Family Day to Remember

Those of you that read this blog regularly (and thankyou to all 3 of you) know that I am a bit camera shy. Total stage mom when it comes to exploiting my children's beautiful faces but not so happy for me to appear.

Truth is I hate having my photo taken because I quite factually know I am going to look manic (at best) or about a thousand years old. (at worst)

This is not false modesty, it is a fact. Just ask anyone who has tried to take my photo with a digital camera. There is always a lot of looking into the view window and "oh" noises as they try to find a decent shot.

So imagine how delighted I was (NOT) when Mr Hammie answered the door to a fellow offering family portraits and agreed to book a session in the new year.

I could see where he was coming from, we have never had a formal family photograph taken.

(well, one that didn't involve me annoying a high ranking member of the government and a freelance photographer working for the national press)

My family have also complained about the lack of happy snaps.

Apparently telling them to check my blog isn't enough- sorry Grandma!

Any "family" photos we have are taken one handed with a camera phone while the other one of us wrangles the children. And with our recent behaviour curve, I couldn't see this changing.

Getting the four of us into the frame is a no-go; or so I thought.

However this cold evening a guy called Derek knocked on the door offering to "save you the time and effort it takes to get to a studio by bringing the studio to you in THE COMFORT OF YOUR OWN HOME"

The idea is they find that kids are more relaxed in their own environment and "this allows us to get them at their most natural state, with a big emphasis on having fun" - or so the website says.

When we booked the session, Derek said it would take about 20 minutes to set up his equipment, and around an hour for the photos.

We said: You've got 15 minutes - shoot it. And he did.

The session was reasonably relaxed and while it took a few goes to get everyone in the same room at the same time, we managed it in the end. We also got some nice little paired shots and Derek managed to leave with all his expensive equipment intact (phew!)

We saw the proofs last night, which Derek has kindly allowed me to share with you. We have ordered our first framed family portrait EVER and a really nice triptych that Derek put together.

When we get those back I am going to pick out some little ones for my sisters and family in Aus. Solid ones they can put on top of the TV - promise!

I am really happy with the experience, which is amazing considering the potential for anxiety and absolute disaster that it could have involved. It wasn't expensive (and you know what a tightarse I am) and the results are very valuable.

A good memory we can tangibly share.

So much of our lives is about challenges and pushing shite uphill. Sadly it is often the awful days that stick in your mind. The good days are such a relief that you forget to mark them and suddenly you find that a couple of years of birthdays, Christmases and even a communion or two can pass without any record.

We looked up recently and found that 11 hard years had passed without us sitting down to mark it together. So I guess Derek found us on the right day.

I think he did a lovely job, don't you?

xx