Family Photos

As you know, I love pictures.  So when I get the opportunity to have someone else take the pictures for me, I jump on it.  The community organization in my town offers a fall photo shoot with a professional photographer so of course I sign up for it each fall so we can get our one "professional" family photo each year.  Every year, as we are wrestling children to put on their clothes, smile for the camera, and give us "just 15 minutes" I wonder why the heck we are putting ourselves through this.  This year was no different.  Our photo shoot was at 9am on Saturday morning so we had to wake up and start moving.  As we were rushing to get everyone in their outfits, Will was having a meltdown over the outfit he had to wear.  The pants were to tight...too scratchy...the shirt was too big.  Jack was freaking out over the sweater and throwing it around yelling that it was "yucky".  Sara fortunately put on her clothes with no issue but was walking around the madness trying to figure out what to do next.

Eric looked at me and asked why were were doing this.  I was stressed...he was stressed and the kids were obviously not happy.  But somehow we managed to get everyone dressed and out the door.  Will somehow did a 360 and was all smiles for the camera.  Jack wouldn't smile no matter what the photographer said or did.  And Sara wouldn't stand still long enough to let the photographer take a picture of her. I was fairly certain we weren't going to get any decent picture out of the session but we tried.

I just received the pictures yesterday and once I looked at the picture, I knew all the stress was worth it. While the "before" was not pretty.  The "after" was so worth it.  Having a family photo to look back at in future years is what we will remember...not all the craziness involved in getting us to this point.  I will go through the stress, the crying, and the yelling in order to get a memory like this.....   

Penny Loafers

The other day my parents brought over a bag of clothes from the three boys that live across the street from them.  Will and Jack love the "big boys" so anything we get from them is an instant favorite.  Will starts digging through the bag and pulls out a tie, then some belts and last, two pairs of penny loafers.  The second he saw the penny loafers he was in love despite the fact that they were about 1 1/2 sizes too big.   

To make a long story short, these penny loafers have become my arch enemy.  I can't get Will to wear anything other than warm up pants or sweat pants and now we have added penny loafers into the mix of outfits that already made me cringe.   And to top it off, he wants to wear his black dress socks with his penny loafers just like daddy.  So here was Will's outfit of choice......penny loafers, ninjago shirt, wind pants and tie.  

And then outfit #2......

And last but not least...this was his outfit choice for lounging around the house.  

Am I a bad mother to admit that sometimes I wish I could put a sign on his back whenever he goes out that says "I did not pick out this outfit."  ;-)

Apple Picking

It's my favorite season of the year!!  I think I say that every year but fall is truly the best.  Hayrides...apple picking...pumpkins...cool weather!  Love it!  A few weeks back we went apple picking at a farm in RI.  We had a fun day of apple picking, hayride and then some tasty treats afterwards.  I hoped to get a few nice pictures of the kids together but none were in the mood.  Sara is the worst of all three now when it comes to photos.

This was my first attempt at a photo of the three kids.  Sara wasn't in a picture mood.

I attempted a photo of the three again.  It didn't turn out much better.  Sara was too preoccupied with the apple.

 Oh never mind....

 A few more of Sara.  I couldn't get the apple out of her hand.  She screamed if I tried to touch it.

Hayride!

Miss Sara

So I'm a little behind with my posts.  My life has been consumed with Norfolk gala stuff.  I can't wait for November 9th to be here so I can resume my normal life again.  I've been lacking with the photos but I do have a few posts to catch up.

Miss Sara is getting so big and so freaking cute if I do say so myself.  I still have to write her one year post but at this point it's old news.  She is walking (almost running) all over the place now.  And she has learned how to climb onto the kitchen table.   I've found her a couple of times sitting in the middle of the table munching on some tasting leftovers she managed to find.  She also loves to give hugs and once you ask for one hug, you get about 50 because she keeps coming back for more.  

I snapped a few photos of Sara last week so I wanted to share.  There are a lot of almost the same but I thought they were too cute that I couldn't leave any out.