They Grow Up So Fast!

I recently read From the Mixed up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler.  It's basically My Side of the Mountain for inner city kids.  In the book, a character references people who take so many pictures to show everyone what a good time they had that they essentially forget to take the time to HAVE a good time.  I won't lie, I've had this thought plenty of times.  Usually as I watch guiltily while someone else snaps away.  I just. can't. make. myself. do it.

However, I do recognize that it's my own guilty way of justifying my terrible habits.  So that I can explain to my children someday that we were so busy having a great time (ahem...) that we just couldn't stop to take a picture.  So, recognizing that this was pretty lame, I set a goal to do better.  You wouldn't know it by the results, but I really tried.  Luckily, smartphones provide an opportunity for all to be photographers.  Including my children.  And what we lack in quality, we make up for in quantity.  So, after searching through the 4000 + photos on my iphone (and yes, I really do mean that), it turns out we actually do have a record of our lives.

For example, this fall, we took the family on a haunted hayride.  Translation: one person in a mask jumped out of the cornfield and scared the daylights out of us while we rode by on a hay-wagon.  Luckily, someone offered to take a picture for us.

Hmmm...  We also celebrated Halloween.  Oh, wait, I have no proof.  But we DEFINITELY carved pumpkins.  Sans one sleeping baby.

And thanks to a particularly nasty sickness we were all passing around, I cooked my first Thanksgiving (mostly) solo.  Let's take a picture!  Of the post-inferno yam pan, at least.

They were delicious anyway.  They say on average, a household has a kitchen fire once a decade.  We're just doing our part to keep up with the statistic.  And yes, we're still checking the fire alarms!  We also celebrated New Years Eve.  Eastern time.  It is our annual tradition.  As you can see from the photo, unbeknownst to us, Elias didn't keep with the rest of the tradition, which is to pass out on the couch, drunken only with our own exhaustion.  And completely miss the celebration in our own time zone.

As you can clearly see, I have been sincerely trying to capture the significant moments of our lives.  Now for a bit of the insignificant, because that's where the real and interesting moments lay.

 

Despite having to scroll daily through 200 new close up pictures of someone's eyeball, I hope that they continue to capture these moments so that we can remember what it was really like.  The good, the bad, and the really really strange.  Keep your fingers crossed!