The Amateur guide to taking family photos

 (Spoiler: the few good pictures are at the end)

Do you want to know how to take your own family pictures, even when you're not a professional trained, photographer? How about when you're not even a "mommy photographer" with a fancy camera pretending to be a professional photographer? Well, I am perfectly qualified to tell you, because I am neither of those things! yay!

1.First, scour pinterest photos for all the best family group poses, preferably for the current season. Then carefully plan how to pose your own family on the special day. Forget about how you actually have to be in the picture too and how things never go as planned. Check.

(not my picture, obviously)

2. Go scout out good locations for your pictures. I went and looked around this grove of trees with Elora and River a few weeks beforehand to plan where we could stand and what time the light would be right. I also watched the place so we could go out when the leaves were the most colorful- they weren't at that colorful point yet when the girls were there. (Spoiler: the pictures of the girls in this spot turned out infinitely better than the family pics here.)

3.Plan out your outfits. All of the best family pictures on Pinterest look good partially because they all have matching outfits. I don't care if we look dressed up, but matching colors are good.  Too bad we don't all have leather boots with fringe or fur, like all the other peoples' photos. Except this one.

(not my picture again)

 We went with a blue/brown/ white theme this year, which I thought would look nice with colorful leaves... also they matched a really cool shirt Elora had. I wore some skinny pants that I rarely wear in real life, so at least one person in the photo could have fancy boots with their clothes. Yeah, they were hidden in most of the pictures.

4. Go out later than planned, so the light won't be bright enough. Make sure the baby didn't get a nap so she's especially uncooperative. Confuse everyone about where you're going to take the first pictures, so they're wandering around wasting more time. Check.

 5. Make sure you look at everyone's face before you snap the picture. Are they smiling nicely? Not picking their nose? Are everyone's eyes open? Is the baby happy and looking at the camera? Are you standing up straight, and at the correct angle so you look more fit? Oh wait. You're in the picture so you can't really tell. Oh well. Check. (I didn't fix the color on these ones).

Jonah and Josh. They look real nice.

smile, River!

River. And Jonah. And Eli. Lovely.

6.Find an unexpectedly nice spot, then wait in annoyance when one kid has disappeared into the trees and you all have to wait for him to come back before its seriously too dark.

So anyway.  All the pictures we took IN the grove of trees turned out pretty bad. The leaves reflecting on the skin in the dim light (or something) made everyone look weird and orange, and it was really hard to fix afterwards; in some photos the color still looks way off. The sunset was beautiful though! Too bad River was ornery, so all my plans of how to arrange people went out the door, as we were just hurrying to take pictures whenever River would sit still. Sigh. Here are those pictures in the grove:

The color is sooo off here.

This one is okay, just a little pixelated up close. Don't like the seating either.

 

Same, except River's making a silly face. And weird color.

Love the light behind us, just what I pictured.  Too bad River's hiding! Such a missed shot.

Same picture, just cropped horizontal. Oh Jonah.

7.  Actually get  one good picture in the location of choice, after all the props and the kids are gone. Love the sunset here. Ugh.





8. Amidst many fails, get maybe three or four usable pictures. (The pictures in the field were taken before the grove of trees).

This one I liked the idea, but it wasn't executed well. River looks cute, but I wanted to be by Joseph instead of keeping River in the photo!

Love this one! Except the angle makes Josh and Jonah look strangely small, while Elora and Jonah are huge. haha. The leaves are very nice.

Another good one! Good job guys!

 

Same picture, except River's face is different. Click to see larger.

9. Find much better spots to take a group picture, after some of the group has gone and everyone is tired of taking pictures. Take a picture anyway to remind yourself that at least you saw that good spot.

 

 

The End.

Visit to Grandmas

I have five million pictures of our vacation this summer, but I doubt everyone wants to see all my photos. Instead, I picked a few photos to share my 'impression' of our trip.

Grandma's house was delightful. There is a beautiful garden out back with hollyhocks, fairy lights, and some cute fruit trees. Our cousin Strider was there, and River and he had fun exploring. More fun than it would appear in this picture.


 


My Grandma was there too, and the kids had fun spending time with her.



We loved Mom's apricot jam, and we even got to pick some apricots. Grandma Betty put these apricots in the window to ripen.

 

The kids did water balloons one afternoon and we did a lot of relaxing in the yard, especially in the evenings when it wasn't so hot.

 


 

We had fun Japanese style lamps up in the yard for Jonah's birthday, and enjoyed leaving them there for the rest of the week! It was like a party every night.

Jonah had a great party, and we started the day off with our traditional muffins, and ended the day in the decorated yard.

One evening we went on the  hike at the Canyon Park and it was lovely. It had rained that day and we weren't sure we'd be able to go, but the deluge let up just in time and lent a glow to the black path and the surrounding scenery. It also made it nice and cool instead of hot as the weather had been during the week.




 
 

As you know, we spent one day enjoying Cedar Breaks. There were fragrant wild flowers everywhere and it was a wonderful day. We hadn't been there in about ten years!

 

 

 

We also visited Brian Head Peak and took in the view from the top of the mountain. On the way down, we stopped at the ever popular Bristlecone Pine Trail to round out our drive.

Our last night in town we got to see the Green Show at the Shakespeare Festival's new area. And the next morning, we made a stop at the temple still under construction.

On our drive home, we got to make another fun stop: Devil's Tower. We haven't been there for about four years, so it was a fun little hike with the scenery of the tower as well as some smaller flora and fauna. The landscape is very similar to that around Mt Rushmore; in fact I think they're both considered part of the Black Hills.

 

A little plant growing out of a boulder

 

Cool moss on a boulder

I have tons of cool pictures from here and everyone else, but it would take forever to post them all. But here's the coolest one that I know you want to see.