Category Archives: Holiday

Moments and Memories: Preserving the Magic of Your Family Holiday with Photos

Choosing travel is one of the most charming ways to celebrate family holidays. Besides spending quality time with your family, you get to explore new places and share the experience with your loved ones. Of course, who wouldn’t want to cherish such everlasting memories? Since family holidays give us ample time to celebrate the togetherness, documenting your family stories with photos is not only fun, it’s a great thing to recall how adventurous your holidays have been with your loved ones.

However, capturing great snapshots is an art. And not all of us are experts in clicking the right moments. That’s because there’s so much more to it except just posing for every photo. So how about a candid shot with a perfect lighting?

Preserving the holiday magic goes beyond just packing, booking, and travelling. Below are some great photography tips to help you capture the memorable stories hidden in each of your holiday photos.

Select a Black and White Theme to Capture a Timeless Photo

Though shooting in colour mode is a photography norm, most of us are still fond of the black and white effect that makes up a timeless photo. Interestingly, black and white photography is still preferred!

But when should you actually convert your holiday photos into black and white images? You can choose this option when the texture, form, and light in the image are more compelling as compared to the hues in the scene. Also, if the colours in the image are creating a distraction, it’s best to prefer black and white over scattered colours.  

To create this artistic look, simply take a photo and turn it into black and white colours by adjusting the settings of your digital camera.

Bring a Camera Battery Charger with You

If you’re wandering in a garden filled with flowers, what could be more exciting than experimenting with some floral photography? But if your camera has a low battery, this can destroy all the fun. However, there isn’t any need for letting those precious moments vanish forever. By packing a camera battery charger, you’re good to go to any place without worrying about your camera charging needs.

Pack Your Camera’s Lens Cleaning Cloth

If you’re heading towards the beach, the sea salt, sun cream, and the sand won’t do any good to your camera except for killing a perfectly captured moment. Taking splashy shots of your kids may come out to be blurry because of the sand grains stuck in the lens of the camera. In such a situation, a lens cloth works well. Clean your camera lens with the cloth before taking lively photos of the kids while they’re playing at the sea side.

 

Be Mid-Step While You’re Walking

Whether you want to start off with hiking or just feel like having calm, relaxing walk with your spouse, it’s challenging to capture the exact story in a photo. That’s because even if you’re walking, the photo will show that you’re just standing. To create the walking effect even in photos, here’s a trick: be in your mid-step as the camera captures the moment. If both of your feet are in the same place, the photo will show that you’re standing still.

Let Your Photos Narrate a Story

While you’re on the go, it’s a natural emotion to preserve every moment: your car drive, the time spent during the flight, your family’s first step on the lands of their favourite travel destination, the culture of the country, the streets, and even the food! Though this surely is a great way to capture the joys of your journey, you can uplift the charm further by capturing the minute details of these moments. For instance, if you’re in a touristy site (such as Eiffel Tower), try to shoot from a new angle – right from the ground, or from a higher place.

Preserve the Little Adventures

Exploring new places is not only fun, it’s a sure-fire opportunity for kids to try out new things – things they had never done before, for instance, diving in a lake for the first time! While they do this, don’t just capture their first try. Take a moment to record the entire family’s reactions too. To do this, make sure you’re shooting the whole scenery.  

The Bottom Line

Photography is itself a journey. And when it’s about cherishing the moments spent during family holidays, nothing beats the joy of capturing your kids’ candid laughter in an extraordinarily artistic way.  If you’re equipped with a high-quality camera, a camera charger, and the passion to take captivating family photos during the trip, you’re ready to relive the holiday magic even after years. 

John Stowe is an amateur photographer based in Leeds UK. He got the digital photography bug back in the early 2000’s and has since had many different models of cameras. He loves to share his ideas and thoughts online for others to read.

Get Your Holiday Cards and More at Tiny Prints

It’s that time of year once again and I have been busy getting everything ready around the house for the holidays. In addition to get the house in order, I’ve also been getting ready to send our holiday cards out, finding teacher gifts, and something for the kids to give out to their classmates, as well as a few other items.

When it comes to all of these things, I am happy that I can make Tiny Prints my one-stop-shop.

Large Selection of Holiday Cards

Picking out the perfect card for our family to send out this year, was hard. Tiny Prints has such a large selection to choose from. From picture cards that are personalized, foil-stamped, glitter cards, ornament cards, and more.

This year I decided on doing two cards, a holiday photo card as well as an ornament photo card, along with some matching address return labels.

Pictured above: Keeping it Real Flat Holiday Photo Card in flint and the Keeping it Real Address Labels, also in flint.

Pictured above: Jolly Berries Holiday Greeting Die Cut Ornament Card in milk.

I am very pleased with how great these cards both turned out and I can’t wait to get them out in the mail to all of our family and friends this weekend.

Of course, customizing the cards to fit our needs was a breeze. It took a few minutes to upload our photos, get them in place, and then customize the colors, names, etc. To make things even better for those who don’t have the time to address all their cards, Tiny Prints offers FREE recipient addressing on any custom envelope! All you have to do is stuff and send!

Gifts for Teachers & Classmates

Since Alexander and Ellie are both elementary students, we like to have gift for their teachers as well as something for them to share with their classmates.

This year, in addition to a few items I already have together for their teacher, I thought it would be nice to add a personalized lined notebook for each of them, because, what teacher couldn’t use a notebook?

Pictured above left to right: Tiny Prints Little Notes lined notebook in wild strawberry and Striped Spectacular lined notebook in baroque.

For their classmates, we went with a fun little greeting card for the kids to give out. Tiny Prints has a great selection of kid friendly holiday cards too!

Pictured above left to right: Tiny Prints Mesmerizing Maze in stormy blue and Peppy Penguin in surf (kids) holiday cards.

If you are still on the hunt for the perfect holiday cards for your family to send, be sure to check out Tiny Prints

Family Fun for the Holidays

The holiday season is here and now is the time to get out and create some great family memories. For our family, we like to find family friendly events in our community to enjoy.

If you are looking for some great, family fun in Memphis, Tennesee this holiday season, just out this great list, brought to you by Wolfchase Chrysler Dodge Jeep Ram.

Starry Nights

Pack the entire family into the car and head down to Shelby Farms Park through December 28th and check out over 1.5 million lights on display throughout the park. You can drive through in your car or sign up for a horse-drawn carriage or hayride.

HOURS:

Through December 28th, 2016: Sun-Thu 6pm-9pm; Fri-Sat 6pm-10pm

ADMISSIONS:

Cars
Entry Per Vehicle $20
Run/Walk/Ride Mondays $5; Family $20
Carriage Rides $60

Zoo Lights at The Memphis Zoo

Visit the Memphis Zoo and check out the spectacular holiday light displays, singing Christmas trees, live reindeer, take a ride of the North Pole Express Train and so much more!

HOURS:

Zoo Lights is open daily, beginning December 15th through 30th from 5:30-9:30pm.

ADMISSIONS:

Zoo Lights admission: $7/Members; $9/Nonmembers

Christmas Eve: Zoo Closed. No SunTrust Zoo Lights.
Christmas Day: Zoo Closed during the day. SunTrust Zoo Lights opens at 5:30 p.m.

The Enchanted Forest 

Be sure to take some time to stop by the Pink Palace Museum to check out the Enchanted Forrest complete with the festival of trees, gingerbread village, model train, pictures with Santa, and more.

Pictures with Santa 
November 19  –  December 24
Photo packages: $10 – $60
Photos courtesy of J&B Childress Portrait Art 

Enchanted Forest Fridays
Dec. 2, 9, 16 & 23 9am to 9pm
The Enchanted Forest is even more magical at night! Visit when the sun goes down and see how the trees sparkle and shine!

ADMISSION: 

Adults: $6
Children/Seniors: $5

Snowy Nights

Head to the Memphis Botanic Garden with the family and celebrate the season with snow and lights in the children’s garden.

HOURS: 

December 2 & 3
December 9 & 10
December 16-23
5:30-8:30 pm

Last admission 8:00 pm

ADMISSION:

MBG members $8
Non-members $10
Children under 2 are free

S’mores kits, hot cocoa, and other concessions are available at additional cost.

 

 

Kid Friendly Holiday Fun – Houston Texas

For me, there is nothing more magical then seeing a child’s face light up during the holidays. I love this time of year because there is so much magic in the air. That is why I love to get my kids out and about for some holiday fun!

Our community puts together some great kid friendly events and so does the city of Houston, Texas. Check out this great list of kid friendly holiday events, brought to you by Northwest Chrysler Jeep Dodge Ram.

Santa’s Wonderland

They say everything’s bigger in Texas, and from what I can find, there is no bigger display of Christmas lights then the one at Santa’s Wonderland. Take a hayride and check out the lights, enjoy some live music, do some shopping, step inside a large snow globe and so much more!

For tickets prices, hours and special event information, be sure to visit Santa’s Wonderland online.

Zoo Lights at The Houston Zoo

The Houston Zoo is filled with 2 million lights and each night at 6:00pm, it reopens for Zoo Lights from November 18, 2016 – January 15, 2017.  (Closed December 24 & 25)

Prices are:

  • Value Nights: Member $9.95 Non-Member $14.95,
  • Prime Nights: Member $14.95 Non-Member $19.95.  Kids 1 and under are free.
  • Online tickets have no additional fees… and let you skip the long ticket line.

Magical Winter Nights at Gulf Greyhound Park

Beautiful lights surround you when you start your magical journey in a world of wonder as magical lanterns glimmer throughout the night. From there you can visit the holiday market square, dinosaur land, and more!

These prices are online only.

Value Night (Mon-Thurs)*:

Adult $20

Child (4-12 years old) & Seniors (65+) $13

Weekend/Christmas Week (Fri-Sun & 12/19-12/25)*:

Adult $22

Child (4-12 years old) & Seniors (65+) $15

*Children under the age of 4 receive free general admission to the festival but still need wristbands or tickets if riding the carnival rides.  

Unlimited Carnival Ride Wristbands:

Online $20 (save $5 off on-site price)

*Carnival ride wristbands require purchase for all ages. Festival admission required. 

 Parking:

$5 online or on-site (On-site is CASH ONLY)

Please note: Value Night tickets are only valid on “value nights” Monday-Thursday  (except the week before Christmas 12/19/16-12/22/16) and Weekend Night tickets are only valid on “weekend nights” Friday-Sunday & Christmas week 12/19/16-12/25/16. WE HAVE A NO REFUND/EXCHANGE TICKET POLICY*

Let Febreze Help You Combat the #12Stinks of Christmas

The holidays are officially upon us and that means all of the smells, good and bad are coming with them. Let’s face it, not everything about the holidays smells pleasant. 

From hanging up musty stockings that have been stored away all year to burnt cookies to impromptu guests, you can just imagine now, the smells that are about to take over your home.

Thankfully, Febreze is here to help you embrace the jolliest time of the year with ugly-sweater-clad-arms wide open. It’s the return of “The #12Stinks of Christmas” featuring beatboxing superstar Doug E. Fresh and hip-hop enthusiast @ItsDougThePug, here to help eliminate any stinks the holidays throw your way this year.

Febreze’s full lineup of festive odor-eliminating Air Effects, Candles, NOTICEables are here to keep your home guest-ready all season long!

The 12 Stinks of Christmas

12 Musty Stockings
The stockings may be hung by the chimney with care, but after a year of being buried in your basement, that musty stink is anything but joyful. Revive your holiday stockings with Febreze Fabric Refresher to eliminate lingering odors and leave behind a light, fresh holiday scent.

11 Burnt Cookies
Maybe the day of your party wasn’t the best time to try out that ambitious new cookie recipe. Use a Febreze Candle to eliminate any stinky, smoky odors from your kitchen and ask your cousin to pick up a pie from the bakery on his way over. 

10 Flushes per Minute
The endless cycle of guests in your home means your downstairs toilet is getting one of the year’s biggest workouts. Plug a Febreze NOTICEable in the bathroom and let the two alternating scents continuously eliminate those not-so-festive odors.

9 Casseroles A-Cookin’
Your Aunt Barb had one too many eggnogs, and reminiscing about her sorority days has taken precedence over watching the oven timer. Light a Febreze Candle before everyone starts to notice the overwhelming stench of burnt onions, and eliminate odors to keep your home continuously smelling as fresh as it looks.

8 Frying Latkes
Nothing says happy holidays like a hot plate of latkes. But once the smell of greasy potatoes makes its way from your kitchen all the way to your family room, the aroma goes from appetizing to unpleasant. Don’t stress, Febreze Air Effects helps keep odors at bay and lets you breathe happy through the holidays.

7 Diaper Bins
Your new niece is an adorable bundle of joy, but you’d rather get a pile of coal under the tree than take another whiff of those dirty diapers. How can something so little stink SO much? Light a Febreze Candle to continuously eliminate odors (without offending her parents) so you can breathe happy all season long.

6 Boys in One Bedroom
You missed your son so much that his return home for holiday break seems like a Christmas miracle. But then…you notice the giant bag of dirty laundry he’s dragging behind him and remember why his sister was always the favorite. Use a Febreze NOTICEable to prevent your whole home from smelling like a dorm room by continuously eliminating locker room stinks.

5 Pugs in Sweaters
Fido may have better holiday attire than you do, but his penchant for festivity leaves behind a distinct parfum.  Use Febreze Fabric Refresher to instantly eliminate pet odors and leave behind a light, fresh holiday scent.

4 Impromptu Guests
Your in-laws are here and they’re early…again. Spray the house with Febreze Air Effects to instantly eliminate odors, and leave your impromptu guests wondering how you manage to keep your home smelling so fresh all season long.

3 Smelly Chairs
You know your grandmother’s hand-me-down chairs smell like years of love, and the musty scent reminds you of her living room. Unfortunately your guests don’t see it that way. Plug in a Febreze NOTICEable by the antiques to eliminate odors and leave behind a light, fresh holiday scent.

2 Mounds of Mess
With ten cousins throwing their sweaty socks into one giant laundry pile, the mounds of mess can pile up quickly.  Not only do the mounds take up half the guest room, but they also stink.  Take the Febreze Fabric Refresher to the mound and don’t quit until you are smelling light, fresh holiday scents instead of damp clothes. 

And one family that really needs Febreze!
No matter what stink plagues your home this holiday season, know that Febreze is there to eliminate odors so you can breathe happy and focus on the joy of the season!

Which of the 12 stinks are you most affected by during the holiday season? Be sure to leave us a comment below and let us know!