Let's see, where did I leave off. I believe I was about to fetch the chattering child and make my way to mall to see if we could pull off these photos on a short nap.
First things first, Eli needed his hair combed in a desperate way. I suspect he sleeps standing on his head but have yet to catch him in the act. Yet another reason I covet the new video
mo niter my friend Pam has. But whatever the reason, his head looks like a hay stack when he wakes up so we headed to the bathroom where a combination of water, hairspray, and spit held down most of the fly-aways. Then I hastily gathered up our stuff and we headed out the door.
I hit the next bump in the picture taking day as a result of hastily gathering our things. I realized when I was about halfway to the mall that I had forgotten Dylan's sweater! You know, the sweater for our sweater and jeans family look! I ruled out turning around- then I wouldn't have had time to eat lunch at the mall
foodcourt before our
appt. and I NEEDED
sarku. Plus, I had already killed some time by running through
McDonalds to get Eli the least messy lunch item I could think of that he could also eat by himself- a plain cheeseburger. This way I wouldn't be feeding him when I should be focusing on my
sarku. That's priorities people! So I quickly decided that Dylan could either A) buy a new sweater because we were at the mall already or B) just wear the shirt he had on (luckily a dashing green collared shirt some cute girl got him). So we made it to the mall and Eli began munching on his burger while I waited for Dylan. Lunch proceeded uneventfully.
We arrived early at Portrait Innovations and it was a zoo!! Why did I think it would be any different? It is the holiday season and I'm sure everyone was doing the same thing we were. So we were resigned to waiting. I wanted to stand up on the couch and make sure the employees knew that we had a very small window in which Eli would remain happy but I'm sure that would have been unappreciated and perhaps lead to a longer wait. Luckily there was a
lego table that was interesting for awhile, even though Dylan wouldn't let him put the blocks in his mouth. We made it into the portrait room soon enough and began our pictures. Here's a little tip to any mom who is going out to do family and individual shots with their kids. Do the family first! Because in the individual kid shots you are working up a sweat doing cheers, cartwheels,
backflips, etc. to get your darling to smile. By the end of our picture session my hair had fallen, my forehead was shiny, and my
lipgloss nonexistent. This was okay because we did our family shots first- if only by happy accident.
Eli did beautifully through the whole session! That's through three different outfits, different props, some lady making funny noises at him- all things that have the potential for scaring and upsetting he found simply delightful today. The flashing umbrellas? Fascinating. There was one small incident when you could tell he
earped a little (remember the bottle I fed him in hopes it would put him back to sleep?) and there was a disturbing flash of white in his mouth but he was a trooper and sucked it back in and down. After a little eye-watering (must have been sour!) he was back to his cheesy grin and his touchdown trick.
Things went a little south through the picture
choosing session. Who can blame him? I think Dylan was just as antsy but he cried less then Eli. Let's just say by the end of the picture choosing/ordering/paying they were both sitting on the floor by the diaper bag eating fruity cheerios and drinking out of the
sippy cup. Or maybe just Eli had the cup!
All in all, picture day was a huge success, much more so then I thought it would be. We have awesome pictures of Eli, our Christmas cards are ready to be put in envelopes and mailed and we have our first official family picture done. What a day! Dylan put it best when he said it was relatively painless, which I'm taking to be a compliment!
