As I mentioned in my post on Monday, I am searching for a good picture of my kids and family to use for our annual holiday photo card. It was a beautiful fall day with such colorful leaves all around our neighborhood, so I tried snapping a few pictures on a walk with my kids. Here’s how I did with my camera phone:
My daughter is generally more cooperative for taking pictures, but we’ve done so many “funny face” shots that EVERY time I take a picture now, there has to be at least one funny one.
My son was making nearly EVERY picture a funny face one. And yes, dear 3 year old boy, they are funny. Maybe, just maybe, a funny face shot will make it into our Christmas card.
Here are some other picture options. Which ones are your favorites?
Someday I would like to have professional pictures taken, but my husband is still a bit put-off by the idea after one bad experience. The photographer took pictures of us in a lovely setting – along the lakefront and in front of some trees. My daughter was almost 3 and my son just turned 1. Here was my own snapshot before the photo shoot started later than our scheduled time thanks to the photographer’s tardiness.
Brilliant blue sky, aqua blue shimmering lake, sand, we could check every box in the “Ideal Setting” category. And take pictures our photographer did! We had THOUSANDS of options to review. It was overwhelming and time consuming at his home (aka not the most convenient for us, being parent of two kids under age 3). The family pictures of all four of us were just weird-looking too. We looked so posed and stiff – not at all our style. None of them were that great.
There were SO many good ones of our daughter. She was running, holding flowers, smiling….just being her cute, almost three year old self.
Our son was another story. He was just little, and it was dinnertime (though we had snacks before), and we barely got a smile out of him. We found one picture that we liked of him.
We had “won” the gift certificate for the photographer’s services as part of our church’s silent auction. Somehow, according to his crazy pricing, we did not receive much in way of print-credit. He had this complex pricing matrix and wanted us to join his family plan, so there would be numerous photo sessions through the years. Given that we hated the family pictures, it was NOT for us. We finally ended up buying two 8×10 portraits, one of each child, and paid a hundred+ for them. They are now hanging in our living room, where they shall be forever & ever. Amen.
Whenever I mention the idea of getting professional pictures taken to Daddy O., he bristles in reply, thinking of our bad experience. I guess I have to resort to my photo archives or quick snap my own pictures for this year’s card anyway. Hopefully these photo card options can make my pictures look good!
Have you ever been disappointed by professional photographers? How do you take pictures for holiday cards?
go mama o. 
I vote for the kids on the white bench and you and Daddy O together – both so cute! If you decide to give a pro another try, my friend Bridget Paul at http://www.bridgetpaulphotography.com/ is a fantastic photographer. Friends with small children have used her and she also did some great portraits for Matt that he needed for his job search.
I like the white bench pictues best too! I thinks it’s just a neat background….
As far as how I take my pictures….the self-timer on my camera is my best friend. I’ll take my camera to the park with us and set it up in a quiet spot and we can snap away!! Plus, we can act a lot more natural because there isn’t some stiff photographer trying to style and position us!
I really like the one of all four of you sitting on the bench together. It makes me smile at the happy family! 🙂 Haha, this post is so my life too. When I do manage to get a good one of both kids together I feel like I won the lottery. 🙂 My favorites are the natural ones though, so I try my hardest to get them both laughing really hard. 🙂
Thanks! Yeah, it’s so hard to get good pictures! Getting them laughing is a good approach for sure!