A woman has to know her limitations. There are photographers who can take great shots of people, specifically posed shots of people, but I am not one of them. I can’t practice this skill on Larry, due to his propensity for making rude gestures when I try to take photos of him. I can take good photos of Riley, because he is bribable. Larry does take bribes, but his preferences in this area have a tendency to interrupt the photo session and that is just not helpful at all. To me, I mean.
There are some other people I like to practice on occasionally however. I was all holier-than-thou about bribing my own kids when they were growing up, but I am totally okay with bribing these two. I think it is actually required that I engage them in activities that are just slightly off center from their parents’ plans for their overall enrichment. So, when they were here last week, I suggested that we work on Grandma’s photo taking skills. I may have mentioned the bag of sugared gumdrop fruit slice thingies I had on the counter. They were all a bout that!
“Can you guys try to smile for me?”
“Okay – Anna! Look at me!”
“Good Anna! Now, Mark, you look at me too!”
“Thant’s nice Anna – now look at Grandma again!”
“You guys are doing great! Isn’t this fun! Okay – hold still now!”
In five minutes, I took about 80 frames. Here is the pinacle of photo acheivment for the day:
Things kind of went downhill from there. Anytime Anna’s nose is running, she very helpfully points to the problem and says, “Snot!”
I did wipe it for her, but apparently I missed something.
Right around that time, they decided that 4 minutes and 27 seconds was plenty long enough to sit still for one lousy piece of candy, so we were done. 
I can still get a good one once in awhile.
They are beautiful! Snot and all;)
I so love mark he is so handsome and so reminds me of someone… his sister is a beauty and personally i think you did great getting pics… I take HUNDREDS to get that ONE decient shot… people just dont know what WORK it is to get that ONE fantastic shot… but I know you are like me … we grandmas dont care EVERY shot is perfect when it is of our babies!
Those are ADORABLE. I love your captions.
Snot! LOL. Gotta love kids.
p.s. I think Dixie and Riley are in cahoots for treats.
They are way cuter than muffins :)
I feel your pain. It’s why I take pictures of my dog (who will pose), flowers, food and landscapes.
I am not a people taker, although it’s one of my jobs at school so you think I’d be good at it now.
PW is having a Faces contest that incorporates making a Shutterfly photo book so I looked in my files last night and I’ve hardly got anything. So why bother?
Kate – I thought the same thing. I hope at the end she does the 40% off thing like last year – I got a couple of them then and they came out nicely.
And thanks everyone – they are the world’s most fabulous grandchildren after all :)
It’s actually called ‘not but whatever.
Bribery is the only thing that worked on these two. I’m not too good for it.
Great pictures.
I think they are all good! Pictures like the ones you got show the real personalities of the kiddos not just the “smiling” personalities. Keep taking those pictures!
Beautiful, beautiful children.
This truly made me laugh … I’ve had the same experience over and over:)…Yesterday I tried to find a photo for my daughter of her family of four in one shot…in the past year I did not get one picture where all four of them look good…makes me appreciate portrait photographers all the more:)
What cuties!
I rarely ask my kids to pose or smile… it feels so forced. I love just capturing random moments. It kills me when I’ll be happily snapping away at people and someone will call out “Oh! Everyone smile!” Grrrr….