The passport: Step 1
Do you have any idea how hard it is to get a 3-week old baby to pose for a photo that will be considered appropriate for an American passport? That was my task for the morning. We went to a photo shop in Basel that has been recommended by many American parents of babies because they have a reputation for knowing how to meet the American passport standards.
In order to get an American passport, the baby must be sitting up, with eyes open, both ears visible, and no hands/fingers in front of her face. Parents (or any other person) cannot be visible in the picture. So I sat on a stool with a white sheet covering me, Baby propped up in my lap, while the lady at the photo shop talked to Baby to get her attention toward the camera. That is not easy when she's only 3 weeks old! At first, she was sleeping, so we took off her socks and tickled her toes to try and wake her. As you would imagine, that meant she woke up crabby. None of those pictures turned out, so the photo lady suggested I go for a walk and come back later. We went to Starbucks where I fed Baby (public breast-feeding is getting easier by the day), and then rushed back to the photo shop while Baby was happy from eating, but not too sleepy from eating too much. On this second try, the photo lady snapped a bunch of good ones, but unfortunately a tiny bit of one of my arms is visible in the best picture, so they needed to work on cropping out my arm. We had both had enough for today, so we'll be going back to pick up the photo tomorrow.
Kirk has taken a million pictures of Baby since her birthday three weeks ago and I'm just thinking... wouldn't it be nice if the embassy just allowed us to use one of those?!
In order to get an American passport, the baby must be sitting up, with eyes open, both ears visible, and no hands/fingers in front of her face. Parents (or any other person) cannot be visible in the picture. So I sat on a stool with a white sheet covering me, Baby propped up in my lap, while the lady at the photo shop talked to Baby to get her attention toward the camera. That is not easy when she's only 3 weeks old! At first, she was sleeping, so we took off her socks and tickled her toes to try and wake her. As you would imagine, that meant she woke up crabby. None of those pictures turned out, so the photo lady suggested I go for a walk and come back later. We went to Starbucks where I fed Baby (public breast-feeding is getting easier by the day), and then rushed back to the photo shop while Baby was happy from eating, but not too sleepy from eating too much. On this second try, the photo lady snapped a bunch of good ones, but unfortunately a tiny bit of one of my arms is visible in the best picture, so they needed to work on cropping out my arm. We had both had enough for today, so we'll be going back to pick up the photo tomorrow.
Kirk has taken a million pictures of Baby since her birthday three weeks ago and I'm just thinking... wouldn't it be nice if the embassy just allowed us to use one of those?!
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