I vividly remember when I had the joy of sharing my pregnancy with two other friends in my Young Married’s class at church waaaaay back in 2005. My friends Erinn and Shane and I all gave birth to our babies, our first, within 2 weeks of each other.

Alivia

Cooper

Tyler

It was so fun sharing the ups and downs and the joys and pains of having our first babies all together! We went out to lunch to celebrate (and I think this was our first outing since the babies had been born) even though we had stitches in unmentionable places, hemorrhoids and the like. I do remember begging them to stop making me laugh because it hurt! (I had Cooper via Caesarian) HA!

L to R; Erinn, Shane and Me with our sweet new babes!

Well, these three gals taught me a lot about being a mom. Stuff I didn’t know you are “supposed” to do. I remember when one of them, I forget which, called me to say that they just got their one month pictures taken of the baby…and I’m thinking, “Oh,…you’re supposed to do that?” And then, I remember one of them telling me about the 3 month pictures they got taken and I thought, “Oh,…you’re supposed to do that too?”.

Eventually I swallowed my pride and asked about all this picture-taking nonsense. I learned that apparently, ah-hem, Mom’s of the Year take their baby’s to photographers to have their pictures taken once every 3 months for the entire first year of life. WHAT?

Who came up with THAT plan?

Because you know what happened when I made said appointment for my precious little babe right? Yeah, I dropped like $150 bucks on PICTURES of my child.  Which I promptly gave to all the grandparents like any good daughter would…..

I’m pretty sure that the first year of life, Cooper got baby announcements, 3 month pictures, 9 month pictures and then like 12-18 month pictures. That’s a pretty impressive track score for me. We won’t discuss a monetary amount….

Chase on the other hand…aw…my sweet Chase. I made him the MOST ADORABLE birth announcements (thanks to my friend Amber!). Seriously, they are so cute. And they sit on my computer…finished…unprinted and unsent.

Additionally, the child is 10 months old and I have personally taken lots and lots of pictures of him. But no one else has…

Oh my road is riddled with good intentions! But alas, we’ve had other things going on right at those points. And technically he did have his pictures taken when he was 3 months old; they were just family pictures of all of us, not just him. I guess in my weak defense I can say he has announcements and 3 month pictures and just nothing since. There’s still time, right?

Well, then I went and saw this website. And SHEESH! I could spend a FORTUNE here! I think if I went, they would be forced to have me sign Chase up as their next child model.

Anyway, while I reel from trying to put this in the budget (HEY! Jeremy is getting a raise in January!), why don’t you savvy parents share your secrets of the photography trade. I leave you with pictures of Chase.

Chase, mere minutes old

Chase on Day 1

Chase at a couple weeks old

Chase at 3 months

Chase at 6 months

Chase at 9 months

Chase now

Ok, there, I feel better. See what I mean? I’m gonna be broke….