We spent a few days in Texas last week for spring break, visiting my sister and her family. It was warm and wonderful, filled with good food (pie and ice cream and Texas BBQ!), good beer (my new favorite Shiner) and good company. I’ll be writing a round-up post for travel purposes, but in the meantime I just had to share our bluebonnet pictures.
We seem to only visit Texas in April. I’m sure it’s lovely year round, but it’s hard to beat a trip during bluebonnet season. The Texas wildflower is everywhere this time of year, and the sight of them never gets old. Every time we visit, the kids know they must endure a photo session in the bluebonnets. It’s non-negotiable. Now, in years past, it wasn’t hard to doll them up in cute outfits and pose them in any way I saw fit. The last time we did this was four years ago, and the kids were 3 and 8.
And while the march of time has certainly made aspects of parenting easier, the same can not be said for taking posed pictures in a patch of wildflowers. One kid wants to only make goofy faces, the other kid doesn’t want to show any teeth.
On second thought, maybe not that much has changed.
I brought along acceptable outfits, but long gave up on matching. In retrospect, I’m glad I didn’t spend too much time fretting over them. We found the perfect bluebonnet patch (I can’t help thinking of them like the pumpkin patch in Peanuts: “It’s the most sincere bluebonnet patch around!”), but the outfits were in the suitcases instead of on the children. Thank heavens for the crop tool in Lightroom.
In the end, it was completely fine. The pictures you take when your kids are 2 are not the same pictures you take when they’re 12. Life is different … not bad different, just different. Sure, they don’t wear what I wish they would, smile on command, or pose in any way that would require touching each other. But they also sleep through the night, wipe their own bottoms, and cut up their own food. They are growing up, and it’s utterly frustrating and fantastic. They were wonderful travel companions, and I enjoy their company. If that means they’re too big for me to braid their hair or make them cuddle, that’s a trade-off I can live with.
They’re still pretty damn cute in a patch of Texas wildflowers. Bluebonnets are magical that way.
[…] the home of my sister, but it helps that she lives in a place with pie and Sonic happy hour. And bluebonnets. Traveling with the intent of visiting family is very different from traveling with a plan to soak […]