Which is cheaper? Join the Picture Plan or pay for college?

When they are babies we break out the video cameras and cameras to record every step-literally. I’ve been known to take pictures of the first poop in the potty because it is a big moment in our house when the diapers go away. Then the trips to the mall. During the day, the mall is full of moms pushing their strollers. So of course a very smart entrepreneur started picture stores to capitalize on our desire to capture those moments. They lure you in with a “free” sitting. We watch as they make our baby look like a rockstar, moving in the props like a big heart for Valentine’s Day or sit them in a pumpkin for Halloween. What we don’t realize is the elephant in the room comes out when it’s time to view the pictures.

Every picture is perfect and every sheet is $40. We work like Solomon trying to figure out what sheets to buy without having to mortgage the house. Some sheets are put aside, then creep back into the “I want it” pile. In comes the economical “Picture Plan”. For one easy payment of $75.00 you can get all your sittings for free and a free sheet with each sitting. What a bargain! On top of that you can even choose one extra sheet for signing up. We look at our little precious bundle of joy and know that we’ll be back several times so we gladly sign up for the picture plan. Skipping out of the store with our free sheets we’re already making plans for the next big occasion-like, Groundhogs day.

My plan the next time around is to “take advantage” or the free sitting and only buy one sheet. $120 dollars later, I’m walking out in shock, holding only 4 sheets but sighing over the 5 “picture perfect” sheets I had to leave behind. I explain that the picture plan is an investment into our family history.

“How is this an investment?” He asks as he looks at a picture of our son in a bunny suit.

“Yes, when we are in our wheelchairs at the retirement home we’ll have these memories.”

“Maybe we can use this picture to blackmail him when he turns sixteen.”

Through the infant to toddler to preschool years I act like a fool every few months to get that perfect smile from my angels. I get pictures of them in toy cars, in toy pumpkins, in toy boats, holding bunnies, holding groundhogs, holding American flags. Then they go to elementary school.

Once they go to school all control is taken away from the parent. There’s no one there to get that perfect smile. The kids get in line down to a photographer who probably has a day job at the driver’s license bureau. No one has every had a good driver’s license picture. So the picture people at school hedge their bets.

“Pay before they take the picture?”

“Yes, this one gets money for my school.”

He points to the school package, “They take credit cards.”

Under forty bucks, I think about how many sheets that’d get me with the mall picture plan. “OK, I’ll get that one.”

Now I know why I had to pay in advance. The picture comes home and my son hands me my package proudly. He smiles at me with juice lips. My son looks like the joker, the fake smile the result of the cherry juice I sent in with his lunch-cherry juice! I look at the 5 sheets of pictures, the two bookmarks, several key chains, and a note that I could even turn it into stamps. I take the package and put it in the living room wondering how I’d been taken. Why didn’t someone take a second and get that joker smile off his lips?

When spring picture time rolls around and with it comes picture time.

“No, we’ll just sit this one out.” I say as my son hands me the prepayment envelope.

“Maybe this week we’ll dress you and your brother in the same clothes and go to the mall.” Another investment.

The picture people are ready for people like me, people who don’t pay. They figure that they’ll take the picture anyway and sent it home in a package and parents will buy because who can’t buy a little piece of their child’s history. My son came home with the super package after that picture. I look at the picture and his face is clean but I totally forgot it was picture day and my boy when to school with a Transformer T-shirt.

“We don’t need this picture, you know I’ve still got my membership in the picture club. I’d rather spend the money there and get a good picture.”

“But Mom, everyone is trading pictures today.”

“What?”

He pulls out all the wallet sheets and I see big holes on the sheet, holes where he went and cut the sheet up to give pictures to all of his friends including some of the larger pictures to friends on the bus. He pulls pictures of his classmates out of his pocket and I smile, I’m not the only one in this.

Next year, I’ll pay ahead of time and be the volunteer parent there wiping faces and smoothing hair. Don’t tell my husband I just renewed the picture club membership, always have a backup plan.