Take the picture... Take ALL the pictures

One thing that you all will learn about me really quick, is that I absolutely love love LOVE my pictures!! As soon as you walk into my house, you will be bombarded by tons of pictures of my family and the people I love the most, on every single wall. I just love pictures! I love how they can evoke a feeling or a memory, I love how they can make me laugh and they can make me cry...I love being able to share the beautiful family God gave me/us with all that enter our home, or my social media page. Even as a young single mom with two little kids and very little money, I would take pictures of my kids professionally and family pictures every single year, several times a year. That was just one thing that was always so important to me and I wouldn’t skimp on.

When I got married and we added four more kids to the two kids I brought into the marriage, my husband knew from day one that he was going to spend A LOT of time and money on family pictures. Being the good sport that he usually is, he would just nod his head and say yes dear, and then shake his head when I turned around! LOL Let me just tell you, that family pictures in my house have always been an event!! I picked my photographer carefully, which is a whole process. I take weeks and months to come up with a color scheme and figure out outfits, and then, I watch the weather like a hawk to figure out what days would be the perfect days for the perfect family pictures! As you can imagine the days leading up to family picture day, my kids would hide out as much as they could and my husband just nodded his head and smiled vacantly, as I went over detail after detail after detail making sure I didn’t forget one thing.

Don’t get me started on picture day 😬

On that special day, I would take all of the outfits that I had laid out early in the morning and the day would start with a bang! Hair and makeup needed to be attended to. Showers were a must, and of course haircuts had already been taken care of days before! I was a ball of excitement and nerves and the rest of my family were just keeping their heads down and hunkering in for the ride. We would show up, and mom would start barking orders. The kids would know that not smiling was not an option, and that mom would insist on as many takes as needed to get the pictures I wanted!! With the promise of Olive Garden if you cooperated, and solitary confinement if not, the stakes were high and everyone was on edge 😬

Picture day in October 2015, started out the same way every other picture day began. The hustle and the bustle, the last minute I can’t find my whatever, and oh crap I forgot to get so-and-so a headband to match, were pretty typical for a normal picture day. My good friend Carrie was on tap to take the pictures and we had found the Perfect location for the fall pictures of my dream. I was also super excited because my friend Sam was coming to help....and if you know Sam, you know any time with her is a good time ☺️To be honest, as I woke up Thursday I was actually dreading taking pictures. Not because of all the stress, heck no! I was used to that...I THRIVED on that!! No, my worries came from an internal place that I know most women here, if not every woman here, can understand. The plain truth was I was unhappy with how I looked and unsure if I really wanted to take pictures to document that time in my life. Again, not at all because I wasn’t happy with my family or my life. No, it was simple vanity and the fact that my clothes didn’t fit the way I wanted them to and my muffin top had started to turn into an entire cake 😬I honestly struggled until the day before to decide if I should even just cancel the pictures. I was torn and slightly nauseous over the prospect.

I honestly think the one thing that stopped me from canceling, was knowing how important pictures had been to me in my life so far. I can so remember when both of my parents passed, especially since my mom had just passed that year, how important and healing it was for me to look at pictures of them and our family throughout the years. It gave me such a comfort to remember those times and feel like I had them close to my heart. I couldn’t ignore that feeling, and I knew I couldn’t back out even though part of me really wanted to!!

Let me just say, that day was one of the best picture taking experiences I have ever had!! The location was perfect 👌🏻 our outfits were on point, and even though I was squeezed into my jeans and could only set a certain way, I still thought we all cleaned up pretty nice! The icing on the cake was having two of my best friends there to document it ❤️ Carrie takes AMAZING pictures and has documented some of our most special memories. And Sam, what can I say about Sam that hasn’t been said?? Basically, the party don’t start until Sam walks in!! LOL My kids are kids and couldn’t help but smile as “Aunt Sam” busted out the latest moves and contorted her face into all sorts of crazy shapes. We had so much fun, and even though we didn’t go to Olive Garden, we had a great night going out with the fam to Mexican with Carrie and her family. It was the perfect picture day.

When the pictures came, they were amazing, I just loved them so much!! And yet, as much as I loved them, I looked at the pictures of me and I struggled to post them on social media. Of course I was going to put them on my wall! Every picture is on my wall!! 🙃But as I looked at those pictures, I still saw every flaw in myself. I remember asking my best friend if I should post them. She, of course, said that I should, though she admitted she would have a hard time for the same reasons. Let me just say, if you haven’t done the math yet....those were the last family pictures I had, we had, while I was still standing and able to walk.

Can I just tell you, that I am SO stinking glad that I didn’t let my vanity get in the way of that day!! I look at these pictures now as they come up in my memories on Facebook and as they hang on my walls, and I remember a day so close to perfect that it makes me cry with joy and just a touch of sadness. I cannot imagine, not taking those pictures that day. I cannot imagine not having those to look back on from that time in my life. The last few months of normalcy before our entire world shifted upside down and turned on a dime. The last pictures where I smiled with the naïveté of thinking that things would always be this way. Sure, we’ve taken family pictures since, and there’s some that I really love, but there haven’t been any yet to this day to rival those pictures. Now don’t think for a second, that I am not planning more pictures and striving to top that experience! That’s just who I am!! A picture loving, competitive to my core, wife of 1 and mama of many. I WILL “top” those pictures, or at least, “equal” them someday 😉

So why do I tell you all of this you ask?!? Or maybe you don’t, and I’m just having this conversation with myself! Let’s be real, it wouldn’t be the first time. But if you were wondering to yourself what’s the point to all of this, let me tell you so there is no confusion. I want you to read this and I want you to know that you need to take the picture, ALL the pictures!! Don’t wait until you fit into a certain size jeans, don’t wait until you have the perfect clothes, don’t wait until,... just DON’T wait! I promise you someday, you will never be sorry that you have too many pictures. When your situation changes, or you lose someone you love, you aren’t gonna care about how fat or skinny you were. You’re not gonna care if you could afford the perfect outfits. You’re not gonna care about any of the superficial stuff, I can promise you that! I can guarantee you that you’ll never, ever, be sorry you took the picture.

So, DON’T WAIT!! Take the picture, take ALL the pictures ❤️

Nicole 💞💞