Keeping It Real - Father's Day Photo Shoot

 So here it goes with a "Keeping It Real" Father's Day Photo Shoot.  One of my friends often commented on how in the world I got pictures with all three of my little ones actually sitting still and all looking at the camera.  I would say for the most part luck and it also helps when you take a ton of pictures.  Well then came Max which brings the kids count up to 4.

We had been working on some Father's Day stuff for Eric and I found these cute free tie printables and an idea for a cute shirt.  I thought to myself we could make those.  The girls and I had fun picking out fabric and making the shirts.  I dreamed up this idea of a photo collage that I wanted to put together.  The only problem was it didn't quite go as planned.  

 I had cut out the letters to spell DAD and thought I would have each of the girls hold a "D" and the boys hold the "A."  I wasn't even going to try to do the shot of all 4 together.  I was going to piece the 3 pictures together in a collage.  

You see Max is 2 and does NOT sit still for a second.  Yes, when we got him home he wasn't walking and would sit still and play for hours.  That has all changed now and he is making up for lost time.  The boy doesn't sit unless he is eating, sleeping or strapped in his stroller or his car seat. 

So if Max wasn't taking off, Shane was holding the letter crazy or one or both of them had a great expression on their face.  The kind of expression you don't want to put in a frame. 

Or Max would decided where he wanted to sit on his own which was typically not looking at the camera or next to his brother.

Change of plans.  The picture of the boys was not working out so we decided to try Alexa and Max together.  Hmmmm not exactly the look I was going for. 

After a couple tries we decided to move to .....

Plan 3 .... put the letters down and get a cute picture of them holding hands, walking on the bridge with their cute shirts on. It looks cute from the back but .....

the minute they turned around Max decided he didn't want to walk towards his crazy mom with the camera or hold hands with his sisters. He started to protest.

The girls tried to convince him how fun it would be to hold hands and walk across the bridge.  

They decided to show him the river to try to distract him and then try again. 

No, not going to work! I think I forgot to mention it was a very humid, hot day.  Actually it was the hottest day we had had in June.  Yes, this crazy mom thought we could get some cute pictures for a collage for Father's Day in a matter of a couple of minutes. What was she thinking. 

Well, this look from my first born says it all !

She swooped in, picked Max up and started walking.  As she passed her crazy mom with the camera she said, "Mom, this is the worst idea you have ever had!"

The girls took off as I tried to get a decent picture of Shane with the letter "A."  I was trying not give up on my vision of the collage.  Well, out of 20+ shots the majority of them looked like this.  

As I walked with Shane off the bridge and towards the van.  My first born had a smile on her face again and ...

Max was very happy to be off and running where ever he pleased. 

I have no idea how ... but I actually got 3 somewhat decent pictures for the collage I dreamed up.  Yes out of the 100+ pictures I took I had about 4 keepers.  One of those was of the kids walking away from me.  So needless to say it wasn't our best afternoon out together taking pictures.  I am not sure how soon we will try that again!