What a night this was… We headed over to Chris’s parents to attempt a “Family pic.” Chris was feeling horrid, and it was getting later and later on a school night which is not a good thing.

Right after Thanksgiving, Chris was actually out of work on short term disability for almost 2 weeks for one ailment after another. This night was the beginning of his bout with a severe throat infection. His throat was so swollen he could barely talk and was so painful it was unbearable. He practially lived in the bedroom for 2 whole days.

Just to put it in perspective, before heading over for this pic, he had stopped by Best Buy to purchase his long awaited and desired big screen tv. It sat in the box in the living room for 2 days while he was out of commission. (Back story… Our tv that we’ve had since shortly after we got married, died. The sound just stopped working. Soooo, we decided to go ahead with the Big Screen purchase. Upon plugging in the new tv, we discovered the shocking news that the sound didn’t work on the new tv either! Uh-oh.

Turns out the cable box just needed to be reset and all was well. BUT, you can’t give a guy a Big Screen, let him hook it up and then expect to be able to pry the remote from his fingers when you realize you didn’t really need it!)

Back row… Johnny, Billy, Chris, Wade(9mo’s)

Front row… Miller(4), Gavin(3), Kelly, Robin, Riley(11.5 mo’s), Renee, Haylee(5)

To see what went into getting this pic is priceless. At our first attempt, Wade promptly erupted in screams demanding food instead of photos. So we took a few individual family shots while he started on a bottle. We meanly took him away in the middle of his bottle, so he was UNWILLING to smile…

The camera was propped up on a high chair which was propped up on a chair… set on the ever so fabulous self timer! We had a toy bear that claps and sings patty cake that Billy would set off so the little ones would look at least in the general direction of the camera and of course, ideally smile, before he ran to his spot in the middle and we all began to implore the little ones through our clenched smiles… “Look at the camera.” “Smile.” and other crazy encouragments.

But it turned out, and that’s what’s important, right? It’s been a few since the fam has been corralled into a Christmas pic…

This was taken in 2002… I think this is the first Christmas pic of the family that I have. I was preggo with Haylee Bailey, thus the ever popular “hand on the belly.” Kelly and Johnny had only been married about four months!

My how we’ve grown, and much crazier it is when we get together these days… five kids later. :)