We took our own Holiday Photos...And Survived!!

We did it! We took our own holiday photos! I am very proud of this DIY project because it wasn't easy...at all! 

However it was a really funny experience, I learned more about my camera, and we ended up with some great photos and Christmas card design.

This whole thing started when I started contacting a few local photographers and the ones that weren't booked through the holidays were super expensive. My hubby is the one who said "We have a good camera, why don't we use it?"

First let me say we had a ton of bloopers....ha

This is a time where you have to take a million pics to get a few good ones! And you have to start bribing kids with candy...well I had to :)

My favorite family photo is the first one we took while testing out the new remote and tripod for the camera.

(I purchased both of those inexpensively through amazon.) 

The remote is both a blessing and a curse because the kids were fighting over who got to press it the entire time!

 My hubby recently bought me a new lens for my Nikon D5100 and I had fun testing it out. It is a VR Nikkor 55-200MM, and I LOVE it!

The first few shots we took in our front door, and then we went down the street where there is a fountain and nice landscaping.

 (Boots I bought at Kohl's on sale with Kohl's cash!) :) 

 And now I want you to see the establishment we were taking pics in front of...

Thanks Derrel's Mini Storage for having pretty landscaping!

(Yes that's the busy street where people were honking at us periodically)

Ok and now for the card...I used the new holiday features on the free photo editing website www.picmonkey.com 

I'm pretty much obsessed with this tool and find it so much easier than photoshop.

Today they added photo card collages! Sweet.

First I created a photo collage (See the option at the top to create a collage?), saved it, then edited the collage adding text.

I found this awesome chalkboard background for free via Topsy Turvy! Plus there's some neat already made  cards that you can put your photo in!

For mine I saved the chalkboard background in a jpg and included it in my photo collage I made. Then saved and edited it with text.

Thanks so much for stopping by! Are you doing a photo card this year?


Update: Ashley from Topsy Turvy reminds us that "just remember that pic monkey saves at 72 dpi, so while it's great for digital cards, it will be terrible for printing. for printing you want at least 300 dpi"
Maybe mine will be a good digital card then :)

                                          

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