It’s School Picture Day today for Sunny, and miracle of miracles, we had no arguments over her outfit or her hair—the child is stylin’—nor did she sustain damage from the Wesson Family semi-traditional, pre-Picture Day, concrete faceplant this weekend, as was so lovingly captured in her 16th month photo above.
She said her tummy hurt, but I decided to go with my mother’s patented No Fever, No Excuse policy, in the hopes that if her discomfort actually exists, and is caused by a more pernicious bug than butterflies, any repercussions of my parental Blinders o’ Optimism will hold off until the photographer snaps the shutter.
We’ll see.
But tomorrow is Janie’s Picture Day, which is a potential concrete faceplant of a completely different nature.
There’s a standard equation for these things, and the math isn’t pretty:
Picture Day + Precocious Pre-Teen + School Dress Requirements + Responsible Parents = Armageddon
You could argue that every kid is different, of course, and that I’m weighing heavily on the side of pessimism. And I won’t argue.
I mean, Jane’s already chosen her favorite dress, which looked stunning on her last Christmas . . . when she was four inches shorter . . . and only just starting to wear training undergarments that have since lost their amateur status.
So there’s that, plus weather predictions for tomorrow that appear just a tad too Brazilian rainforest for woolen knit—and an overheated Jane is not a Sweetness & Light Jane®, whom her teachers much prefer.
I’ve been gently suggesting alternative outfits all week, but I’m not sure I’m getting through.
Shoes might also be a problem, since her best pair of black flats disintegrated immediately upon contact with her feet—or so she claims—and the heel of one of her dressy-enough-boots fell off at the beginning of summer. Her barefoot state is all the fault of her neglectful parents, of course, as we didn’t immediately go hunting for new winter boots among all the sandals and flip-flops.
In other words, those of you who live in our hemisphere might want to close your windows between 7pm and 7am CST, in case we get a little loud.
Earful of Cider 
You couldn’t wait until next week when I’m outta town? Man poor planning on my part!
Picture Day waits for no one.
(hey–got any shoes you’re willing to loan Janie?)
Oh my GOODNESS. That face! Even post-chinplant I want to munch the cheeks off her. (I should probably not write that out loud.)
Her six-year old self looks a lot less like Trixie from Hi & Lois, but she has the same smile.
School uniforms.
As a child, I hated them. As a mother, I love them.
I would LOVE to have uniforms and I think Janie would love them, too. . . . but the other parents keep shouting them down.
Free expression is overrated when it comes to schoolwear, darn it.
Free expression is SO overrated. Amen.
You should have seen the fiasco when picture day happened and the little man wanted to wear his button down black striped shirt with his blue checkered tie on a 90 degree day. He was so excited to wear his “fancy” clothes the sleeves two inches too short…oy. So, he wore them, we packed a polo and from what I understand, he didn’t take the tie off the whole day.
The funny part is that no one would believe that I tried to talk him out of the tie and he insisted. Instead I’m “that” mom…kind of like trying to get people to believe that I want the boys to grow their hair and they keep insisting on crew cuts. We’ve become the Keaton’s and the little man is growing into Alex P. Keaton. Great.
These are the times that big sticker-labels with, “I dressed myself today!” on them would be handy.
We should totally look into that, Lyra—might help build those college funds . . .
With a companion sticker, “I am not one of those moms.”
Except I secretly AM . . .
Can we do a sideline in “I did my own hair today!” (or didn’t as the case may be)
Of course!
Did you have her do a dry run by trying the outfit on and looking in the mirror? You know, “practice just to make sure everything is perfect on picture day”. (Having no youngsters of my own, that’s all I’ve got.) Best of luck.
Good suggestion, Dee, and we did. Her chosen outfit was borderline okay . . . but she came to breakfast in a completely different one.
Go figure!
All those times I’ve wished I’d been blessed with a daughter… This would not be one of them. My two boys never cared a bit about what to wear on picture day. My biggest struggle was making sure their hair was washed and preferably combed. Oh, and considering they had chronic colds for ten years, it was a bonus if no snot was coming out their noses.
I think we might have a snotbubble pic for Jane’s kindergarten photo. It’s funny now . . .