Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Photographing children is easier when they aren't yours...

My 5-year-old, Samantha, started Pre-K this week. Our pediatrician says that Sam has "good leadership skills," which is fancy doctor talk for, "bossy." This particular attribute paid off in spades this week because there was no drama at all when the time came to go to school for the first time ever. Sam couldn't wait for Bobbi to leave after the drop-off, "Thanks for the ride babe, see ya after school!"

One of the things that Sam was supposed to bring to school was a family photo. (Let me just sidetrack here for a second and point out that my daughter's backpack was so big and full it looked like she was getting set to hike Yellowstone. I think she actually had bear repellent in there...) Anyway, Dad's a photographer so a family photograph is easy, right? We're bound to have a ton of those, right?

Nope. Not one.

I'm always taking the pictures, I'm rarely in them. So, after dinner tonight we went up to the studio and took a quick picture so that Sam wouldn't forget what we look like during her three hours of school a day. Of course we weren't able to get a good shot because the kids were going crazy playing and it's hard to set the lighting right on yourself (sit still Booray while Booray adjusts the lighting...) but we got something that will do for now. Most of the pictures turned out like this:



As you can see, Bobbi and Sam are trying to pose for daddy while Mac runs in circles around them...


Ooops! Almost got a picture that time!

Children are like a box of chocolates: You never know what you're gonna get (and they attract ants). As it turned out, we didn't get exactly what we came for but we did get some stuff we weren't expecting...



Booray Perry is a children's photographer in Tampa who's children won't sit still long enough to take a family portrait