Five Generation Photo Shoot

One might think that in order for five generations of one family to get together, the family tree would have to be very twisted.  Or a long line of teen moms.  But, we are just your average ordinary family. One of us just happens to be a very healthy determined 103 yr old.

I am the generation in the middle.  I am a grand-daughter and a grand-mother. I am a mom and a daughter. I am the middle one and it is incredible! The middle is the best, just like the stuffing in an Oreo.  That's me!

My grandma is the head of this five generation thing we've got going on. My mom is her daughter and  then me. My daughters are the 4th generation and they each have a baby boy. Five generations that branch out two ways. Pretty cool!

To celebrate the new 5th generation baby, my mom and grandma drove all the way from Wyoming to visit the new baby in San Diego.  Three week old Henry was pretty excited about meeting his great grandma and his great-great grandma. You could tell.

We had a five generation visit and photo shoot 8 months ago right after Charlie was born. Now Henry is here and we decided to do it all over again. I'm so glad we did! Luckily, both Charlie and Henry are good weather babies and the grandmas were able to travel to see them.

This photo shoot was no easy feat. First of all, the grandmas had to travel over a 1,000 miles just to be here (one way). I take that back. First, we had to plan this whole shebang! We struggled with picking a day to do this. We didn't want it too soon after Henry's birth; gotta give baby and  mama a chance to recover and get a few hours of sleep! And we had to dodge the busy social calendar of the grandmas. They had a window of opportunity to travel without missing out on some festivities at home. We also needed to schedule a date with the photographer. The hardest thing to work around was the work schedule of Katie's husband, Andrew. He was on paternity leave up until the day before the photos and he didn't know what his schedule would be. We wanted him there but we had to take a gamble and just hope he would be available for the photos. It turned out that he wasn't able to be there, but we sure tried.

We also had to pick a place to shoot these photos. This was an important thing because we wanted the pictures to be pretty, but we had requirements for the setting and since none of us are familiar enough with San Diego, we had to sort of shoot in the dark to pick a spot. This wasn't easy. And let's just not even talk about how hard it was to find a restaurant for after-photo-shoot dinner!

We all had to have something photo-worthy to wear. The grandmas had their blouses and slacks all clean and pressed and ready to go. They didn't need to shop before the trip for anything new, their closets were stocked.

Lexie and I weren't as lucky. We had to go shopping! We both needed something to wear and all of the kids needed something too. We took the kids to the mall in Escondido and we just hoped we would find something. It's a big mall with lots of stores and a nice play area.  As soon as we walked in we found a store to explore called H&M.  Neither one of us had ever shopped in an H&M store before; I vaguely remember seeing an ad for it online. This place was so awesome!  Lexie found an adorable dress that fit her perfectly. And she found some cute white jeans and a navy blue Tshirt for Charlie. I found a white sun-dress for Gracie.

On our previous shopping trip to find photo shoot clothes, we found a pair of shoes for Charlie and a blue dress for Libby at Gymboree at the Temecula Mall, but the shoes were pretty casual and they were more just because Charlie could use a new pair. And the blue dress wasn't really on my mind for the photos because I really wanted the little girls to match.

Since Charlie and Lexie were wearing blue and white, I thought Gracie and Libby could wear blue and white even if they didn't match each other. Good plan.  I didn't find anything new for myself, but I know I have something in my closet even if it isn't jumping out at me saying "Pick me!".  With little ones, our shopping trip was cut short by boredom - boredom multiplied by three!  Off we went to the play area. We only went to one store but it was a huge success. We also picked up lots of other things besides photo-shoot outfits. Score!

The day of the photo session, I found a dress in my closet that I've only worn once before. I wore it to Katie's bridal shower two years ago. I put it on and my mom came in to peek. She squinched up her face and shook her head.  Ok, that's going back on the hanger!  I tried another dress. I liked it when I bought it but then when I got it home I changed my mind and never did wear it.  My mom gave this one the nod. Eh, ok.

Then we all had to do our hair and make-up too.We spent all morning and half the afternoon getting ready!

Men  have it so easy! My husband just went to his closet and randomly picked out a shirt and he was dressed. I want to be a man in my next life!

Poor Katie. She only had an hour of sleep the night before the photos, no chance of a nap, her husband just went back to work (that was always hard for me when I had a newborn), and she didn't have a thing to wear. I don't know how that girl pulled it off, but she managed to run to Target and yank something off the rack, slapped on some make-up and she looked like a magazine cover girl. She sure didn't look tired.

We had to take two cars to San Diego. We were meeting at Balboa Park for the photos. Our photographer had one certain bench picked out for us in the park. We talked him into considering another bench, closer to the parking lot and it worked out beautifully. He was able to shoot most of the photos at the nearest bench, and took other photos just a few yards away for totally different backgrounds. Balboa Park is beautiful, even more so when the photographer has his favorite spots with his favorite angles.

The photos are icing on the cake, really. The best part is that we were all able to get together for a big visit and enjoy each other's company all at the same time. It was amazing to look down the dinner table and see so many people having such a great time, and knowing they're all family.