Happy Holidays From the Hales

I wanted to do joint Christmas/Thank You cards this year, but I'm starting to think I'm a horrible person and it is clearly way to late to thank everyone for the kind gifts that were sent to us when Kayla was born.  I mean, I'm practically a year late now.  Maybe I write joint "We Moved!"/Thanks for new baby and 1st birthday gifts all in one!

Anyways, back on track here.  I wanted to make a quick photo Christmas card this year.  I was thinking about doing something clever with photos from Hawaii and some clever saying involving Mele Kalikimaka.  So I went on shutterfly and found a card I liked, but couldn't edit the wording.  I went through the uploading pictures/placing process and asked Justin what he thought.

This is the response I got, "Can't you make something like that yourself in Photoshop for a lot cheaper?"  Um, yeah sure I'll take the extra time and effort to make it myself.  Slightly annoyed, I set out on my new task.  Honestly, I'm pretty impressed with how well it came out.

Then I was talking to a patient who is a photographer who gave me the idea to have them printed at vistaprint.com.  I got 30 cards with envelopes for less than $20.  So I highly recommend this.  (Except for some reason, I set the size of my Photoshop document at 5x7 but the 5x7 blank card upload on vistaprint didn't seem to work out well.  It got a little stretched length wise but I still think it looks good.)

The big reveal (I hope everyone has received one...if you didn't, sorry we only had a small amount printed to save money.):

Then, from VistaPrint, you can put a quick photo and message on the back free of charge as well!  Pretty sweet.  Here's a crappy iPhone photo of the back:

Top Five Worst Christmas Songs

So lots of my blogger friends have countdowns and fun stuff on their blogs for the holidays.  Granted, most of them are the best, or funniest such and such, so I thought I would do something a little different.

I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE christmas music.  I could listen to it all day everyday throughout December.  (Sidenote: if you haven't checked out Michael Buble's new Christmas CD, you are missing out.  He's amazing.  And HOT.)  While I love holiday music, there are those few songs that I have to change the radio station or turn down the volume so I don't have to listen to them.  So here are my top five WORST Christmas songs.

*Disclaimer:  This is my own opinion.  You have the right to yours as well so if you like any of these songs, I'm sorry but you have poor Christmas music taste. :)

5. Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer- Dr. Elmo

I often find myself singing to this despite my dislike.  I just don't like it.  No explanation necessary.



4. Where Are you Christmas- Faith Hill

Now, you all may or may not know about my lesbian girl crush on Faith Hill on Sundays (I mean come on, leather bodysuit, catchy song, you can't go wrong), but this Christmas song is bad.

YouTube won't let me embed this video so here it is.

3.  Christmas Shoes- Alabama

Ok so this song isn't that bad, but I'm of the opinion that Christmas songs should be joyful & merry.  Call me crazy.  But this song is sad.  Like, really sad.  Therefore, not a great Christmas song in my opinion.



 2. Grown Up Christmas List- Amy Grant

Something about this song just rubs me the wrong way.  But, if you want a slightly tolerable version, Michael Buble does one.  He makes everything tolerable. :)



1.  Christmas Eve in Washington.  Maura Sullivan

As much as I love DC, this song makes my ears bleed.  If you look on youtube for it, you will be sure to hear some even worse renditions, but this is the best video I could find for you.



Honorable Mentions:


1. Dominic the Italian Christmas Donkey
2. I can only take so much of Feliz Navidad.
3. I don't HATE this one, but the lyrics are quite bad.  Do They Know It's Christmas- BandAid
4. Happy Christmas (War is Over)- John Lennon.  I have to admit I find myself singing this one but didn't realize how particularly unhappy it was- with more bad lyrics.