I just can't win with pictures!

I am a control freak. Most people who know me really well know this about me and those who don't often find out right in the middle of an anxiety attack. I try and hide it most of the time only freaking out to Paul or by myself but sometimes it can't be avoided. Take this summer at the Seiter family reunion... I always try and make sure that Avery looks cute, well dressed, and well groomed etc. So when I walked outside and found her completely covered in sidewalk chalk in her new cute clothes and freshly showered body, I may have freaked out just a little. And it is such a dumb thing to get all worked up about, but there I was in front of Paul's family and I couldn't hide it. For this reason, I have had a hard time having kids and letting them, ok just Avery at the moment, be kids. I have had to give up a few silly things like the idea that I will do Avery's hair in the morning and it will look exactly the same, not a hair out of place, at dinner, or even lunchtime. Avery may have a tantrum for no reason, that I can see, in the middle of Walmart, and despite my embarrassment, Cam may have an audible and visual blow out during a really quiet part of our Relief Society lesson. I can't control everything, and I'm not sure if I would even really want to, but some days I have a harder time than others. Take yesterday for example. In my last post I mentioned that the weather here in North Dakota is really true to forecast, and I still stand by that. That said, I have been wanting to go outside and take some family pictures, but it has been too cold. When we saw that it was going to be warmish again on Friday, we made plans. Avery has come down with a little cold but it hasn't been a big deal, until yesterday, of course. She coughed all day, her eyes were runny and red and to top it off, under her nose was bright red and raw from wiping it so much. She refused to take a nap and once again fell asleep in the car on the way to the shoot. She was so grumpy, and all my yelling at her to smile and be cute and open her eyes, just made things worse. Cam was fussy as well, and wanted to have a binky in for most of the time... not family picture worthy of course! And to top it all off... when we got out of the car to take the pictures, the horses on the property came running at us full speed, hoping for a little affection. They were so friendly and beautiful, but we could not get a picture in without them. If we moved, they moved, if we sat down, they hung their heads low, right in the picture. So we have all these pictures with horses in the background... not exactly what I had in mind! Some of them just have horse rear ends or hooves, and those can be cropped out, but most of them are quite comical.. it looks like they are our pets and we wanted them in the pictures! NOT how I pictured the day going and not what I wanted in our family pictures! And I picked the spot and don't know anything about photography so when we got home and looked at them, we noticed how weird the sunlight was in the pictures. Oh well... Some of them look ok... and they will have to do. It's getting cold again and I'm not going to go through the stress of trying to organize a picture again. I can't control everything, right?



The sunlight is pretty weird in this picture and Avery must have been talking, but it's one of the only "normal" pictures we got. Avery would not smile or even look at the camera most of the time.

Notice the horse in the background!