A couple of months ago, someone e-mailed me and asked me to guest post for them and wanted a family picture.

And then I realized I didn’t have one! Our last family picture was taken at the beach this summer and since it was February, I didn’t think that quite fit their need.

Since the peach blossoms would be blooming soon, my friend Nicole and I decided to swap sessions and take them there!

I immediately began planning. I debated pink dresses, I debated colors…until I walked into a little shop in Charleston on a long weekend and found a dress I absolutely loved. Since it was a little more than I’d normally spend, I immediately came up with three options for it: I would wear it for spring pictures with the chambray shirt around it, I would wear it without the shirt for beach pictures and I would wear it with a cardigan for Easter!

From there, I started planning everyone else’s outfits.

Since my dress was mint, I knew I couldn’t have too much of that color but I needed everyone else’s outfits to tie in.

I decided on Cray’s outfit next mainly because he is so picky about his clothes (and I also started prepping him then for pictures!) and since he loves a suit and he loved this particular one, the second color was decided. The blue would tie in with my chambray/denim and not veer too far off. He had this blue v-neck already so it was perfect!

I went back and forth with Callie’s outfit. I debated on a more traditional look for her but since we do whites at the beach, when I found this mint dress with the tutu at Target and she loved it, I knew I could tie a little denim shirt around it like mine and be good! Everything I looked at for her had a little flair so I knew it’d fit her personality well.

Russ was a little more difficult. He doesn’t love a short sleeve button down but he had this particular one for a while so there was no need to buy one. We ordered some pants from Amazon but they were WAY too small so we ventured to Old Navy on a date night to try on the perfect khaki and found it!

Finally, I was just hoping Kuy would have something already in his closet that would work and it did! I knew since Russ had khaki, he would need a shade, as well. I thought straight denim (like jeans) would be too much so I found this gray t-shirt that had the perfect colors in it. Then, I took to instagram for help on the pattern. I was torn if he needed the bit of pink and it turned out to be just what we needed! The pattern softened the look and tied everyone’s colors together. Plus, I threw on some pink earrings and we were done!

Our month worth of planning complete!

The key? I used colors I LOVE and colors that I decorate my house with….this way I can hang them around my house without fear of them standing out in an awkward way. I was so excited about this session and I prayed my kids would cooperate BUT I also had bribes and I had been talking about it for WEEKS. I LITERALLY mentioned it almost every day so when the day came, everyone was ready and no one was stressed! This made for a seamless evening and NO one cried.

And now, I am wondering why I haven’t done it more. Everyone I sent these pictures to said the same thing…when did they get so old!?

But we all DIED laughing when finally after being soooo amazing, Cray yelled, “I can’t do this anymore.”

And that was a wrap.

All pictures by my beautiful friend Nicole of Eva Higgins Photography.

 

Amber