I took all afternoon getting our girls dolled up for the photo shoot. Their has was combed (this is a rarity), they looked adorable in their matching cream cable-knit sweater dresses and shiny shoes, they had had the annual pep talk: “We’re going to Wal-Mart and a nice lady is going to take your picture so you need to be happy and say ‘Cheese!’ and then I’ll get you a BIG TREAT AFTERWARDS, OK?”
They were ready.
Until we actually got there, met the grumpy sales associate who made us wait for 15 minutes, and had too much time to forget the pep talk. After running laps around the studio, trying to kill time, we went to the back and the photographer (who clearly despises her job) kind of threw the kids up on a platform and hoped for the best.
My eldest child was surprisingly cooperative, my middle child was angry and would not stop waving her arms around and scowling, and my youngest child, although very cute, was hunched over and cross-eyed.
I picked the least awful proof of the bunch, but next year I think I am going to pick the WORST one just to show everyone: this? This here? IS MY LIFE. Merry Christmas!
(Photo Credit: awkwardfamilyphotos.com)
Do you force your children to take Christmas photos? Is it generally a positive experience or an annual trial that the whole family dreads?
this is the greatest picture ever! No one (well at least not me) wants to see these perfect kids sitting perfectly on SAnta…it makes me feel inadequate!!!! still laughing!
I LOVE this picture!!! Honestly, adorable- could not stage a more original one. I have on of me at 2 on a black santa’s knee in Nigeria (where we were living) and I am scowling at him and it is a treasure of mine
Oh, did I ever need that laugh today! Thank you! We have a couple of versions of the photo you’ve shared. My kids will get excited about seeing Santa, then realize they’re sitting with a strange hairy man in an unfamiliar environment with a bunch of strangers staring at them and FREAK OUT! Two of our Santa photos have me in them, too, because waiting in line for-bloody-ever, dealing with the surly staff, and then meeting the big hairy stranger, um… dampened their excitement. Somewhat. We haven’t gone this year, yet. We will – my daughter is old enough to think Santa’s a rock star, and has been begging to go and see him since Halloween. My son (also known as the World Champion Screamer) is less convinced.
But anyway, yes I do make them do Christmas photos, but not in a studio. I park them in front of our Christmas tree with a couple of books or a toy, and then shoot a dozen shots with my point-and-shoot, choose the best of those, clean it up a bit in iPhoto, order prints from the shop down the street, and then mail them out with the family Christmas cards. It’s better for my sanity that way.