The complete and total idiot's guide to Christmas card photos

Here's a fun! and easy! way to start the holiday season: a do-it-yourself Christmas card photo shoot! After all, nothing says "festive" like crying children and swearing parents. Want awesome holiday pics like ours? Here's a foolproof step-by-step guide:

1) Do not plan ahead. This is crucial. Pictures better reflect your kids' personalities when they're spontaneous. So spring it on them (and your photographer/husband) with no advanced warning. (Added bonus: your husband will love you for this!)

2) Get the kids completely wound up. This always makes for successful pictures.

3) Coordinated outfits are not necessary. Maybe try for something without food stains or holes, but really... who cares? Although, in retrospect, I kind of wish we'd gone with Evan's "A Very Camo Christmas" theme. Combat-themed Christmas cards rock.

4) Make sure your husband has to spend at least 37 minutes making unnecessary (he says "nuanced," whatever) camera adjustments. This gives the kids adequate time to start pinching each other and assures that someone will start crying.

5) Bribe kids with leftover Halloween candy that no one wants. Example: "I'll give you Milk Duds if you stop crying." It kind of works.

6) Time to put the baby in the frame! Be sure to get him overexcited so he wants to kiss everyone.

7) "Smile!"

8) "No, kids, your real smiles."

9) "Um, guys, could you maybe not show us your tonsils?"

10) {sigh} Put away the camera. Tell your husband to stop dropping f-bombs in front of the kids. Open a beer. Consider studying up on Photoshop; after all, with the 54 pictures he just took, there's gotta be something salvageable. Right?

11) Make a note to call the Sears Portrait Studio first thing in the morning.

Maybe I'll enter another contest someday

I just won something!!!

The Blurb/Parent Bloggers Network Halloween photo contest, to be exact. Grand Prize, even.

I've been kind of waiting for the results, and was excited to the announcement in my reader this morning. I figured my best shot was at Best Handmade Costume. But my heart sank as I scrolled down, because when I saw the jellyfish that won that category, I knew I had been outdone.

"Better luck next time, me," I thought, and continued to scroll down to admire the remaining winners.

And I about passed out when I saw my little Jensen, all dressed up as a mummy, under "Grand Prize Winner." Shut. Up.

Seriously. I never enter contests, because I am shy and it feels like self-promotion to me, and I am the worst self-promoter in the entire world. If my life depended on me being a salesperson, I would die. No question.

But for some reason I entered the contest and now I have $75 toward publishing a Blurb book of my blog-- what better way to document my beginning ventures into this crazy blogging world?

Thanks a million to PBN and Blurb and their judges: Tracey of Mother May I and Shutter Sisters, Casey of Moosh in Indy, and Aimee of Greeblemonkey. Congratulations to the other winners with their amazing (seriously, the pink baby octupus? that is so cute it shouldn't be legal) costumes, and to all the entrants, who all had great costumes and great posts. And be sure to click through to see the winners here-- they're adorable!

Update: At breakfast, I told Jensen his picture won. "Isn't that exciting?!" I asked. He agreed that it was. Then, with all the seriousness a seven-year-old can muster, he put his hand on my shoulder and said, "But, Mom, remember not to brag." Buzzkill.