Thank you, Shutterfly!

Simply Joy Christmas

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Not only did Shutterfly give us 50 free Christmas cards, they helped us when we picked the completely wrong card for our offer!! So excited about our cards, so act surprised when you get your's in the mail. :)

Cheeeeeeese!

So, we are finally to a point with the girls where they both LOVE having their picture taken. It is almost impossible to get one of either one of them alone because the other always wants to be in the picture too. What a relief after years of tears and begging. :) We love Portrait Innovations but always leave with way too many pictures. Even after giving them away to family, we end up with an envelope full of extras. This year, my wonderful brother-in-law Matthew is taking our Christmas pictures for us. He bought a studio kit and has a great camera. His pictures are amazing! We are so excited.

This year, we'll be creating our own Christmas cards and are so excited about using Shutterfly. We have ordered photobooks and personalized gifts from them in the past. The catalog came in the mail last week and there are so many great designs to choose from! It will be hard to narrow them down to one. So far, these are just a few of my favorites (make sure you hold down the Ctrl key when you click, or this page will close):

Holiday Charms

I thought this would be so cute with the girls. Look, one of the names on here is even Carly! :)

Peppermint Bliss

Sweet Stocking

I definitely want something that we can add a few pictures to. It will be hard enough to narrow it down to one card design...I don't want to have to narrow it down to one picture too! (this is me being "the glass is half full" and assuming we'll have several great ones. :) )

Can you believe Christmas is almost here again??!!

***(Shuttefly is already an awesome site. What makes them even more awesome? This! They are giving away 50 Free Christmas Cards to bloggers. )***

Cracked us up!!

On Sunday after church, I was asking Taylor what her story was about in Sunday School. At first she said she couldn't remember, and then she said "Jesus". She said something about way up there, so I thought she was saying something about heaven. I asked her where Jesus is and she said "Ummmm, me don't know. Jesus not in my class!" I asked if he was in Heaven and she said "He in Carly class!"

Sweet Girl

I love Carly (obviously, that should go without saying. She is my daughter.) But there are the extra things that really touch me. She is so understanding, forgiving, and complimentary. When I mess up, I am really hard on myself, even about the stupidest things. She's always right there saying "It's ok, Mama!". She loves to pick out a shirt for me to wear and when I get dressed, she always tells me I look beautiful. (and it always seems right at the moment when I really needed to hear it. :)). And when we have horrible days where I feel like a nagging, terrible mom, she sticks with me and keeps smiling. She will be a great mom one day. :)

Sometimes I wonder who is learning from whom??
(whom? is that right? I never could keep that straight. :) )

Much Needed...

Today was a much needed GREAT day with the girls. We downloaded some new music and danced like crazy. The girls had a beach party when I was in the shower. They took our beach towels, got their swimsuits and sunglasses on, and "laid out" in the bedroom while I got ready...without fighting!! Then we watched my wedding video, Carly's ultrasound video, and just hung out. They even helped clean up while we danced some more.

Days like this are what keep me going after horrible days like yesterday.

James 1:2-4
"Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything."

Too Little Becomes Too Much

So, I keep thinking lately "Who gets to decide when something is not enough or when something is too much?" It's subjective and very annoying! The two cases that keep coming up:

Having Kids- We have two and people are constantly asking us when we are going to have another one. I think it's partly because some people cannot imagine that we could be happy with two girls (especially Andrew) and we just HAVE to try for a boy. I am perfectly happy (and stressed out :)) with two...

but at what point do people start making the "You're done now, right?" comments and talking rudely behind the parents back about them not getting the concept of birth control. I get so frustrated with people criticizing The Duggars (http://tlc.discovery.com/tv/duggars/ if you don't know who they are). Yes,they have a lot of kids, but they also pay for everything outright, homeschool their children, and seem to be a great family. There are people with 6 kids that have better control and better behaved children than others with only 1 child.

Weight- When you are overweight, no one will admit it to you. You know it and they know it, but (thankfully) most people are nice enough not to tell you. Then you lose weight and suddenly people are making snide comments about you, about what you are or aren't eating, how much you exercise,etc...and you still have weight to lose to be considered healthy.

So, this is mostly just a rant that I've been wanting to get off my chest for awhile.

Excuses, Excuses

Ok, before I get on the post I wanted to add, I just have to apologize for my slacking.

I just noticed my layout was a Christmas layout and my last post was on my birthday, in December!

Our new computer started disconnecting any time I try to read anyone's blog or do anything with mine. It's really annoying and I can't figure out why. So, we never sold the old one so I'm forced to use a small screen in order to see around the large gray streak that goes from the top to the bottom.

Anyway...