I got into this discussion with my fellow playgroup moms a few days ago. One of the moms decided to save on postage and handed out her Christmas cards to all of us during our weekly gathering. I opened mine right away and complimented her on getting a great shot of her kids lined up in front of the Christmas tree. (Any parent knows that’s no easy task when you have five kids under the age of 10.)
The compliment was soon followed by inquiries by other moms wondering why said mom and her husband were not in the shot. Her response was expected (by me anyway)-—if you think it’s hard getting five kids and a dog to pose for a Christmas card photo imagine hard difficult it would be to try to capture a winning shot using a self timer. What’s more, she pointed out, she needed her husband to snap the pic while she stood to the side of the camera and bribed her kids to smile.
The discussion soon turned into a debate on whether or not Christmas card photos should include the entire family or just the kids. Most of the moms sheepishly admitted that they willingly chose not to be in their Christmas card photos simply because they feared they’d be the most unattractive person in the shot. Others admitted they had no idea how to work the self-timer on their cameras, while another mom confessed to not having a tripod and didn’t feel comfortable asking a neighbor to come over and take the shot. Needless to say, I am not expecting too many Christmas cards with photos of the entire family coming to my home from that group.
Regardless, I thought it was an interesting discussion. Some people may argue that you should include a picture of the entire family especially if you are sending the card to people you don’t see on a regular basis. That way the recipient can see how the entire family has grown over the course of the year. Others maintain it’s nice to include the parents in the photo particularly if the card is being sent to a person who rarely associates with the kids (takes the guess work out of wondering who the children in the picture before looking at who signed the card).
What do you think? Does your Christmas card picture feature just your kids or are you in the shot as well?
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