A large part of my job is taking photos. You'd be amazed how much time can be spent styling fingers and strategically angling shoes. So when my friend Amy offered to feed us in exchange for coming over and taking a picture of her little family for their Christmas card, I figured I had a small level of skill to pull it off.
I've known Amy since we were wee Delta Gamma pledges at the University of Idaho. When I talk about my sorority sisters, I like to say we've grown up together. We've seen each other through four of the most formative years we'll ever have and always miss (RIP fraternity "mixers" as Carlovilla likes to call them). We also have tons of blackmail photos of each other that keep us playing nicely in the sandbox. JK...we wouldn't do that. Or would we?
We've experienced so much that's made us more than friends. And it wasn't all paying for friendships, pillow fights and "Circle The Fat." We really are sisters. As an only kid who went from being solo with a bunch of stuffed and real animals to living in a mansion with eighty other women for four years, I'm incredibly overwhelmed by and grateful for that.
Since Amy would kill me if I blasted her Christmas card across the internet before she sent it out, I thought I'd show a behind-the-scenes moment (side note: my mom used a picture of Amy and me for a Christmas card one year - random and awkward. My grandma still has it on her fridge).
THIS is what goes into creating a happy family photo. That hand in the corner coaxing a smile out of a 85 lb puppy is Raz's. I think he's holiday a Dorito. The rest of the outtakes are all just yellow blurs of said puppy running toward us and Amy and Will trying to hold him back. Makes me think of the people with hand puppets cooing at babies behind the camera at JC Penney.
When Facebook, Instagram, blogs, et al tell you how killer everyone's lives are, remember that. It's not all perfect poses and steamed hems. There's a whole lot more going on behind the scenes...and huge puppies running out of the frame to jump up your entire body for a treat.
But it sure is worth it. And wow are we getting old. Homes and young animals? Next come babies.*
*I have nothing to announce aside from one farty little kitten.
I've known Amy since we were wee Delta Gamma pledges at the University of Idaho. When I talk about my sorority sisters, I like to say we've grown up together. We've seen each other through four of the most formative years we'll ever have and always miss (RIP fraternity "mixers" as Carlovilla likes to call them). We also have tons of blackmail photos of each other that keep us playing nicely in the sandbox. JK...we wouldn't do that. Or would we?
We've experienced so much that's made us more than friends. And it wasn't all paying for friendships, pillow fights and "Circle The Fat." We really are sisters. As an only kid who went from being solo with a bunch of stuffed and real animals to living in a mansion with eighty other women for four years, I'm incredibly overwhelmed by and grateful for that.
Since Amy would kill me if I blasted her Christmas card across the internet before she sent it out, I thought I'd show a behind-the-scenes moment (side note: my mom used a picture of Amy and me for a Christmas card one year - random and awkward. My grandma still has it on her fridge).
THIS is what goes into creating a happy family photo. That hand in the corner coaxing a smile out of a 85 lb puppy is Raz's. I think he's holiday a Dorito. The rest of the outtakes are all just yellow blurs of said puppy running toward us and Amy and Will trying to hold him back. Makes me think of the people with hand puppets cooing at babies behind the camera at JC Penney.
When Facebook, Instagram, blogs, et al tell you how killer everyone's lives are, remember that. It's not all perfect poses and steamed hems. There's a whole lot more going on behind the scenes...and huge puppies running out of the frame to jump up your entire body for a treat.
But it sure is worth it. And wow are we getting old. Homes and young animals? Next come babies.*
*I have nothing to announce aside from one farty little kitten.