Christmas from Grandma Becky

The kids had a present-full Christmas Eve this year! First thing Christmas Eve morning they Skyped with Grandma Becky and opened presents from her. Then after naps another package from Grandma Becky arrived so they opened presents again! Believe me, they LOVED Christmas Eve this year!!! We took probably 100 pictures of them opening presents. I won’t include them ALL, but this is still probably a picture-overload post!

(Oh, actually, they also opened some presents on Saturday. I knew Grandma Becky got them both boots, so we let them open their boots on Saturday so they could go ahead and wear them!)

 

Makenna jumped up and down screaming when she opened this present. She was SO excited that they got a Cinderella movie!

These last pictures are the “after nap” pictures so that explains the bedraggled looks!

Love this expression on Makenna’s face! She was so super excited for new Tinkerbell panties, ha ha:

Thank you for the great Christmas, Grandma Becky! We have some very happy kids who are enjoying their presents immensely!

Family Pictures 2012

Every November or December, we always get our family pictures made. This year we didn’t have the budget to get professional photos taken, so we just improvised by taking our own outside in the yard. We are super high-class, obviously! : )

A couple of weeks ago I took a few pictures of the kids. I am definitely NOT a photographer and I never mastered the lighting for my pictures so they aren’t the highest quality. It was also COLD outside so the poor kiddos’ smiles are pretty strained in some of the pictures! But I still managed to capture a few cute shots.

Makenna (Makenna actually likes having her picture taken, so there are more pictures of her than Max. Max complains about me taking his pictures and says, “Are we done yet?!?” after each shot! Also, Makenna is SUPER photogenic usually but she was really just freezing and shaking all over during these pictures. We will have to try again in the Spring when she’s not so cold!):

Makenna and Max together:

Max’s smile here cracks me up!

Love Max playing with Makenna’s hair in this one:

Max:

Makenna is in the background of this picture, but it’s still my favorite shot of Max!

He insisted on wearing his “puppy ears”:

On Sunday, after Church, I said “enough is enough! Let’s take some family pictures now!” We were all wearing Christmas colors, so we all sort of coordinate even! : )

We didn’t have a photographer, so we sat on the hearth at the fireplace and Austin propped the camera on the back of the couch and then ran and jumped in the picture. We had to redo the picture several times until we were all actually in the picture. : )

Then we went outside to take pictures of parents with kids.

These two are SO photogenic!

Austin with his “mini-me”:

This pose didn’t work out so great for us… But it is still pretty fun!

I have to admit, I don’t really like any of the pictures I am in. I am absolutely huge and my face looks swollen and I have no color in my face… but I am 30 weeks pregnant so I will probably not like any of my pictures for a while! At least there are cute kids sharing my pictures!

We finished off our photo session by heading back inside for a “Mommy and Daddy” picture. I actually do like this picture—I love my handsome husband! (Also, totally off topic, but for some reason this pregnancy has turned my hair curly! I shower at night, go to bed with my hair wet, and wake up in the morning with curls! So crazy!)

So there’s the Matthews’ Family Portraits 2012! Not our best pictures, but I’m still thankful for my gorgeous family! : )