Over Exposed

We went to JC Penny's to get our Christmas picture taken. Frankly, I should have gotten the school nurse to take the pics...that is how bad the experience was

I should have know that these pictures were destined to be a failure. I had to go to 5 different stores just looking for a pair of white dress shoes for Audrey and could not find any, so ended up with silver. The dress that we had bought for Audrey, the only one that fit her, had a smudge on the front (we got a good discount for it) and it did not match anyone else's clothes. Saturday morn, I took the girls to get their hair done...that was a lot of fun, but the girl had quoted me $10 for each of their updos (even after she had seen Audrey's hair and told me it would be fine) but after it was all said an done she charged me $20 for Audge's hair.

The girl who took the pics clearly wanted to be somewhere else. She asked me what the pictures were for and I said that we were here for the family Christmas-pic...pretty straight forward. I guess I should have drawn a little diagram with stick figures so that she could understand better. She called the girls "you" and not once did she try to get them to smile, to pose them (I posed them) or give a flying whoot that we were even there. The only pic that turned out decent was lucky. She blamed Wes being so tall for her equipment not working (when she clearly had no idea what she was doing) she hit me on the head with one of the lamps and did not even say sorry. AHHHH!!! So we get done and are told to wait 15 minutes to see the pictures. 15 minutes pass...then 30 and then 40 and by this time I am seething. I go and ask when we can see our pics and am told that they are short staffed and that we are going to have to wait another 40 minutes to an hour. My voice started going up exponentially and that is when the manager screamed out that they would give us two free sheets. I thought, ok, I have a coupon for no sitting fee (because hell would of frozen over before I paid $40 for that photo session) and a free 8x10...that is 3 free sheets. Alright, we will walk down to the bookstore and wait.

We get back and the same girl (I will not call her a photographer because she isn't) shows us the pics on the computer. She took 25 shots and they had made a few of them into those special fancy sheets that cost more money and those were the only ones she showed me...I asked where the originals were. She pulled up the pics and only ONE of the family pictures were even on the screen. Her Manager had gotten rid of the rest because they were so lousy. I had steam coming out of my ears. I kept telling her "I need a minute, I need to talk to my husband" and she just stood there like I was speaking Russian. So I grudgingly decided on a couple of pics for my free sheets, and was told I could not have them because they were special sheets and were excluded. I wanted to just walk out but we had spent so much money just getting everything for the pictures that I was not going to walk out empty handed. Then low and behold the girl's cell phone goes off...I am in the middle of asking her a question and she tells me to be quiet and tells the other person that she is supposed to be off and she is trying to get out of there. I looked at her and told her to go and get her Manager and leave. Good Riddance!!! That was probably the highlight of the whole experience.

(I did call and complain to JC Pennys customer service. They are sending me a coupon for two free sheets and a free photo session. Yippee:P)

So we had a major dilemna: we still needed Christmas pics and didn't want to pay anyone to do them. We didn't want to drive two hours to the good photographer, so if you want something done right, do it yourself. We got home and took pics of the girls and then our neighbor came over and took our family pic which turned out FABULOUS!!! I can not post any on this blog because that will ruin the Christmas card but here is a good pic of me.