I posted a couple of weeks ago about choosing a great location for your session. But what I didn’t tell you about that day was the adventure that the Little Man and I went on. See, I hadn’t been to this location before. It may be old hat to others around here, or a place that you wouldn’t necessarily think of for portraits. And that’s exactly why it was perfect.
New places, especially with children, inspire such a raw and beautiful curiosity about them. There’s such a desire to seek out the cool parts of this new place. Discover what makes it interesting.
I didn’t tell Little Man where we were going that afternoon. Just that we were going for a drive and were going to end up at a big park :: that we were going on an adventure. He fell asleep on the drive, and when he opened his eyes, we were nearing our destination and had to cross the river. Literally, tires in the water. (It was shallow…promise, Mom.) Little Man’s eyes opened up REALLY wide and asked why we were in the water. With fear in his voice. I said it was OK and part of our adventure. He asked again. “Momma, are we getting out of here soon!?”
I convinced him after we parked that we weren’t in the water anymore. He got out of the car…and quickly stated, “you said we were going on an adventure. This is our adventure? Where’s the park?!” Oh. OK. Good luck selling him on this one.
He quickly warmed to the idea that there weren’t swings or a slide nearby. That we were going to create our own adventure. I taught him how to skip rocks. Make “Witches’ Brew” in the shallow pools of the creek bed by stirring up the dirt and rocks at the bottom. We climbed on the rocks. We listened to the rush of the water as it moved downstream. We saw little schools of tiny fish dart from one shaded area to another. Traced our fingers along the bare wood remnants of Box Elder bug trails.
And he talked about our adventure for days after. Asked when we were going on another one. Now…if the weather would just cooperate. 
by Cathy
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