The Photo

We used to send out Christmas letters with our holiday cards and pictures. I thought it was good, if for nothing else, to take stock of the year (since I am terrible about journaling, much less putting "baby" or other memory books together for my kids). At least I could pinpoint which year my son was Aladar for Halloween and which year we went on which trip... so that someday I could put those pictures in the right order.

Years ago my husband put the kibosh on the letters. I resisted at first, citing the reasons above, but I could sort of see his point about them tending to be mostly self-congratulatory and a fictional confection of what really goes on. So I agreed to stop sending them, even to distant relatives. It was also one less thing on my December "To Do List..."

We switched gears to photo cards. As I've noted before, it's become patently clear to me as a parent that all anyone really cares about is how your kids are growing, especially if they don't see them very often. In theory, this is a great idea. I love receiving photos of my friends' kids (and my friends, for that matter). (Then again, I also like receiving Christmas letters, but I digress...)

This all sounds good on paper. The problem is getting The Photo. As I've chronicled before, I'm no photographer. I try, and two of my three kids are good sports, but 99 times out of 100 the shots are miserable. Nothing I'd choose to print copies of.

If you go the professional route, then my life becomes a whirl of preparation for The Photo Shoot. A photographer who took the first precious pictures of my first son once told me all the tips for getting the most out of your family photo. It involves a lot of planning, all the more so as our numbers have grown to five human beings to coordinate (but not match), do hair for, and care and feed so that they are in relatively human moods during The Photo Shoot.

With a nine year old whose main occupation seems to be eye rolling, a six year old who showed up in superhero mode, and a-nearly-two-year-old who, well, was acting her age and clearly wanted no part of the entire business... the family photo basically didn't happen. Even our laid back photographer, Miranda, admitted later, "Well, we didn't get the rock star shot of all five of you."

Fortunately we did get some great ones of the kids, and even one where John is (miraculously invisible to the camera) holding our squirmy daughter in between her brothers in a tree. Given what we were working with -- that's The Photo for 2006.