A Palace and a Beach

I have always wanted to do family photos in San Francisco but never seemed to get around to it.  After thinking about it forever, I finally booked one of my favorite bloggers, Melissa from Savvy in San Francisco, who not only is a mother of three and a fabulous blogger, but an incredible photographer as well, to take family photos while we were in the City over the holidays.

It was freezing cold, windy and there are 5 of us.  In all honesty, I thought to myself that if we get one great family photo then it will be a success.  What I did not realize is that Melissa is a miracle worker.  Not only did we walk away with NUMEROUS family photos that I adore, she also captured moments with my children that I will treasure forever.  The best part about it is that the children had a blast the entire time and my Oldest told me these were his favorite family photos yet.

These photos were taken at the Palace of the Fine Arts and Crissy Field.  I apologize in advance for all that I am sharing but there are just too many that I love.

If you are in the Bay Area and interested in doing photos, I HIGHLY HIGHLY recommend Melissa.  She is uber sweet, so great with kids and make the entire process extremely easy.  Check her out over at Savvy in San Francisco.

Thank you again Melissa for everything!!

Behind

Thanks to a great project with Gilt Baby and Kids (more to come on that later!), I was asked to deliver a photo of me with ALL THREE kiddos.  After spending what felt like hours trying to find a great photo of the four of us, this is the ONLY photo I have from the last 7 months where everyone is smiling.

7 months and one photo.  Pathetic.

Do you ever find that you get lost BEHIND the camera and rarely actually show up in any of the photos?  I know I have mentioned this before but I think that I am so consumed with getting great shots of everyone else (there were a TON of the hubby with all three of them), I completely forget to hand the camera off to someone else so I can get in a few.

What is even more pathetic from this shot is that it is from my little sister's rehearsal and is the ONLY photo that I have of me with the kids from the entire wedding weekend.  Like I said.  PATHETIC.  

Yes, I want to have thousands of memories of my children, but I also want them to know that I was actually there.  I have got to get better at this.  Do you feel the same?

Worst part, Gilt needed a horizontal photo.  Believe me, I hate being the person that has to tell Gilt I cannot deliver.  Will anyone notice that Baby Girl looks about 12 months old in the photo I sent?  UGH.

On the plus side, this photo has motivated me to wear this exact outfit tonight to a 40th birthday dinner.  This proves that I wear something more than once, regardless of what my hubby says.

Apparently I Enjoy Self Inflicted Pain

Because I continue to schedule family photos each year.  It is always a pain in the ass experience, and continues to get worse with the addition of more children.

Top 10 Downfalls of Family Photos

1. A child inevitably gets a bruise on their face the day before (this year, it was Baby Girl)

2. If you pick summer clothes, it will be freezing.  Warmer clothes and it will be dreadfully hot.

3. You always fall back on the beach (this is an OC thing) and when you look for other locations, you realize there are not many (though this year I did succeed in getting a different spot!)

4. If you are at the beach, people stare at you and you feel ridiculous

5. You dress your children minutes before walking out the door in hopes that they do not spill something on themselves

6. You spent so much time getting everyone else ready that you end up looking like crap and are usually shiny

7. During the shoot, your children suddenly decide to turn on you, one at a time, so that in each picture, one of them is not smiling or looking at the camera

8. One child decides they do not give a crap that you want a good picture (this year it was my diva Baby Girl who screamed bloody murder if we did not let her just sit in the dirt and play)

9. You overdose on bribes to get everyone to take "just one more shot"

10. Six months later the picture is already outdated because children change so fast

The plus side to all this? The photos!

Photo courtesy of Dane Sanders Photography

Photo courtesy of Dane Sanders Photography

And of course the amazing photographer who made it look like none of the above actually happened (and perhaps airbrushed out the bags under my eyes).  Thank you Dane!