant a kiss or romantic moment, we kissed just to say that we kissed at said place. "Kiss me on the escalator to the food court." "Kiss me at the red light on Broad St." "Kiss me in your mom's driveway at 3 o'clock in the afternoon." And on and on. We have kissed all over town and most surrounding states. The kissing game is my favorite.

The novelty of this game has worn out for JD. He is mostly annoyed when I say, "kiss me while I stir this pot of chili" or "kiss me while your mom and dad sit on our couch." I would never admit to taking the game too far because that's the point of the game: to kiss in the most outrageous/stupidest places. I will admit to driving him to the point of hating this game though. He rolls his eyes and begrudgingly gives me the most half-hearted kiss when I say, "kiss me before they collect the offering at church." The game has taken a turn for the ugly and if I don't watch it, I will be the only player in this most awesome pursuit.

That is why I need mistletoe. You cannot deny someone a kiss under mistletoe. It's a law. And I'm pretty sure JD has only kissed me under approximately 10 different balls of the stuff in our lifetime so the game is still on. Plus, I can keep moving it around so it will be, "kiss me under the mistletoe in the kitchen," and "kiss me under the mistletoe in the foyer." The game must go on. With so many awesome, unkissable places left to kiss each other, it simply must.