Photo Bomb

I've been impressed with the beautiful Christmas family pictures that I've seen tagged in my facebook news feed and on Pinterest. So impressed that I thought to myself, I could totally make a simple, cute set and do my own Christmas pictures of the kids. I rolled up my sleeves and got to work. An hour later, my set amounted to a strand of yarn pompoms. Ok, so maybe not exactly what my vision was, but good enough for us.

Do not ask me why I would choose this afternoon to take our picture. My kids all have hacking coughs and runny noses, they've passed on their germs to me and we are all not ourselves this week. Not to mention that  I wasn't really prepared for this photo shoot and when you are shooting kids, preparation is essential for success. 

So, after lunch, I made them all change into their Christmas clothes and I set the stage...errr....taped my garland to the wall. I ran for my camera, had everyone lined up and my battery was dead. So much for preparedness. I grabbed my iphone, it has a decent camera. And now I know, the shutter speed on an iphone is no match for small, mobile children. I gave up about thirty seconds later. Who was I kidding? I'm not a photographer, my "set" screams homemade and everyone was burning up in their Christmas clothes. December, you may cool off whenever you like. Thanks.

Once I had restored the house from insanely messy to just messy, I had a little laugh that ended up a sob. What a joke, my lofty plans for my Christmas photo shoot turned into a crazy fest for mama. 

You know, we go to a lot of trouble to take that perfect picture for our card. The clothes, the hair, the smiles- everything perfect. But it's a manufactured moment. It's not real. 

What should be real is the love that should emanate from every person this time of year. We get the whole month to celebrate the birth of a Child whose life changed the world. The end of the holiday season, though, should not be the end of our celebration, of our joy, of our serving and loving and sharing with others. We can take it up a notch in December, but the other eleven months should be a continuation of the joy we always feel at the most wonderful time of the year. 

 Santa is a holiday, Christmas is a lifestyle. 

This one is my fave of the bunch.

The End.