Anatomy of a Blog Picture with my Children

The other day I was photographing something (not my children) and Ellie all of a sudden requested that I take a picture of her!  This doesn't happen very often (that kids pictures are her suggestion) so I happily agreed.  She suggested that we recreate the portrait of Reni and her which is now hanging over our fireplace.  You can see it here.

The following is what ensued.  I share it here to show that before I can get a good snapshot, there's usually many, many that fall prey to the 'delete' key.

Could Reni look more bored?  He's thinking, "C'mon!  Let me get back to my Christian biographies!"

Now he's smiling because he still doesn't mind his photo being taken.  Ellie's forgotten how to smile naturally.

Reni has realized that Ellie's older sister tendencies have really started to manifest themselves after 7 months of emerging and he doesn't like it.

Ellie realizes she can't 'hug' his arm, so she goes in for a kiss.

Does this need a caption?

Or this?

Reni leverages his accumulated upper body strength and throws off his sister.
Ellie, just wait til he gets bigger!

Not bad, but Ellie's a little overly excited by something her daddy must be doing behind me.

Aren't you just a little curious to know what Nathan's doing to elicit this reaction?

This might be our winner of the set.  Love how they're holding hands.

And this is what came right after it.  Gotta love those smiles!

Daddy's sillyness continues to tickle them...

And this, friends, is the smile that we celebrate learning of, almost one year ago... a big anniversary is approaching!