Do it Yourself, Christmas Card Photo

Front of Card
One of my favortite things about the holidays, is receiving Christmas cards. Especially the picture cards! The past 2 years we didn't send any cards out, so this year I was determined to make it happen! We wanted to do something different, so we thought it would be fun to do a "jammie shot!" It wasn't as easy as it looks, but we were really pleased with the shot we chose, and best of all, we did it ourselves! That's right, NO photographer here! This is how we did it.

1. Choose a comfortable setting. We chose our bed. What better place than a nice comfy bed to keep everyone relaxed right?  Well....... not exactly. Even though we planned our shoot after his nap, Tommy was fussy, so we had a bag of Cheerios to keep him occupied. But, then we had Jake who wanted the cheerios, so it was a constant battle to get a picture without Tommy's hands in his mouth eating Cheerios, or Jake's head in our laps where we had the bag of Cheerios hidden! 

2. Choose your wardrobe. I bought the jammies for Mike and I on Amazon, Tommy's came from his Aunt Robin, and Jake already had his red and white sweater for Target. Score! 
Tip: Color ALWAYS works well in photographs. The more color, the better.

3. Hair and Make-up. Do your hair and make-up. Look your best. Throw on that Christmas red lipstick!  

4. Set up a tripod. Lucky for us we already had one, but you can get a tripod online pretty cheap. You can even get a tripod for an iphone!

5. Take a TON of pictures. The more pictures you take, the easier it is to get a shot where everyone is actually looking at the camera. We set our camera to take 10 shots at a time, then we'd look at the lighting, poses etc. There was many a shot where I'd say to Michael,"OMG! I need to change my position. I look FAT!" ( :

6. Choose your shot, make your card. From Shutterfly, to Tiny Prints, to Vistaprint, to Minted, there are so many card companies out there that you can get great deals! We chose Shutterfly and I googled Shutterfly promo code and was able to get a $20. off coupon code online. I wasn't actually happy with the fonts at their sight, so Michael designed our card in photoshop, with his own fonts. We then chose a card from Shutterfly, added our picture with HIS font design. We left Shutterfly's lettering BLANK. You don't have to choose their fonts, or their font colors. Design your own. It's easy!

7. Have fun. Most of all, be yourselves and have fun! People can sense when something is not genuine. Have a cocktail ahead of time if you want. Come to think of it, why didn't I do that?! Oh well. Next year!

And there you have it!

Back of card

3 comments

Michelle said...

Oh my gosh, it is SUCH a cute card! Love the jammies, you are one cozy family!!

Teresa said...

So cute!! I can't believe you took those yourself. What kind of camera do you use?

Nicole Marie said...

OMG!! so freaking cute!!