Picture day tears

So it’s picture day at my children’s school. Of course I want them to look nice – freshly bathed, teeth and hair brushed, no leftover breakfast on their sweet cherub faces… I also wanted them to wear something cute! For my 22-month-old daughter, I pulled a pink, orange and white outfit with a big orange bow for her hair. Darling! She was ecstatic to wear her favorite colors and couldn’t wait to get out the door.

For my four-year-old son, I grabbed a blue-striped button-up shirt with his favorite Cars T-shirt to wear on top. …Silly Mommy for thinking it would be so simple for my son!

When he saw the button-up shirt, he cried and cried – I’m talking giant crocodile tears streaming down his rosy little cheeks. It was terrible! You’d have thought his favorite cars had disappeared into a black hole. So I asked him what he preferred to wear and he said a green T-shirt. Ugg. Although I wanted him to wear a collared shirt, I definitely prefer a smile over a frown.

In the end, I told him that it didn’t matter what he was wearing for his picture – his sweet, happy face was what I really wanted captured in his school photo. Which is absolutely true.

Have you ever made your child wear something they didn’t want to, because you wanted them to look a certain way? What was the outcome?

Mandy Forbus is a Senior Marketing Specialist for Texas Health Resources and Mom of two.