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Last year my oldest son started Kindergarten.  I was excited for picture day, and made sure he was looking especially cute when I sent him off to school, since the most inexpensive package of photographs was $35 (plain slate background, an 8×10 and some smaller ones to give friends and family).  You can’t just buy an 8×10 – and the copyright restrictions don’t allow you to make copies of them anyway, legally.  So my cheapest option was $35.

The pictures came back a couple weeks later and they were really great.  I loved them and figured it was money well spent!  Four months later, I check my son’s bag for homework and notes and find another envelope of photographs – taken a different day!  These were “look before you buy” pictures – apparently his school had a second picture day.  They do one in the fall and one in the spring.  This set of pictures was even BETTER than the first!  Plus, I already had them in hand, how could I resist?  I ended up writing another check for $45 – because this package was bigger and included stickers of his smiling mug shot.

My son started soccer last year.  At the end of the soccer season, they took soccer pictures.  We spent another $8 to get him standing with his soccer ball and then one of him and the team together.  He also played his first year of little league baseball… and you guessed it!  They took photos of him at bat and another with his team, and I spent another $8 to get those!! 

All of these photographs were from his Kindergarten year at school – $96 in photographs to be exact.  I realize I didn’t have to buy all of them, but as the photographers know, it’s really hard to resist – especially the package that they send you the photos BEFORE you have to pay!

This year, I wanted to get some photographs of my two children together, since we really didn’t any other than the snapshots I take around the house.  We decided to give Wal-Mart a try.  Their Picture Me Studios are all-digital, and that meant everytime the photographer snapped a photo, I got to preview it instantly on the screen and decide whether to keep it or take another one of the same pose.  We took about 28 pictures in the space of an hour (they do at least 7 different poses).  You can walk out of Wal-Mart with an 10×13, an 8×10, two 5x7s, five 3.5x5s, sixteen wallets and eight keepsakes of the same pose.  This gives you one for yourself, one big one for grandparents, two 5×7′s for other close family members, five 3.5×5′s to frame and give as gifts, wallets and keepsakes for friends.  That’s a steal.

Of course, don’t be surprised if you end up buying some of the other poses and building a more expensive package, since you know they’re all going to be gorgeous!