Christmas Picture Fails

Because, biased like I am, I think my kids are really cute even the pictures which I'm not going to distribute as Official Kid Pictures of the year.

As you might guess, picture day with preschoolers and babies is interesting.

And blurry.

For instance I have one who really doesn't approve of wool sweaters.

Or maybe he's checking the quality of the stitching.  I don't know.

So eventually Daddy (see the fingers?) tried to get in the act to encourage stillness, but...the itchiness.

Also trying to get a picture of the baby, who wanted to go to sleep, proved...

...less than productive.  I'm still trying to catch him in a happy mood so that I can come up with one good picture.

Because I refuse to settle for fear I will be that holiday family in Awkward Family Photos.

Alas.  Sometimes things strike Daddy as funny which Mommy finds merely infuriating.  It is one of the perils of marriage.

This one turned out pretty good, though.  I just need to figure out a way to blur the Ted Dekker book in the background, which of course I didn't notice until I began editing pictures.  Just because Dekker tends to be a bit...less than sentimental?

Meanwhile Buddy was not in a smiling sort of mood, at least not while I was snapping the photos.  He would smile before and after.

During he either moved (blur) or made these odd faces.

Like, in pictures, you're supposed to contort your face, right?

I mean, come on.  Everyone smiles.

He's going to do the big arms thing.

Or maybe a little pose to show you how well he can climb the couch.

Or how quickly he can make a masterly escape from his sister's overzealous hugging.

This is his Cool Dude face.  Again, I said "Smile!"

"Mom, have you considered how wasteful it is to take Christmas pictures when we could be spending the money on a flock of ducklings for a family in Zambia?"  Actually, yes...but I'm not going to spend as much on pictures as a flock of ducklings costs.  But if you have extra cash, ducklings are cute and mighty tasty.

Oh, the writhing, blinking, talking, wiggling, lengthiness of Picture Day.

And of course, being female, we needed multiple outfits, too.

This is really just bad timing and a blink.  But I think it expresses his opinion of multiple outfits pretty well.

Of course, sometimes a sleeping baby makes for a pretty cute photo.  But I was also kind of afraid if I used this for an official photo, he'd look dead.

But never you worry!  There are good pictures.  You will get them on or around Christmas.

Cheers!

Breanna