vday outtakes

I wanted the kids to pose for a Valentine's picture, nothing fancy just a shot of them showing off their sibling love. This is what we came up with:

Not bad. They're both looking in my general direction. Of course that was one of about fifty shots, and frankly, the others are so funny. We joke that Elia loves Wells in theory but not always in practice. That shines through in a few of these. Enjoy the Neckers kids, unedited.

holiday photo outfits

Last week we had our family photos taken for our annual Christmas card. Our photos will be back to us soon but in the meantime, I wanted to share our photo outfits with you.

Over the years we've played with different styles, some more formal and some less. These days, we're feeling pretty casual, as necessitated by life with two young kids. I also love the idea of coordinating all the time but alas, when Elia picks her own outfits and Wells spits up on his and Todd and I throw on whatever is clean and readily available, coordination is not our strongest game. Family pictures gives us a chance to step out of that and do something a little more thoughtful.

This year, I wanted to go with more looks with more traditional colors that weren't a huge departure from our everyday style but still a little special. Our looks are pictured below and you can see them in the sidebar photo as well - a special sneak peek.

holiday photo outfits 

My best tips for picking photo shoot outfits are:

christmas cards

One thing I love about the holiday season is receiving Christmas cards from so many friends and family members.

We had a great photo shoot this summer but I was thinking that it might be fun to have a holiday themed photo of Elia for our card, instead of a summery one and thought I'd try to take some photos myself.

I just had to share the results.  Below is the best shot I got outdoors.

 We moved the party inside and the photos didn't improve much,

At least her outfit was cute.  Can't wait to see how your holiday cards turned out!