This year I really wanted to be sure we did the Christmas card thing and that we did it right. I always love what the designers over at Minted do so I knew I wanted to start there. We immediately fell in love with this Joyful design, by Carrie ONeal, and knew right away that it had to be our Christmas card this year.

I originally had plans to have all of us, myself and Jon, included in this card this year (as we don’t really show up in pics around here too much) but we just couldn’t work out a time with Jon’s busy schedule. But next year, we will prevail. I’m determined! So of course I do wish we could have all made an appearance but other than than, I’m really happy with how these cards turned out!

I wanted to do something fun and playful with the shoot so we made a few props.

Little O is in love with his mounted polar bear wall hanging so thus began our inspiration. I made a simple paper bear mask for each kid and they had lots of fun with it. Baby M didn’t wear her’s for too long of course but I find that a few props always helps in getting those great candid shots and giggly expressions so we were good with it.

The kids weren’t too keen on an outdoor shoot so we decided to bring the outdoors in and make a few trees of our own, with our tried and true craft medium of choice – cardboard.

One of the reasons I chose Minted to do our cards this year is the multi-photo background options they have. One photos is never enough. I always seem to have so many favorites after a shoot and this was a great way to showcase them all.

Of course not all photos made it to the card so I can’t help but share a few more here. I loved so many, it was hard to narrow it down.

Figuring out wardrobe for your Christmas photo shoots can be the most fun part, right?! I died when I saw this perfect fairisle sweater from Marie-Chantal. It actually set the tone for the entire color scheme. And AJ, well he hates anything itchy or scratchy so you can imagine how delighted we both were when we discovered just how incredibly soft, supple and snuggly this sweater is. I mean it’s like baby’s skin! No joke. It’s a new favorite, for sure. And really I’m actually dying over all of their sweet clothing over on Marie-Chantal. Makes we want to just up and move to England already.

Once I knew yellow was going to be in the color scheme It was clear that Little O had to wear this black pocket tee from PRSPRKids. Paired it with this striped Toto Knits scarf , that you might remember from this post. Love it.

And baby M, well I’ve been waiting all my life to invest in darling little dresses and to wrap little baby girl legs in snuggly tights and leggings, and these from Fawn Shoppe were just too cute to pass up. They make me think of little sugar plums…(Oh my that just got me excited for bringing this little lady to the Nutcracker Ballet is NYC someday…eep! so excited!).

And now with our Christmas card squared away, it’s time to start thinking of what to get these three bear cubs for Christmas…The older ones are getting harder to please these days. They have their ideas, Santa has his, and then there’s that handmade magic that we always like to throw in…guess we better get to it!