Today I have a hundred or so smiling faces looking at me. No snowmen or Christmas trees, no Santa's sleighs or gingerbreads. No matte or glitter, just shining glossy faces. I resisted for years and years. I would fill out my card and then slip a photo inside. But the temptation to move to the photo-side just got to be too strong. So I gave in. I ordered my first photo cards last year.
This year I went all-in. I gave up my *favorite* seasonal past-time of addressing the cards and sticking on a free label that we got in envelope pleading for us to donate money to some worthy cause... maybe they shouldn't have included the free labels. To be fair, it'd be smarter for them to offer free labels only if we donated... At any rate, this year I found a site that included shipping not just in the box to me, but to all of my recipients as well. Holy wow. I happily typed in the addresses and clicked submit.
I'm over-simplifying a bit here. Actually a lot. Every year Christmas cards become an unholy event in our household (and I'm assuming every one else's households as well). Behind every smiling face is a shouting parent behind a camera and another parent sitting balled up on the sofa crying, "Whhhyy won't you just smile?" For every photo that you see on a card (and sometimes there are three or more on the card), there were 50 more with their eyes closed, or blurry hands moving, or their butts facing towards the camera or their hats covering their eyes. How many of these gems do we have on the photo roll? Too many to count.
And just when you have given up all hope, you take your last photo and...
Painless, right? See, I could just lie and say this was the only picture I took in front of the fireplace that day... but I wouldn't do that to you. And if I did, you would know I was lying anyway.
Of course, I have to resort to mostly tricks to get our Christmas cards done each year. I try to occupy the children so I can snap a shot of them that looks like I planned it that way. Here are some of my tricks over the past few years.
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| Won't sit still? Wrap him up as a present! |
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| Too busy playing to notice that Mommy has laid down fake snow and is taking a picture! |
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| Read a book and then press delay on the camera! Start and stop reading about 10 times! |
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| Notice we've changed the book so I can send photo cards to my Jewish relatives. |
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| May the force be with you this holiday season! |
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| Imagine resorting to such trickery that you will actually give your children sugary donuts before bedtime in order to snap a cheerful shot with them staying in one place all so you that you can write, "Hope your Christmas is filled with sweets and treats" on the card.
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A friend of ours enlisted the help of professionals who resorted to putting their child in a gift box just before every photo and then snapping the shot as he finagled his way out, hoping to get a good moment. Mind you, the gift box was not part of the photo, but the prop was used in hopes of delaying this child from running around the room and appearing as a blur in the photo. Somehow she managed to have two pleasantly smiling children in the shot with the "runner coming out of the box". I'm not sure how she managed that.
Most of us have decided that parents should not be in the photo at all. It's just too much work to get a good shot of the whole family. Which is also why, in our annual photo book, there are usually only about 4 family shots... and none of them come from the holiday season. The only exception to this rule is if you have older kids and they are in the photo wrapping you in Christmas lights... and the photo is being taken by a professional staging the whole event OR if you are pregnant. If you are pregnant and you are not in the photo, your relatives will ask you to send pictures separately of you being pregnant... so you might as well put a photo on the photocard and get it over with!
Some people want to jump onto the photo card bandwagon but don't have children. These people often opt for glittery cards that get all over your sofa. Or they choose to send a photo card of their pets. I think I can admit that wrangling pets into outfits and getting a shot of more than one pet in a photo at a time would actually be more challenging than taking a picture of two kids. In fact, I think it's downright impossible to get two awake pets in the same photo, let alone in costume. This is probably why people resort to just putting the face of their puppy on a photo card image which turns her into a reindeer... or an elf.
This year I have noticed that most of the photo card photos have nothing to do with the season. Many of them are just pictures taken throughout the year. What a liberating thought... that this doesn't have to be a scene I set up in front of the Christmas tree or during the first snow of the year. In fact, the children might not have to be tortured at all next year. Or better yet, I could just follow them around with a candy cane and take the holiday pictures just about anytime... or anywhere. Or maybe my kids will get better at smiling on cue and not moving around after I set them up just right Who am I kidding? I might as well just go buy the glitter cards that are on clearance this time of year.
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