Family Pictures from Hell

Today was family pictures day. I had carefully planned everything, so that we could have a positive experience and replace our current hideous family photo with something better. I picked the perfect time, 11:00. Enough time to let everyone get enough sleep, eat a good breakfast, and get beautiful, but also before the hungry lunchtime sleepy nap time crash. I requested our favorite photographer, pulled the outfits I wanted everyone to wear out of their closets (including Chris's) a week in advance so they wouldn't get worn. Ironing was even involved. (Of course not by me. I don't iron. Thank you, hubby.)

We still managed to be running late, so we started out a little grumpy. However, I got to the studio fifteen minutes late only to discover they had no record of the appointment I had made. This despite the fact the photographer, who's in our ward, vividly remembered booking it. They told us they could still take our pictures in about fifteen to twenty minutes. So we waited it out. At which point Deacon decided to pass the time by filling his diaper. I sent Chris out to the van for a diaper and wipes, and he returned with a diaper and three dried up wipes, one of which looked like it had already been used to wipe a dirty face. I attempted to change the diaper, but I had a few things going against me. One, Deacon decided to put his hand in the diaper and smear poo on his pants; and two this was not an ordinary three wipe diaper, but rather a seven plus wipe diaper. I ended up begging wipes off a total stranger in the restroom.

Then I returned to the studio where we continued to wait for an hour and a half! I thought about leaving, but I kept on thinking about all the effort required to dress my children and get them out the door, so I continued to wait. By the time we finally got back to get our pictures taken, everyone was hungry, tired, and super grumpy. Deacon kept walking out of the family photo. Parker wanted to lay down and go to sleep. McKay refused to move anywhere where the photographer told her to go. And Chris and I look livid. As we looked through the proofs, there was not a single photo where at least one person wasn't glaring angrily at the photographer. In a way it was hilarious to look through them. So we selected the least hideous picture, which is in all honesty, truly awful, and got out of there. But not before I spoke to the manager.

Apparently I'm slightly assertive or something. The other day Chris asked me why I wasn't better friends with someone in the ward, and I said, "She's too sweet and kind and meek."
"Yeah, she's nothing like you then," he replied reflexively.
"What are you saying? That I'm not kind?"
"Well, it's not the first word I would have picked."
"What would you have picked?"
"Strong-willed. Assertive. Self-confident. Opinionated. I don't think meek would have made the top one hundred."

So my assertiveness came out. I asked to speak to the manager. Then I asked her what kind of discount she was going to give me for making my family wait ninety minutes. (In a sweet, kind way. Really.) She told me she couldn't do anything because I wasn't in the computer. "Hmm," I told her, "since I made an appointment, and you still don't have me in the computer, please explain to me how that's my fault."

So to make a long story, slightly shorter, I got a 10x13, two 8x10's, a sheet of 5x7's, 3 x5's, and 2 wallets all for $4.99! All of a family photo I hate! But the best news--we don't have to do this again for one whole year! Yippee!