New Tradition for the New Year

This year was our first Christmas season, since we have been married, that we decided to stay home instead of packing up and heading out to stay with family for the Holidays. I know, seven years and we are finally going to start our own traditions. Part of the reason for this is because I am pregnant and still dealing with being sick and also because our daughter is two this year and we wanted to start making some of our own family memories and traditions.

What is our new tradition you ask.....well it comes out of procrastination. 

I was super late with getting Christmas letters out then found that Staples had a deal on cards, 50 for $5. SWEET!!! Even after Christmas came and went, I still hadn't gotten them done but the deal was still good at Staples.

Friday I designed our cards and sent them in, for the extra $5 I put a bunch of photos from the year on the back so everyone could see how much Lady A has grown. I LOVE how they turned out. 

The reason this is going to be my new tradition......getting them ready and sending them out after Christmas means there is one LESS thing to try and fit in, we got to make personal photo cards at a great price and if I wanted to {since everything is digital now} I can also include some of our photos from Christmas morning for grandparents and others.

It looks like the sale is over now but watch for it next year if this sounds like something you want to do. Unfortunately the my local Staples customer service was lacking quite a bit, but next year we will be somewhere new and I enjoyed doing New Years cards so much this year, I'll still end up doing them again.

Valentine Chalkboard Printable

Here is my second attempt at making a chalkboard printable. I downloaded the chalkboard backgrounds from here. I put mine together in Photoshop but you can create it in Picasa just as well.

Simply open the chalkboard background in the color of your choice, then add your text on top. For Christmas I got a Samsung Note and absolutely love it. I wanted to have a bit of a hand drawn element to this one so I used the note to draw the heart. After a little bit of photoshop magic I was able to remove all the background and change the color to pink. If you would rather, you can download mine and print so you can add it to your own Valentine decor.

This is a 8.5"x11" so you can 'shrink to fit' if you are printing it to a smaller size. Enjoy!!

~Mindy

Christmas Chalkboard Art

Lately I have seen some really cute chalkboard art. Baby announcements, quotes, kid art etc.

I thought I would give it a try and love how it turned out. You can make your own too. I downloaded the chalkboard backgrounds from here. I put mine together in Photoshop but you can create it in Picasa just as well.

Simply open the chalkboard background in the color of your choice, then add your text on top. If you would rather, you can download mine and print so you can add it to your own Christmas decorations.