Those Pajama's...You mean the skeleton ones?

Every year my dear friend and neighbor Marci and I oohh and ahhh over the holiday PJ's way before it is even okay for them to be out in stores. We exchange emails with links, discuss coupon codes, and whip out the debit cards months in advance in order for our little darlings to match. We eagerly await our packages, call each other when they arrive, and then burrow the PJ's deep in the drawer until the perfect moment arrives.

I know that some aren't the matching type, and usually Marci isn't either, but if there is one thing she gives into my matchy matchiness on, it is these cute holiday jammies. And, you see she has willingly allowed me to torture our kids for my pure picture pleasure every Halloween & every Christmas since the big ones were born.

And...every year there is a day or night planned, an ideal time and location, and the expectation that the kids will sit, smile, and make it easy. However, it has NEVER gone that way. The kids move, they cry, and they do everything they possibly can to make it nearly impossible to snap one decent shot of the two, three, and now four of them. But, it doesn't really matter!

What I came to realize this year as the sun was setting too fast, the kids' stomachs were growling from the smell of the pizza that we were trying to bribe smiles out of them with, and all their little legs wanted to do was take off running across the neighbors lawn, was the fact that memories were being created. Sure, a picture with all four looking straight at the camera smiling was the task, but it was not the goal. The goal was for the kids to laugh, smile, hug, run, eat, and create lasting memories with each other!

And...you know what? You better believe that is exactly what these four friends did that night as they rocked their Halloween PJ's.