Time Capsules/Treasures

Yesterday was picture day. Well at least it was for a fast and furious fifteen minutes. Fifteen minutes that was filled with yelling and screaming and laughing and wrestling and joking and silliness and a little more yelling AND FINALLY a few decent pictures.

I've had an annual Youngblood Kid Picture Day every October for the past six years. It goes like this...I force the kids to wear decent looking clothes and stand next to each other in front of a Fall-ish looking back drop and take a few pictures.  I promise them I won't make them do something like this for a whole year and sometimes throw in a promise of candy and treats/bribes.  

I take these pictures because I love having sort of a benchmark of their growth from year to year. I take these pictures because I love all of them madly even if I yell a lot while taking the pictures.  I take these pictures because it is just one of the 5,467 traditions that we do as a family.  I take these pictures because time, man, it's going fast and each October I love capturing their faces and their expressions and their squinty blue eyes and giant smiles and messy hair and the way they always end up hanging on each other or hugging each other.  These pictures are my time capsules.

This past summer on our epic road trip, I rediscovered a deep love for Jim Croce songs.  Time In A Bottle is not my favorite musically because I think it sounds sort of creepy. BUT the lyrics! Take out the creepy/haunting music and listen-- If I could make days last forever...I'd save every day like a treasure. Well, these pictures are my treasures. 

These pictures are circa 2011 (taken on a cheapo digital cam).
My babies!!!!!!!!! 

This year I got to take my fancy-not-new-anymore-but-still-not-sure-how-to-use-all-the-features camera and take the pictures.  I got to capture the sweet faces, the silliness, the mayhem and the love.

We added the dogs this year just to make it a little
more mayhem-y.

There were too many leaves not to throw them at each other.

We don't go anywhere without a football, duh.

This year we sort of rushed the photo shoot in between games, the cable guy coming to fix the line, youth group and homework. It felt a little more chaotic than in past years, but it was fun.

And I finally got a shot that I LOVE.  Here is the Treasure/Time Capsule of the loves of my life for 2015.

Check out some other pictures I've taken 

with my Fancy New Camera:

The Zoo With My Fancy New Camera

Belle Isle With My Fancy New Camera

Baseball and My Fancy Camera 
Pure Michigan With My Fancy New Camera 
Everyday Kind of Small Town Family Fun w/My Fancy New Camera