9 Month Fiasco

Most of you know me to avoid the 'typical' maternal things.  My daughter rarely wears anything but a diaper if it's warm enough because I don't like constantly washing her clothes.  I let her play in the dirt and get messy.  I have no problem letting her fuss in public places (even though it's more socially unacceptable here than in the States).  However, one thing I have done well (so far) is get her pictures taken every 3 months.  My Grams gave me a picture frame with four different small holes for newborn, 3 months, 6 months, and 9 months, with a larger space for the one year picture.  I always went to the JC Penny's photo studio in the States because of all the coupons in the parenting magazines for free sittings and 8x10 portraits.  We would end up paying less than $5 for enough pictures to allow for us to record this life-stage for posterity sake.  Here, however, I don't have coupons and haven't found a professional photographer who is less than a bazillion (hyperbole) Rand.  So, I decided that I could pull off doing her pictures here.  So, I waited for the lighting to be good in the living room, threw a white sheet over the TV cabinet and put a white quilt down on the floor.  I forgot, however, that I am now dealing with a very mobile child, not to mention there was nothing else to distract her except the dog and all the other things in the house.  Needles to say, this was not quite as tranquil as the photo studio.  So, two hours later, I had maybe six decent shots, a broken mirror, an overturned fern (muddy water and potting soil to boot) and a filthy dog who had tracked puppy prints all over my white quilt.  Needless to say, when Todd finally arrived home I was more than slightly frazzled and told him that for her 12 month pictures, we were going to have Lani stay over at a friend's house, hire the neighbor girls to come and distract Em, and Todd and I both will each have a camera, so it wouldn't be such a disaster.  However, I did get some pretty cute shots of my very energetic little girl.  I hope you all like them!