The beach

This is a photo I took of my daughter while we were at the beach this week. In preparation for the upcoming photo shoot I've been gauging the kids' behavior in each environment. The ocean -- beautiful, vast, humbling, soothing...yeah, the kids still hate it. The only way I was able to bribe them to sit on the beach with me was to bring boxes of salty snacks and juice boxes that a good mom wouldn't buy. So I'm leaning toward park pictures now -- I'd prefer not to end up with a photo essay entitled "The day we spent a ton of money hiring a professional photographer so we could have pictures of crying and whining and look more dysfunctional than usual". I keep telling the kids that they're going to be ostracized in California for not liking the beach.

A couple of weeks ago a friend of mine, who apparently spends quite a bit of time hanging out at a publishing company, recruited my kids to be photographed for a children's book. My 4-year-old liked it. A lot. I'm worried she could easily be led down the Britney Spears path. My 2-year-old, on the other hand, frowned harder whenever they told her to smile. She is tending toward the opposite path. She has a real talent for chugging milk, so it'd be a serious loss to the college fraternity party scene if she ends up becoming a recluse.