Tales of Picture Perfect

Yesterday was our annual family portrait session day.  I like to torture my oldest once a year by making him change his clothes in the middle of the day (which he HATES to do) into something clean, not even "fancy" just fresh.  Anyway, as some of my friends can attest to, I searched low and high for weeks and weeks to find the "perfect" outfits for the kids.  I love doing the photos outdoors in the fall when theleaves have changed colors and the sky is Carolina blue.  In the past, I have walked in the GAP, found the outfits in about 5 min flat and walked out.  This year, not so much.  Weeks and weeks I spent pouring over clothing racks of black and gray.  Seriously?  I am not a fashionista, but I have heard the "gray" is in this year, which is lovely, because I do like to wear grays and blacks with my jeans... BUT, and again, this is a BIG BUT... for my 5 and 2 year old daughters... negative.  Now I am aware that in their teenage years they may venture into some darker clothing, and I will cross that bridge when we get there, however, not now, and definitely not for family photos. This was really a problem for me, but i am letting it go now. I could go on, but I wil save you.

Moving forward to yesterday. I told my dear hubby what I wanted us to wear in the pics.  Oopps, failed to mention that last year we ended up with family pics of just the kiddos because I was on my death bed with some strain of the flu or something that week.   Ok, so I thought since we missed them last year, we should jump in a few this year, just to be able to remember how we looked in the midst of our wild adventure of raising children.  So, yesterday AM was pretty hectic due to the holiday/day off of school. We did take our tot to the ENT, to which I learned she has a lot of mucus in her nose and therefore has more allergies then the mere food allergies we already know about.  Come to find, she is allergic to elm trees, dust and dust mites (sure, I'll vacuum the house every day... wink wink), dogs and CATS.  umm.. we just got a kitten 6 weeks ago. hmmmm. Third ones a charm - no allergies for the big two.  Speaking of the big two, they were shuffled around between playdates yesterday, due to the fabulous day off of school in the middle of the week.   I promise, I am getting around the the point of this blog.

12:30, I put my baby girl down for her nap.  I scheduled the pics for 3PM, so hopefully she would be well rested and pleasant for the afternoon.  Nowadays she will only nap in "mommys bed", which is actually fine, because she sleeps for a few hours so I typically do not mind.  However, yesterday, I had to move my clothing change, my flat iron and my makeup downstairs so I could get ready while she naps.   Ok, no prob. So, as I am flat ironing my hair (my son next to me complaining he needs more legos because he refuses to take apart anything he makes with them because they are all "special") I am realizing that my gray hairs are much more noticeable when my hair is straight.  And so began the plucking.  Sadly, I may have to start dying it because I think I almost plucked out my entire mid section. I finished flat ironing and was brushing my hair and accidentally clipped my ear.  Yep, my diamond stud popped out and practically jumped down the drain in 2 seconds flat.  Did we decide I can curse on here? Well, I couldn't then either because of my son sitting in the room not too far away.  So I asked him (ok, maybe not), I told him in a loud quick voice to "Go get Daddy". 

One of the best moments of my life was giving birth to that boy. My first born.  My mom had given me her engagement ring diamond and my hubby got a jeweler to get one to match it and put them into studs for me. What a great push present.  However, at this moment, half of that present was down the drain, literally.  Thank goodness my hubby is handy, because he went under the sink, took off the pipe thing (I not so handy) and out came the earring... along with a whole lot of water.. but at least I got it back.  And fairly quickly.

Sidenote #1- Hubby can become a plumber if ever need be.
Sidenote #2-Sorry mom, I didn't tell you this yesterday.

So, it is now 2 PM, countdown to pics.  Get oldest changed (he actually didn't whine too much) and daughter just got home from a playdate.  Good thing that you can't smell people in their pictures, because she was RIPE from running around the park for a few hours. So, got them both ready.  Asked hubby where his cream shirt was. He said, "I do not have a cream shirt".  Can I curse, a teensy bit?  We had less than an hour til picture time and now he tells me he doesn't have the right clothes.  So at 2:20 I hopped in to the car and drove to Wal-Mart. Yep, I did.  This was an emergency ya know. Of course they did not have cream anything, so I got him a long sleeve white shirt and that was that.

By the time I was home at 2:40, little miss was up and dressed too and we were in gear to go.  However, hubby decided he needed to shave. Why, why everything so last minute with these dudes?

2:50, we are all ready.  Miracle!!  Have snacks in hand, hair brush, sippy cup is filled with water and then I noticed my Lincoln Park after dark is half off.  Ugg.. this is why I never get my nails done.  So, I tell my oldest to pick out some candy from the candy bin to take to the pics (bribery is always a plus around here) and I run upstairs to scrub my polish off as quickly as I can.

2:55.  I hear screaming from downstairs.  "Spit it out.  Spit it out now".  I run downstairs and you will never guess what happened.  My special angel middle daughter was blue. Not as is dying, as in decided she wanted a bright blue air head 5 freakin mintues before our family pictures. Her teeth, her lips, her mouth.....AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH.  I definitely should be cursing now, but I didn't then so I won't now.  And, she was hysterical. Of course she was, my sensitivie little girl.  So, not only is she completely blue, her eyes are swollen and red.  Yay picture day!  I told her to run upstairs, wash her face, and brush her teeth.

3:06- we arrive to the park (thank heaven we picked a location in our neighborhood) and spent the next two hours running around, cuddling, laughing and playing together during our photo shoot.  It was 65 degrees out, not a cloud in the sky, my kids had the perfect outfits, the perfect smiles and we had great fun!  In 20 years when I look back at our pics, I wonder if I'll even remember the nonsense that surrounded my day. Nah, I'll just be sad at how much I miss having all this craziness day in and day out.  The only thing I'll remember is how "picture perfect" the day turned out to be.