A skateboard, a frisbee, and a silk worm- what do pictures look like when kids don’t follow the session plan?
I’m arriving at the park when my phone rings. I can almost predict what she’s going to say when I see that it’s the mom I will be documenting today. I know because it’s what I say, it’s what we all say - “Sorry, my meeting went late, but we’ll be there soon. I didn’t really get to dress the kids but their wearing, uh, clothes. They want to bring the dog, is that ok?”
There is so much that we can’t control, and nothing teaches us this better than kids.
Or let me say, I’ve never had to learn that until my own kids. I wanted to control everything since before I was using my training potty as a foot bath. And the older I got, the worse it became. The control thing, the potty training got better.
Having kids made my life an exposure treatment into relenting control. From my first doctor’s visit, when they told me I was having twins, all the way to today when my toddler thought wearing diapers as shoes was a great idea. I’ve been leaning into these sweet lessons of acceptance. You can see a clear body-slam shift in my photography because of that.
I love that these pictures usually happen because the kids go off script. They have way better ideas.
And when kids have ideas, their behavior is contagious. When an adult tells you to smile, it’s not inspiring. Actually a little annoying.
But we all want to laugh and climb trees. We all want to put frisbees on our heads and pretend to be ninjas. We all want to sit in the sunset, invent new games, and compare last airbender notes. Kids might not do anything according to plan, but that is their super power. They don’t worry about the small stuff because they are too busy enjoying them.
These are memories I could never capture if I was controlling everything. I am not creating these moments - I’m just inspired by them. Completely caught up in them.
I was so glad she called. So glad to tell her this was fine, this was great. It was just another day at a local park, where the kids learned to skateboard and play basketball. But I can’t not be inspired by these kids, and this force of nature mom. They explored and learned. They fought and made up. They teased, wandered off on their own, made poop jokes, got bored, and did it all over again.
These unscripted moments of a family being a family was a pleasure to document.
