CHRISTMAS MEMORIES

(written Christmas 2006)

A dreaded tradition in the Yenny home is the annual Christmas picture. When the kids were little, a picture in the Christmas card was necessary just to keep far-away friends up to date on arrivals which at one point seemed to be occurring annually.

When the kids were younger, getting one good picture required three rolls of film and three adults. My sister Theresa was behind the camera, JY was dancing around behind Theresa acting like a fool trying to get the kids to smile or laugh and I stood on the sidelines yelling: get your fingers out of your mouth, get your fingers out of your brother's mouth, take the rabbit ears from behind your brother's head, stand up straight, put your tongue BACK in your mouth, uncross your eyes, etc.

This was all done under the threat of someone either falling in the mud or puking on their Christmas shirt.

Amazingly enough, we pulled it off. Every year we took anywhere from 100 to 200 pictures and got one that didn't make us look like bad parents with no help from Photoshop.

But then the kids got older; they can cooperate. Or so I thought.

So this year I went at it alone. On Thanksgiving Day I forced the boys into shirts with actual collars (torture) and Jonathon into his uniform (he actually complained about the poor quality or our iron!). Digital camera in hand, I lined up the kids, yelled at them to smile and took a dozen or so pictures.

I never realized how hard it is to monitor the expressions on everyone's face while taking a picture. And I didn't realize what a poor job of monitoring I had done until the next day. A dozen pictures and not one that didn't have at least one of the boys looking goofy. And all three managed to look goofy AT THE SAME TIME in some them. Elle, on the other hand, understands the power of the camera and looked perfect in every picture.

Well, I had Plan B. Over 1,000 pictures were taken by my sisters and me in Glacier National Park in July. I spent a day going through all 1,000 pictures and there was NOT ONE with all four Yenny kids. Sam and Nate were in hardly any pictures at all and I am beginning to wonder if they were even on vacation with us. Elle, on the other hand, is in about 900 of the 1,000 pictures.

I finally managed to get some Christmas cards ordered, all four kids are featured.

Thank you, Photoshop.