You may remember this post about selecting outfits for your family portait. I gave some practical tips and showed you the wardrobe I'd selected for our family. Since we have since gone on vacation (the easiest time, when we're all together!) and endured the portrait process with 5 kids ages 5 and under, I figured I'd show you how the results differed from the plan.
The plan was never a set-in-stone edict, instead it was more a guide or a formula to help show my family the direction I was planning. They didn't need to purchase the exact outfit–although, I did end up purchasing (and subsequently returning) most of the pieces in the "plan". For some people, we found outfits we liked even better. For others, they already owned a piece that would work.
our "plan"
our portrait
You can see that we kept with the theme and the vision of the plan, but went a different direction with many of the pieces. I found a great sale at Crazy 8 and got picked up my nieces's dress for a song. My sister-in-law didn't love her shorts, so we with something she was more comfortable in. I found some shorts for about $15 for Husband and he wore a shirt that he already had. It was about a billion-ty degrees, so I traded the big bell bottoms for a cute chambray skirt I had packed just in case.
And, I'll bet you can't even tell that Cooper (Twig2) is wearing girl shorts. :) I was in such a frenzy making sure everyone else had their outfits selected and packed…I forgot to pack appropriate shorts for Coop. Luckily, his 5 year old cousin (the pretty little girl in the dress, above) had a single pair of jean shorts. We just hiked them up, secured them with the pink glitter belt that came with the shorts, and pulled his shirt down to conceal the whole mess. See, that's just the proof that family portraits are all about catching ONE moment…not about an idealistic happy 3 hour photo session. :)
You might try throwing together something like this next time you are working on your family portraits. Your photographer might even provide a similar service. It makes the whole thing run much more smoothly and everyone looks pretty cohesive. One thing I wish I had thought of was to have the kids kick off their shoes…but I'll take that small oversight for this priceless image. :)