Ugly Betty
If I hadn't been there myself, I never would have believed Kristen when she told me about it. Saturday, I met Kris, Josh and Jackson at the mall where they had an appointment to have a couple of family pictures and portraits of Jackson taken at the Sears picture studio. I hope that the Sears business model does not hold out any hope for repeat business because nothing that happened during the three hours that we were there would be worth returning for. And that's not a typo; we were there for three hours.
To help get things kicked off right, another customer dropped a bag off on the bench next to us that we only noticed when Josh started to smell it. Yup, some guy just left a dirty diaper sitting next to us. We watched his bad kid climb all over everything in the store and run wild, telling Jackson that he would never be allowed to act that way. When that family finally left, the dad came over and picked up his dirty diaper. Don't worry, buddy, we were happy to watch that for you.
Manager Betty finally called us back to her little studio to begin taking pictures. They started out with some family photos and it quickly became apparent that Betty was A-not very good with kids and B-rude. I don't think she understood that you can't just tell a baby to smile and hold his head at a certain angle. She missed taking so many good photos because she wasn't paying attention or "wasn't ready yet." Maybe she thinks of herself as the next Annie Leibovitz or Anne Geddes but I've got a newsflash for her.
We moved on to just pictures of Jackson, but Betty kept stopping to rearrange Jack's outfit or futz with the background. Almost every time he smiled, she missed it and wouldn't take any pictures of him not smiling. If she did manage to accidentally get a picture of Jackson smiling, she would say, "Oh, his mouth is too round." At one point, I know Josh and I were both thinking that we could take her out and take the pictures ourselves. She wouldn't even do the pictures that Kristen asked her to do.
By this time, Jack had had enough and was ready for a nap so we decided to get some sleeping baby photos. Once he was asleep, Betty kept trying to rearrange him, so that his arm was in a different position or his butt was higher or his head was turned. She even asked Josh to pick him up and turn him around. Sleeping baby, not baby doll.
Jack couldn't sleep through all of the poking and prodding so we got a few more photos when he woke up and then called it quits. While we were dressing Jackson and packing up, Betty was reviewing the photos on a television monitor. Just as Kristen and I said "Oh, that's cute, we really like that," she deleted it! When we asked her why, she said we were only allowed to have one of each pose to pick from. She tried to tell us that she took "a lot" of pictures of Jackson and she normally doesn't take that many. I'd hate to be part of a session where she didn't take very many because I felt like I could have taken 4-5 times as many in the same period of time. She missed so many good photos.
We stepped out of the studio to walk over to the computers and review the pictures, but it took Betty another 30 minutes before she was ready to join us. Kristen and Josh finally got to look at the product of all of that torture and pick the pictures they wanted. Jackson and I took a little trip to the bathroom to change a stinky diaper, and when we came back Betty was still being as pleasant and helpful as she was when we left. As we were (finally) leaving another family was arriving for their session. I wanted to tell them to get out now while they still had a chance.
They did get some cute pictures of Jackson, but then again, I've never seen a picture of the kid that wasn't cute. Here are two of my favorites:
To help get things kicked off right, another customer dropped a bag off on the bench next to us that we only noticed when Josh started to smell it. Yup, some guy just left a dirty diaper sitting next to us. We watched his bad kid climb all over everything in the store and run wild, telling Jackson that he would never be allowed to act that way. When that family finally left, the dad came over and picked up his dirty diaper. Don't worry, buddy, we were happy to watch that for you.
Manager Betty finally called us back to her little studio to begin taking pictures. They started out with some family photos and it quickly became apparent that Betty was A-not very good with kids and B-rude. I don't think she understood that you can't just tell a baby to smile and hold his head at a certain angle. She missed taking so many good photos because she wasn't paying attention or "wasn't ready yet." Maybe she thinks of herself as the next Annie Leibovitz or Anne Geddes but I've got a newsflash for her.
We moved on to just pictures of Jackson, but Betty kept stopping to rearrange Jack's outfit or futz with the background. Almost every time he smiled, she missed it and wouldn't take any pictures of him not smiling. If she did manage to accidentally get a picture of Jackson smiling, she would say, "Oh, his mouth is too round." At one point, I know Josh and I were both thinking that we could take her out and take the pictures ourselves. She wouldn't even do the pictures that Kristen asked her to do.
By this time, Jack had had enough and was ready for a nap so we decided to get some sleeping baby photos. Once he was asleep, Betty kept trying to rearrange him, so that his arm was in a different position or his butt was higher or his head was turned. She even asked Josh to pick him up and turn him around. Sleeping baby, not baby doll.
Jack couldn't sleep through all of the poking and prodding so we got a few more photos when he woke up and then called it quits. While we were dressing Jackson and packing up, Betty was reviewing the photos on a television monitor. Just as Kristen and I said "Oh, that's cute, we really like that," she deleted it! When we asked her why, she said we were only allowed to have one of each pose to pick from. She tried to tell us that she took "a lot" of pictures of Jackson and she normally doesn't take that many. I'd hate to be part of a session where she didn't take very many because I felt like I could have taken 4-5 times as many in the same period of time. She missed so many good photos.
We stepped out of the studio to walk over to the computers and review the pictures, but it took Betty another 30 minutes before she was ready to join us. Kristen and Josh finally got to look at the product of all of that torture and pick the pictures they wanted. Jackson and I took a little trip to the bathroom to change a stinky diaper, and when we came back Betty was still being as pleasant and helpful as she was when we left. As we were (finally) leaving another family was arriving for their session. I wanted to tell them to get out now while they still had a chance.
They did get some cute pictures of Jackson, but then again, I've never seen a picture of the kid that wasn't cute. Here are two of my favorites:
Somewhere during all of the waiting, we had a conversation about baby dreams and whether or not it was possible to have a nightmare when you don't have any experiences and didn't know what to be afraid of. Well, Jackson knows now to be afraid of picture studios. I hope he doesn't have any bad dreams about Manager Betty.
Comments
I was hoping you would have posted to your site! ha!!!! :)
Suzan