23 December 2022
Merry Christmas and happy holidays, friends! I wanted to pop in and share our Christmas card before the big day passes us by. As always, we chose a design from Minted, though this is the first year in 9 years (!) that they were not a gift! The PR gal I’ve always worked with has moved on, and I didn’t have it in me to complete the rigamarole (posting, custom codes, stories, reels!) they ask influencers to do these days :) Regardless, I never considered a card from another option – the quality is beautiful and the designs are perfect. Here’s what we chose this year! I’ll confess that I felt a bit scattered when sending our card to print, and didn’t include the names and ages of our children, the year, a piece of scripture, or a few additional photos on the back as I usually do – yeesh. Of course, names and ages are on our accompanying newsletter, but I like to have them on the card, too, in case they get separated in posterity. This year, we opted to use the photo we snapped on Easter in our backyard in lieu of a photo session. It was an expensive year (ahem, kitchen, I’m looking at you), and it just seemed to make sense to go with a beautiful photo we already had! And then, of course, we tucked a copy of our 2022 newsletter into each envelope: I am seriously considering moving to an old-school narrative newsletter on folded, white 8.5×11 printer paper next year. Thoughts?! Would you find it weird if you got one in the mail? These types of missives used to be ubiquitous in the cards my family received growing up, and I loved reading them. And I’d be following in a proud family
28 December 2020
Friends, I hope you had the sweetest Christmases, if you celebrated! We did celebrate and it was sweet. Being the sole providers of Christmas magic, though, without family or church or friends to play supporting in-person roles, did leave me feeling a little unexpectedly nervous last week. My desire wasn’t for a perfect celebration, but more one that was satisfying and loving and hit the high notes of my own childhood. I think I was subconsciously afraid I was going to forget something, ha! (And forget something, I did – I didn’t realize until Christmas Eve that we do not own a copy of A Visit from St. Nicholas. Yikes! I recited it from my phone, which was unimpressive to my audience of two.) One sweet moment that stands out? Drilling holes into the underside of our mantel on Christmas Eve afternoon for little cup hooks to hold our stockings. Since it was the first Christmas Eve we’d spent in our home, we’d never needed them before. It was our first year hanging our stockings by our chimney with care, but not the last! Anyway, I wanted to take a minute and pop in to share our 2020 Christmas cards with you! Thanks to the postal service delays, it appears they are arriving to loved ones’ mailboxes about the same time as this blog post, even though I mailed them weeks ago, ha! So happy to share them with you loved ones, too. It was hard to choose a greeting that felt appropriate for 2020, but I thought this one fit the bill. Our photo is a favorite from our Fourth of July backyard fun with Lisa and Christen. As always, our card is from Minted. This particular design is by Alethea & Ruth, who I’ve chosen many times over
21 December 2018
At the beginning of last December, I was experiencing the lows of pregnancy – the can’t-get-off-my-couch-feel-sick-all-the-time lows. From the couch, I fretted about sending out our Christmas cards on top of all the other, more mundane tasks I had been neglecting, and ultimately mailed them without personal notes and without our customary infographic/newsletter just to get them out the door (though I included it here for you to see!). That was painful, friends!! Though I know handwritten notes aren’t for everyone, I feel deeply that jotting a quick line acknowledging the recipient as an individual goes a long way towards our Christmas cards feeling less about us, and more about connection and Jesus. I mean, yes, the card is still a big old photo of us, and the newsletter is about our family’s doings, but I think it helps (as does hand-addressing the envelopes instead of having them printed). So it was with a big sigh of relief that I was able to send out our cards this week WITH notes and WITH a newsletter even with more December craziness. They’ve already led to several additional connections with family and friends since then, which is the best! Here they are, if you’d like to see… Our card, as always, is from Minted. Choosing the design was super simple this year — this one from Sara Hicks Malone couldn’t have been more perfect for our photo choice! Can’t wait to show you more from our newborn session with Graham soon!! As our family grows, I’ve found myself including more and more text… though I love our graphic interpretation of a newsletter so much, I could see us switching to a more traditional letter style in future years! It’s a family tradition, after all :) I can’t believe I forgot to snap
25 December 2017
Merriest Christmas, friends! Since I can’t hug all of you in person, I’m sharing our Christmas card here today… He brings joy in all circumstances, and it is our joy to celebrate that in this card! There were just too many cute snaps of our little JBug this year, so we squeezed a few more on the back :) One change this year? In the craziness of the last two months, I decided to let go of printing and sending our annual newsletter. It was a tough decision, because I already had it designed, but in the end I’m glad we chose simplicity. There’s always next year! And as a consolation prize, y’all can enjoy it here! :) Iām writing this post a few days early, and by the time you read it, I’ll be celebrating the holidays with our beloved family! I am sending you all lots of love and wishes for a cozy Christmas filled with delicious food, comfy pajamas, and laughing until your cheeks hurt with the ones you love. I will see you back here on Friday for my year in review ā one of my favorite posts of the year!