Christmas Pictures

Have you started thinking about your Christmas picture yet?? This process is usually done Thanksgiving weekend at our house. When we still lived in Alabama we would go to Gulf Shores, AL to visit my parents for Thanksgiving and I would attempt to take "The Christmas Picture". By Christmas picture I mean the beautiful shot of my four wonderful children, all looking at the camera with their angelic little faces. I picture in my mind the shot I want to take and then try to get my children to cooperate. I usually had my mom and my husband there corralling the kids with the following....

"Please look at your mother while she is taking the picture"
"Don't bother Abigale she is the baby and when she finally is looking at the camera we want you looking at the camera"
"Quit bugging your sister...Quit bugging your brother"
"Don't worry about the Seagulls they wont hurt you"
"Keep your eyes open...I don't care if the sun is in your eyes..Under no circumstance do you close your eyes!!!!"

Since we moved to Missouri last year I had to give up on the beach picture and go with something else. This year I had a plan. When I took the kids to the beach in August I was going to attempt a beach picture. I waited (procrastinated) until the last evening we were there. I wanted to wait until the sun was going down so the sun would not be in anyone's eyes. I was trying to leave as little to complain about for the kids. So it ended up with just me doing all the yelling and screaming.. I mean nicely asking them to please look at the camera. I loaded all the kids in the car and drove to the public beach. I know I could have just gone down the elevator and stepped out on the beach at my parents, but with all the hurricanes last year they had no dunes or seagrass. So I get to the public beach 10 minutes before it closes and the nice security guard tells me they are locking the gates in 10 minutes So as I am driving to the edge of the parking lot I give my kids the pep talk. It went something like this..."Ok, kids we have 9 minutes now and I want you to leap out of the car toss your flip flops in the sand and run...I mean run to the nearest dune with seagrass and where I can still see ocean behind you...DO you understand. Ok lets GO GO GO. I couldn't believe my eyes. I had kids flying out of the car and even helping with the baby. There were shoes flying and sand flying from under their feet as they ran to the dunes. You would have thought it was Amazing Race. I took about 15 pictures in 5 minutes and I felt like I was successful. What a wild experience. I think I will try it again next year!!!

Let me know what you do for your picture and maybe post some of your past pictures for all to see. I am posting some of mine from the last few years and the last shot I took at this years photo session. I told the kids to act goofy ( Not the one I am using ha ha) I will post that one in December. Good Luck.