Well, I finally finished the Christmas project I started for my-mother in-law a few months ago.  You might recall that my mother-in-law’s gift to her sister (my wife’s aunt) was a nice family portrait.  Of course, I was volunteered to be the photographer because my price was right (free).

My wife’s aunt finally chose the photo that she and her family liked best.  They only had one request: that I Photoshop out a stain on somebody’s jeans.  No problem.  I fixed that in a few minutes.  Then I uploaded the photo to Costco and ordered a 20 x 30 canvas print.  It finally arrived.  It looks amazing, and it’s freaking huge.  I’m both surprised and proud that a photograph so nice came from me.  We plan on presenting the canvas print to her family this weekend.  I can’t wait to see their reaction.

The man in me feels the need to breakdown who contributed to this project.  I know doing this is a little petty, but who cares.  It’s not like any of them read this blog.  So here is the breakdown:

• Coming up with the whole idea: my wife
• Location scouting: my wife and me
• Planning / scheduling the photo shoot: my wife
• Posing the photos: me
• Taking the photos: me
• Uploading to the computer: me
• Creating a slideshow and distributing digital copies: me
• Choosing the best photo: my wife’s aunt
• Editing in Photoshop: me
• Uploading and ordering the canvas print: me
• Paying for print: mothe-in-law (reimbursed me…to the penny…no extra funds for time and effort…not that it matters)

For the most part it was a positive experience: my in-laws love and trust my photo abilities, I learned some manual settings on my camera, I got to do a little Phototshop, and I learned that Costco’s canvas prints are awesome.

101.  Simply amazing. My wife’s family called her Grandma Great.   She lived up to that moniker.  She had 6 children, 20+ grandchildren, 80+ great-grandchildren, and 20+ great-great-grandchildren.  My wife is one of the great-grandchildren.  My two boys are part of the great-greats.

My wife and I married a little over 9 years ago.  In those 9 years I had the pleasure to meet and talk to Grandma Great on several occasions.  The most recent was at her 100th birthday party.  Even then she still remembered my wife and asked about our family.  I remember that my son was fascinated with her jewelry and she was kind enough to let him fiddle with it.  What an amazing woman.

Our road trip this weekend is for her funeral.  The last minute planning, packing, and scheduling is worth it to honor her memory.

Sometimes you gotta take one for the team.  That’s what a good man does.

My mother-in-law struggles with giving Christmas gifts to her siblings.  Every year my wife basically tells her mom what to get for her sibling (they mix up the gift exchange each year).  Usually, this doesn’t affect me, so I really don’t care how the whole thing goes down.

The 2009 gift exchange added a wrinkle.  As per custom, my wife gave her mom some ideas for some gifts for her sister (my wife’s aunt).  Again, at this point I really don’t care about the proceedings.  It’s just the M.O. my wife and mother-in-law have worked out.  After weeks of discussion, they settled on the perfect gift.

And what gift did the decide on? Good question.  Apparently, they are giving my wife’s aunt a family photo session to get a new family portrait taken.  Cool, right? Well…yes and no.  The photographer they chose was me.

It’s not that I don’t mind taking photos for family.  Quite the contrary, I love taking photos.  It’s just that I’m not confident that I can live up to others’ expectations.  I’m not a professional photographer. I’ve only had my DSLR for 2 years and I’m just now feeling comfortable with doing the manual settings.

Monday night was the photo shoot.  I shot about 100 photos in a 30 minute window.  I think I got about 15 solid shots, but I still need to print the proofs at Costco or Sam’s Club to see how they turned out.

I did get one shot I liked: one of the header photos for this site.  It’s the one with a sign that reads, “#2 Tee —>.”

Oh, and I earned points with the mother-in-law and big points with my wife.  Well done, sir! Thanks.