School Pictures.

I set aside a few minutes everyday to read my favorite blogs. It is becoming a habit and one that I believe is good for me. I know that may sound weird, but it is about the only alone time I get these days. I have to take it when I can get it.

I always read what Anne has to say despite the fact that I see her and her children at least two or three times a week. Yesterday she blogged about the twin's school pictures and I sooooo get what she had to say. People are annoying.

Her timing was also perfect because I picked up Ryan and Lilly's pictures yesterday too and I am so thankful someone was thoughtful enough to take pictures of them together. The photos are the first professional ones taken of them. I have been slack about this because Ryan usually screams at me and turns his head when I try to take his picture. Then to top it off, a couple of weeks ago we went to have church directory pictures made and it was a nightmare.

Oh, but these pictures are wonderful. The pictures capture my children's personalities perfectly. I want them all, even the one where Ryan has his eyes closed. Now, why would I want a picture of Ryan with his eyes closed? Because he's standing in the middle of the white background and he has on his jeans. He's got his hands in his pockets and he is slightly bent forward and his chin is tilted up and he's laughing. It's genuine and real. He's having fun. I don't know what the photographer did, but Ryan is loving it. So, it is not that the picture is all that great. It's not one that I would have made into a 16x20 and placed on a prominent wall in our home, but I want a copy for myself. I must have it so I can look at it in the years to come and be taken back to his childhood.

I am going to be one of those mothers that twenty years from now will pull out old photographs, artwork, baby clothes and other bits and pieces of childhood memorabilia that I have stored away. I will gather it around me as I sit in my quiet house, probably with a cup of coffee. I will reminisce about these days and wonder how it came to pass that my children are now on their own. I'll be caught off guard because it it will seem like it was only yesterday that they were my babies and needed me for everything. I'll long for moments like the ones captured in these photographs when I was their morning, noon and night.