Gingerbread Houses 2010

Over the weekend we started to get in the Christmas Spirit by having our annual gingerbread house making and decorating. After two failed batches and starting over at 10:30pm so we would have working gingerbread to meet with friends the next day, I think we FINALLY figured out the secret to gingerbread that will maintain it's shape: more flour, longer cooking time, and dough rolled thinner. It's only taken us three years to figure it out. Last year (link to last year's post) we used skewers to hold the house up and even then they collapsed. I even think our decorating was taken up a notch this year too. I wonder what next year will bring? Hopefully, less batches of gingerbread.

Family Photos

A few weeks ago we had our first official family photos taken. We love them! We were disappointed when a photographer we really liked from our old ward was booked through the end of the year and unable to fit us into her schedule. As we started looking for other options we stumbled across Camille Garrison Photography. We loved her style and couldn't be more pleased with the results. She does an amazing job!

If you want to see a few more photos, go to Camille's blog HERE.

Passage to Full Adulthood using Shutterfly

This year Nate and I decided it was finally time to send out Christmas cards! The timing just seemed right and to us Christmas cards seems like a right of passage to full adulthood - a little scary I might add. When did we get so old that now we have a family of our own and are sending out Christmas cards? We still feel young.

Anyways, trying to be frugal I decided I would design the cards myself, find a place to print them, and save money in the long run. So, I started poking around on a few sites I know and trust for great design ideas - namely Shutterfly. I have ordered photobooks for my digital scrapbooking in the past from them and have loved how they turned out and the quality. The colors are always exactly how they appeared on screen - which sometimes isn't always the case. Since I am on Shutterfly's email list I have been receiving emails regarding their new Christmas photo cards for 2010. Shutterfly has so many different designs and styles using traditional Christmas colors to more playful ones and also more traditional designs that I started getting really excited. They have amazing designers working for them.

The longer I searched through the numerous designs, the more excited I got and started dropping in my pictures  - just to see how the cards would really look once they were personalized. I fell in love! The program was so easy to use and it's awesome how you can personalize each card to really make it your own. I really wanted to use Shutterfly but thought it would be too expensive. Then, I heard about a great promotion Shutterfly had to receive 50 free cards. Hmm. Would it be worth it? As I started pricing out the options (Trust me that I know how to use excel and did create a spreadsheet. Would you expect anything less from Nate and me?) I realized with the free cards Shutterfly would be no more expensive than my other options, and did I mention envelopes are included in the price? That was the clincher for me. Plus, the quality is better than anything I could have done on my own. So, you may just be getting one of these Christmas cards from the DeFries family this year. We have a few favorites and are having a hard time narrowing it down.

On another note - I just received an email from Shutterfly promoting photo calendars. Isn't that the perfect gift for family? Shutterfly may just have won more loyalty from me.

Hats off to Shutterfly!