Approximately One Million Pictures of My Kids

 I'm mostly doing this for myself, so feel free to skip it. 

Years ago - can I figure out how many? Yes. It was in 2014, so eight years ago - we were decorating the tree, and I made the kids put on Christmas-ish pajamas and started to take a few pictures of them. My husband, who is the king of the groan-inducing dad joke but occasionally has flashes of brilliance, grabbed the tea cups we had recently gotten from his grandmother and made the kids start posing. 

And thus was born the Annual Adams Christmas Tree Photo Shoot With Props.

(It occurs to me that I make fun of others in our friend group for immediately trying to cement every fun thing we do into a carved-in-stone must-happen-yearly tradition: end of summer at Walsh's cottage. Halloween party at Wardles. Christmas party at Antayas. New Year's party here (this tradition is kind of wobbly). Sandbanks every August. Someone tried to get an Oktoberfest one going, but it petered out after two years thank goodness (one tradition in October is enough, I am an easily overwhelmed introvert), and I might be ignoring the fact that I am a big part of the problem.)

One year it was a voluminous Shakespeare compendium. One year it was tools (in honour of the house falling apart). Covid year it was masks, obviously. I just keep shooting and we take turns looking goofy and it's fun and funny and I don't THINK it's turned into a forced-march chore yet - the kids still participate willingly, and Angus even made me do it this year when I thought we'd wait a couple more days. 

This year it was a candle and matches, a flashlight and an emergency radio in honour of the Christmas-buggering Storm of the Century.

Lucy participates in various assorted ways and attitudes

Matt provides offstage directions

Things get blurry

Someone makes a bad joke

Lucy changes her mind

Whatever this is

Oops

Money shot

Now the candle

Oops

Other oops

The immortal star-growing-out-of-his-head shot

Okay fine, enough

And the rest of us

I often like the out-takes even more than the good shots, and include them in the subsequent year's Christmas cards, fully aware that I'm being a giant dork of the "oh look how precious, somebody's eyes are closed and Lucy is an escaping blur, we are a wild card madcap bunch" variety. I'm mostly comfortable with that. 

Apologies to anyone who is reading all this while the photos are still loading. I won't do this again until next  year. 


Comments

StephLove said…
These are cute. You can see their affection for each other.
January 2, 2023 at 6:19 PM
Nicole said…
Aw, that's a fun tradition!
January 3, 2023 at 4:42 AM
NGS said…
That IS fun! I hate posing in front of trees because someone always has a star growing out their heads! Why does this always happen?
January 3, 2023 at 8:28 AM
Ernie said…
I love how you admit to hating traditions of this sort. Yes, this one seems like an all-in success. I once tried to take a timed family photo. Somehow I hit the wrong button and it recorded a short 2 second video. Mini is messing with her bra and someone is about to sneeze and when I come across the 2 second blip I die laughing every time. This does not relate because we haven't tried to make it into a tradition, but it was a photo story and this reminded me of it. ;)
January 3, 2023 at 1:32 PM
Busy Bee Suz said…
I love your tradition/non-tradition. It's brilliant and will serve you in time.
January 6, 2023 at 7:59 AM
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