Holiday cards from Shutterfly have become an annual tradition on the Dressed Up household. I love choosing the perfect design and perfect photos to create our holiday masterpiece. We live far away from most of our family so our holiday cards are a great way to send them pictures of the kids while giving a cheerful greeting at the same time.

In the Christmas card section, you can chose from folded, flat stationary or flat photo cards. Personally, I’m a fan of the folded cards since I’m more of a traditionalist when it comes to holiday cards. The beauty of Shutterfly is that there’s something for everyone. You’ll find the perfect card to send your love to all of your friends and family.

Are you looking for a great gift for the grandparents? Photo books are perfect! What grandparent isn’t going to swoon over a book full of pictures of the most adorable kids on planet?

If a whole book is too much for you this time of the year, and let’s be honest, we all have 8 million other things to be doing, you can choose from lots of other awesome photo gifts. Gerald’s family is made up of card sharks. Seriously, these people are ALWAYS playing cards. You’d better believe these playing cards will be in several stockings this year.

I don’t want to hog all the Shutterfly goodness for myself, so I’m giving three of you a chance to get some cards of your own. Shutterfly has given me three gift codes for 25 cards each. Leave me a comment with your favorite holiday carol and you’ll be entered to win one. Contest closes on 11/15/11 at 11:59pm CST. One entry per person, please.

Today’s attempt to keep the Cancer Thoughts™ away was my pantry. When my son was born, my MIL stayed with us for a few weeks. She said she felt useless (which she was NOT) and wanted to do something. Could she please clean out my pantry? I’ve thought of this repeatedly and since my in-laws will be visiting in a month, I decided to clean the damn pantry so she’ll be proud.

Here are the shocking before photos:

There was a large dog food container and cat food container in the corner, on top of all that detritus.

My organizational system had devolved into "put it in the damn pantry and close the door."

So, I got out some large trash bags, a broom & dustpan, steam mop, and a magic eraser and went to town. I picked up all the detritus off the floor and swept up all the fallen animal crackers, pet food nuggets, and dead june bugs. At this point, my cat threw herself across the trash pile and vehemently objected to my harshness in judging these items “trash” and not “snacks.”

I found two small appliances that we haven’t used in the entirety of our marriage that other family members would love to have, and quite a few out-of-date canned goods. Can you tell I don’t use canned goods very often at all? I believe my supply is considered “ridiculous at best.” I threw away old cracker boxes with a handful of smashed crackers in the bottom, tea I never drink, etc. While I was doing this, Cancer Thoughts™ creeped in and started asking me who would grocery shop if I wasn’t around? Would Gerald know the kid’s favorite kind of Cheez-It? (Scrabble, fyi.) Would I outlast this can of black beans that expires in 2014? So, I kicked it up a notch and got out the magic eraser and scrubbed years of honey residue and god-knows-what-else off the shelves.

I stood back to admire my work and thought, “I may have cancer, but check out my kick-ass pantry! Who gives a shit about Janky Boob™ when you could eat off the floor in there?” Mission: accomplished.

After:

Check that floor, bishes!

So if you’ve got a home organizational need, call me. I’ve got about 30 more hours of waiting and a fresh box of magic erasers.

And without further ado, here are a million pictures:

I love her stripey nose.

She what a good girl she is?

Kisses!

She's very busy on the twitter.

She moonlights as a computer mouse.

Do you really have to work, mom?

Less working, more lovies.

She's absolutely gorgeous, isn't she?

I realize that showing you after photos doesn’t really help much since you didn’t know what the living room looked like previously. (And I totally spaced on taking before photos.) I tried to Photoshop the after photos to show you the furniture placement before the move, but honestly, I understand Photoshop about as well as I understand Swahili. Which is to say, NOT AT ALL. (Side note: Why don’t Macs have a Paint-like program?)

Here’s the gist of the changes. We used to have two black leather recliners in front of the window with an end table next to each. The wall with the pictures on it used to have a dark grey leather couch against it. The bookshelves used to be centered on their respective walls. And there was kid stuff EVERYWHERE. The green suede couch used to be in Sam’s room and there’s a grey leather love seat that used to be in Maddie’s room.

My dad and his wife did some rearranging themselves and offered us two sage green wing-back recliners that match our green couch. We took those because Gerald’s leather recliner had two broken springs and the leather was peeling off both of our chairs. (Side note: Don’t buy from Ashley furniture!) Are you with me so far?

Here’s what we did: Moved the leather couch into Maddie’s room. Moved the leather love seat into Sam’s room. Moved the green suede couch into the living room. Moved leather recliners to the garage. Moved green wing-backs into living room. Moved bookshelves out a bit to make room from new couch and end table placement. Created a “kid area” in the living room. We had taken out the coffee table when Maddie was about a year old so that we’d have room for her play yard. We put it back together and brought it out.

The changes really open up the living room and give the kids an area to play and keep all of Sam’s various baby trapping entertaining items out of the way. I love the result. Gerald? Not so much. He misses his ratty-ass broken recliner.

This photo is taken from the kitchen, standing in doorway leading to the living room:

This one is taken from the entry way to the house:

This one is taken from my chair, which is the wingback on the left, closest to the window:

My desire for change has been satiated. For now.

How can you be four? How is that possible? I swear you were just born five minutes ago, and now here you are walking around like some sort of Big Kid. Please stop growing up, ok? I’d like it very much if you’d stay little enough to snuggle forever.

Today has been great. We woke up and had chocolate frosted doughnuts with sprinkles for breakfast. Then, you tore into your presents. (Hungry Hungry Hippos, a pair of Twinkle Toes, a new “pretty pretty princess” outfit and a stuffed Rocket from Sam.) Per your request, you and I went to the Dallas Museum of Nature and Science to see the dinosaurs. We spent three hours playing everything we could get our hands on and seeing the dinosaurs over and over again. We had your favorite “Old MacDonald’s” for lunch and came home. You’re passed out in bed right now, but later this evening we’ll have your birthday dinner of cheese pizza and your rainbow birthday cake. I think we’ve officially exceeded your expectations for the day.

Riding the sheep on the farm at the museum

Playing in the water is always a favorite

Baby girl, you are the most imaginative, precocious, intelligent, well-mannered, infuriating, stubborn person I know. You are a know-it-all, a musician, a paleontologist, a whiner, a drama queen and a snuggler. You’re made of both stinging nettles and pink puffy hearts.

Four years ago when I finally got to see your beautiful face and kiss your smooshy cheeks I had no idea what was in store for us. Life with you is so many things, but boring isn’t one of them.

I love you as big as the sky,
Mama

(Also, the stylist had a very difficult time believing that we wanted Mad’s hair cut so short. She kept questioning us over and over and tried to talk Mad out of it. I finally had to politely tell her that we knew what we wanted and could she please just do it. She ended up leaving Maddie’s bangs pretty long and then put a pink clip in her hair to make it look more girly. We took it out as soon as we got home and I trimmed up her bangs. She looks amazing and she loves her new hair and the fact that it doesn’t get in her face anymore.)

Before

During

More During

After

Back

I was going to use this to illustrate the fact that my son is STANDING, but instead I'd like to draw your attention to the attitude Miss Priss is displaying. Pity me greatly.

Couldn't you just DIE?

Sam got some swanky leather moccasins from Alaska for Christmas. Guest appearance by Sofie the giraffe. Whom he loves more than me.

Maddie completely loves this creepy Santa at my dad's house. Personally, I'm afraid it's going to come to life and kill me in my sleep.

Trying to take a picure of Sam yields this result more often than not.

We started a new family tradition of Mexican food for Christmas Eve dinner. And look who's a big boy and sat in a high chair for THE FIRST TIME EVER.

Again with the dying, amirite?

Maddie and my dad about to pass out presents.

I hope your Christmas was filled with laughter, love and shrieks of joy. Or at the very least, a large quantity of alcohol.

Love from the Dressed Up family to yours.

This, of course, leads me to outfits. We need cute outfits to wear in said photo. Nothing too matchy-matchy because that’ll just look weird in a frame. (Totally ok for Christmas cards in my book, though.) And nothing too Christmas-y because, again, in a frame. Here’s what I like so far. What do you think?

For Sam

For Maddie

For me

For Gerald

All photos courtesy of Old Navy.com

All of the outfits except mine are the same shade of red. ON doesn’t have a sweater in the right shade for women. Jerkfaces. Anyhow, I’m going to see if it looks ok with the other red when I go to the store. I don’t want to stand out because my red is clashing.

I used a king size pillow case instead of a sheet. $10 for two of them. I put it on her and used her body as a template to cut arm holes along the seams and then cut some holes for eyes and a mouth.

Underneath the pillowcase. Please notice her new Fancy Nancy sneakers. Please do not notice that her pants are entirely too short. She is all legs, damn it.

oooooooo spooky!

For the the record, she hummed Edvard Grieg’s In The Hall of the Mountain King all along the trick-or-treat route.

Braaaaiiinnss!! Or squaaaassshh!!

Sam used Maddie’s first costume. Only instead of being a cute jack o’lantern, he decided to be a zombie pumpkin.

Bonus: Here’s a movie of Sam jammin’ out to his favorite song.

Sammy Sam from Erica Dressed Up on Vimeo.