Hitting Myself in the Head

I'm so happy that competition is alive and well in the photo studio business. I remember in the early years going through tons of stress scheduling an appointment at least a month in advance with Sears or Wal-Mart, dressing Juliette in her best baby clothes (during a Sears appointment I took a baby dress off the rack, hid the tag and had her picture taken in it. I just couldn't justify spending $40 bucks on a dress that I needed for less than an hour), finding the coupon that came in the mail, waiting for our turn in line (planning naps around appointment time), trying our best to make her smile (or at least no cry), trying our best to choose which picture was "the one" under extremely stressful sales tactics designed to make parents pay through the nose and then trying to decide which family member got which picture (size, qty etc...). Some of the sales tactics included taking a picture, showing it on screen and telling the parents that if they liked it, they would have to commit to paying for it immediately at which point other pictures would cost at least double the cost of the first one or the parents could choose to delete it immediately and hope a new shot would be better. We always managed to commit to just one picture but it usually cost us a few grey hairs in the process.

Today, we go to any of the large Loblaws studios. For less than $6 you get 4 sheets of pictures (a mixture of wallet size, 5 X 12 and everything in between). They take a bunch of pictures that are reviewed with software that let's you zoom, crop and adjust contrast as required. There is usually no waiting if you show up during the week and there are so many of them that it can be done on the spur of the moment. We just finished getting Nicholas and Juliette's pictures done again. To help Nicholas smile I used a stuffed duck and hit myself in the head with it. It works every time. Of course Juliette is a bit more sophisticated. During our last set of pictures I tried to hit myself in the head but she just didn't think it was all that funny. Luckily I had Nicholas and when he started hitting himself in the head we all cracked up. This time around Juliette just did her thing. She was great at posing. She could have been a model in an Old Navy commercial. At the end of the shoot we picked a picture that had a similar pose as Nicholas and one that made her look like she was still a little girl. She's almost 5 but she's big for her age and almost more mature than dad. We keep telling her to stop growing but I guess that’s not really an option.

Kid-centric

It's funny, as a kid you take certain things for granted and only when you become a parent yourself do you discover how difficult some of those things are. What I've realized is that my parents were extremely kid-centric. I define kid-centric parents as: parents who schedule outings/activities during weekends and vacations for the kids first and the parents second. Here is one of my favourite examples of the kid-centric parenting style. For years my parents forced me to do cross-country skiing. To this day, the very thought of going cross-country skiing has absolutely no appeal. As a kid you think to yourself what could be worse than cross country skiing. As a parent of children I realize my parents could have decided to do nothing with us at all and let us stay home to entertain ourselves. The very fact that my parents went to the trouble of choosing an activity that included the kids can be a thankless job that that requires time and money. Now that I'm a parent I realize I've become kid-centric as well. So when I see parents who plan adult events where kids are invited that are not kid-centric, I realize that being kid-centric is not something that all parents do, which I find a bit sad. I'm not saying that my entire life revolves around my children. I have multiple activities that I do throughout the week by myself and for myself. But I do ensure that whatever activity is planned, the kids are either taken care of, or if they're with me, that the activity I'm doing will entertain them as much or more than it will entertain me. Really though, the fact that I'm a big kid at heart makes choosing activities a lot easier. So I'd like to thank my parents for always thinking of their kids first and I hope I can live up to this high standard with my children.

Baby's coming soon... but not soon enough

The kids are sooooo excited about the new baby. They've spent hours cleaning up the baby's room. Nicholas helped me put the crib together and Juliette helped organize their toys. If you ask Juliette what her favourite thing to do right now she'll tell you its organizing and cleaning. I hope this lasts into her teenage years, ok, I know I'll be lucky if it lasts longer than a week. Nicholas has given the baby his bear while Juliette has adorned the baby’s shelf with all of her stuffed rabbits. Of course Juliette would like a girl and Nicholas would like a boy. Whatever the baby turns out to be you can guarantee that it will be well taken cared of and loved by his/her two older siblings. Mom is starting to get tired of being pregnant and Dad is feeling nervous and excited. No matter how many times you do this, a small part of me is afraid that we aren't ready. It's almost like climbing a toboggan hill (my wife doing most of the climbing) and looking down before letting yourself go. It looks a little scary but really fun at the same time. We still haven't decided on a name nor have we gotten the baby clothes from storage. Meanwhile, life goes on like swimming lessons, Chinese school and Nicholas' firs birthday party invitations. I know some day I'll look back on this whole thing and say to myself that they grew awful fast but right now it's hard to believe that.
P.S. If you want to help us pick a name click on the title of this blog or use your own resources and enter it as a comment.