Photos at the park (originally posted on 9/3/08)

I've been feeling guilty for years that we have a ridiculous amount of pictures of each of the kids from birth to about age 2 and then the pictorial memories taper off a bit. In my opinion, the reason that this happens is that they no longer sit motionless, enraptured by your voice and the shiny black thing that lights up and makes noises while you smile and coo at them. Now if I point the camera in their direction, I get the backs of their heads while they run out the door or a "not now, Mom, I'm in the middle of something" or, most often, I receive the cheesiest "I do not want to smile right now" grin that is entirely unsuitable for framing or anything else.

So, because we are now on the move, I had to schedule an entire morning when I knew Scott would be home to help me, just to capture this stage of our lives. Of course, we spent at least 30 minutes moaning and complaining about having to change clothes (Brady: Why can't we just wear our basketball shorts and t-shirts, Mom?), especially into a dress, for crying out loud (Avery: I don't like dresses...they look weird). Nora was happy to oblige in changing her outfit, what a shock (Nora: I look like a princess!).

We started at the train bridge in Geneva overlooking the Fox River, which I'd had my heart set on using because the light coming into the bridge is great. What I momentarily forgot is that it is a holiday and every person in the western suburbs is out biking, picnicing and walking across this bridge! So...we took a few shots and then packed it up for a quieter location. By the time we found a park in St. Charles it was really getting steamy outside and a bit close to lunch time, but as you can see if you take at least 200 pictures, you're bound to get a few good ones. I'll upload the ones that didn't turn out, but are too funny not to share in another post.