How to Shop Your Closet For Family Picture Outfits | Whitney Beth Photography
 

First off, my husband and family are the real MVP’s of this - being that we litterally just took extended family pictures about 3 weeks ago. But when I heard that the Mantua poppies were in bloom, I accidentally planned out our little family pictures in the shower on a Tuesday with the session taking place in two days on a Thursday. With that in mind, Amazon was going to be too slow, and the fact that Covid is a thing now I was going to have to shop our closets for coordinating outfits that not only matched each other, but the location. 

I mean, you can't blame me, right?

1. Pick the pickiest person’s outfit first

Usually I pick what I want to wear first because lets be honest - I care more about these pictures than the rest of my crew. But in this case, I wanted to really shmooze Danny and make it a more enjoyable for him, so I let him pick out what he wanted to wear and went from there. 

2. Pull out every possible outfit for everyone

This may seem like a hassle and a lot of work, but it works every time. Now that I have the one constant and “for sure” outfit to base the rest of your clothes off of I go through everyone’s closets and pull out all possible matches. I even pull things out that I wasn’t even thinking of.

3. Lay them all out

I group them together based on who they will be worn for and take a step back. After looking at them all together I start pulling away outfits that won’t work.

4. Keep taking away outfits 

Keep on editing out looks and outfits until you are left with two solid options. In this case I was left with these two groupings; a more neutral look with my cream dress and solid colors for the boys, or a bit busier dress that would not only match my boys, but pull red from the poppies. 

Ultimately I went with the more neutral option. I liked the way that dress fit me better than the flower print one. My one hesitation with picking the neutral outfits was that was what Fields and I wore for my mother's day pictures. But since Danny and Jones were different and we'd be in a different scenery, I didn't mind. 

Special thanks to my sister, Makayla who got up with us early so that she could be our human tripod. We ended up leaving just before 5:30 am and arrived around 6:30 am. It was perfect light and we had the entire field to ourselves! Relatively unheard of for these poppies. I love our pictures and am SO happy with our outfit choices. Just goes to show you, you don't need to buy all new clothes to have amazing pictures! (I'll share more pictures when I get a second to edit them, until then, here's the cute frame that caught my attention.)