Christmas cards. Oh, the pressure!

For about 2 weeks, I was desperate to get a picture of Maddie and Jacob together for our Christmas cards. This was not a fun task. Everyday, I'd dress them up in their outfits, sit them on the couch and start snapping away. And I am no photographer so that did not help things! Maddie is quite impatient when it comes to sitting up propped against her brother and we had about a 5 minute window of happiness before she started crying. In addition to that, for some reason, Jacob blinks with every picture. Every. Single. One. It's enough to drive a mama crazy!! To top things off, we were running against the clock. It takes time to create the card online, have it printed and shipped here and mailed out before Christmas!! Talk about stress...

Anyway, we finally got one that was presentable. Thank goodness because I was seriously going to pop a vein in my head after so many sessions of this. Here are some of the outtakes -- and a few of the kids individually because my last alternative was just to put pictures of each of them separately on the card. Now I realize why so many parents do this! Note to self for next year: Start this process in July.

Maddie's hair is just fantastic in his photo:



Does anyone else think this photo is hysterical? Look at Jacob's face!! I have never, ever seen that face before and every time I look at it, I nearly pee my pants.



Yet another face...



Sweet boy. Maddie doesn't look so happy.



Wish you could see more of Maddie in this one



Too scrunched up



Grrr. Eyes closed again! This would have been a good one!



Jacob looking intoxicated. Maddie looking less than pleased.



Maddie just downright unhappy



Annnnddddd, eyes closed again



The individual pics...I love Maddie's expressions



Can't get enough of those blue eyes!



Hi sweet pea :) :)



She looks all grown up here...



I just love this outfit



I love it when Jacob smiles this big. Too bad his eyes are closed. Again.



Yet another



And the face I love so much. Classic Jacob.