Haldaman Family Portraits, 2011

When we go on vacation, we always try to get a picture of the whole family, having fun together (or at least pretending to). We managed to get a shoot in on Sunday night, before some of the boys had to go home for work.

You can see that we tried to match everybody within the "family groups" -- my youngest sister and her gang in white, my middle sister and her peeps in blue, my posse in green, and my parents in pink. Except my mom didn't have a pink shirt, so she's the outlier. Which is pretty much typical for her, anyway. (In a good way, always.)

We also did a semi-formal shoot on Thursday night with just my parents and the kids, everyone in white. It was a just a touch overcast and very humid that night, so the combination of the elements plus the lighting plus my general ineptitude made for slightly gauzy photos, but I like them. If I actually knew what I was doing, these pictures would have been amazing. (Also: not sure if you can tell, but my nephew is wearing a tiny little guayabera shirt with monkeys embroidered on it. ZOMG MONKEYS! Little boys' clothes are SO CUTE. Why oh why don't they make anything that cute in my size? Although I'd never rock it quite as hard as he does, the handsome little devil.)

I also got this picture of my parents on one of the balconies of the house, which is one of the best pictures that has been taken of my parents in the last 30-some-odd years. Are they not among the cutest parents ever? I hope my husband and I are that adorable after we've been married for almost 40 years.

Some other sub-family pictures that came out great. (I don't know where the nice photo of my little family is, but whatever, it isn't as lovely as these are, anyway.)

Totally gratuitous, but COME ON. Work it out, Miss Divalette! I miss when Shae was smaller and less attitudinal and she would sit still and pose for pictures for me. Experience leads me to suspect that Makayla won't do this for much longer, so we all took as many pictures of her as we could. Plus: hello, she's gorgeous. (I think this looks like a catalog picture. Baby sold separately.)

Caption for this one: Girls' Club, Class of 2011.

And all of the "biological" Haldamans, on the last day of vacation, which was also the nicest, weather-wise. Because of course it was.

Tomorrow: OUTTAKES! The silly photos are always the best. (A quick sample, via Instagram.)