Our first born, bearer of our many firsts, now our first teenager. Too cool for school, beyond his years, no. His height might confuse many but he’s still just a silly kid inside.
Tagged: birthday, childhood, Lucas, photography
Our Everyday
Sharing our stories, big and small.
Posts tagged “childhood”
This was the moment I held you for the first time. After hours of labor, some small panics and too many doctors you were measured, cleaned and swaddled and placed into my arms. You were crying so I sang “Dream A Little Dream of Me”, a song I had been singing to you in utero. You instantly calmed down and tried to open your eyes to see me. This was the moment.
Tagged: birthday, childhood, family, Lucas, photography
Lucas took his first hip hop class during a summer camp when he was 5. He was hooked. He started dancing competitively at 10. And by competitively I mean a whole lot of rehearsal, a whole lot of practice, a whole lot of time and seemingly very little performance. To be honest I didn’t really get it. Dance was expensive, required long hours and while he was having fun I questioned the whole dance racket. He had the opportunity to attend conventions and competitions that exposed him to world-renowned choreographers and different styles of dance but I wondered how much he was getting out of all of it, did he love dance or just love hanging with his friends?
Lucas performing in his first season, age 10
Tagged: childhood, competition, dance, photography
If I lived in a gingerbread house every day would be sugar-coated, the smell of cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger would waft through the house filling my soul and satisfying my taste buds and my neighbors would all have impeccable taste creating a healthy competition in seasonal landscaping. Each night when I would sleep the skies would fill with gum drops and each morning when I would wake fresh snow would fall. I would believe that everything is possible, that dreams come true and all mankind is inherently good because I live in a gingerbread house, after all.
Tagged: canon, childhood, family photography, photography
Each year we celebrate Halloween as a family. This year was bittersweet as four of the cousins will be graduating high school in June and may not make it back home next year for our annual tradition. We’ll make our memories whenever and however we can.
Tagged: childhood, Halloween, photography
He’s been begging for months to go camping. The weather, logistics, sheer effort stalls us. Anthony offered backyard camping and to our surprise he was appeased, as long as they slept in the tent all night. How we take for granted the incredible power we have, to be able to give our child his heart’s desire.
Tagged: camping, childhood, photography
Tagged: birthday, childhood, parenthood, photography
I made a human.
Three actually.
By the grace of God and biology my body coddled and nurtured a human being, releasing it from my womb at the moment it could breathe air.
But my job was far from done.
Breathing alone wasn’t enough to sustain life.
Things like eating and burping and sleeping in the exact right quantities needed to be tended to. Each miraculous milestone followed by the anxiety of achieving the next.
After they learned how to not spit up their meal I needed to focus on things like reading and puberty and social dynamics and politics and being conscientious and being kind and being a good friend and not over-eating and under-sleeping.
All of these little life skills taught over and over again.
With the constant, age old hope that they will be decent human beings. That they will raise another generation of decent human beings.
I am flawed.
How can I not pass on my flaws to my children? As inevitable as the tide and the sunrise.
The best I can do is laugh with them, own my mistakes and ask for forgiveness.
Oh and love them, with all my human being-ness. 
Tagged: B&W photography, childhood, Mexico, motherhood, photography, Sayulita, travel
God bless Oliver, a boy with wit, silliness and sincerity. Observant and inquisitive, noticing all the details that make him thoughtful and make him worry.
Tagged: childhood, faith, family, first communion, photography
Remember that time you blew out Oliver’s birthday candle? We had just finished singing “Happy Birthday” and before Oliver even knew what happened the candle was out. But I knew exactly what happened. With friends and family gathered around, with cameras rolling, this moment was documented forever. Look at Oliver’s and Penny’s faces, still waiting to blow out the candle that is no longer lit. But your face reveals your guilt. You were only five. Just a young child yourself. Unfair to ask you to be fair, unfair to ask you to be considerate of your baby brother, unfair to ask you to practice self-control. And look at my face, but worse, look at my hand. I have loved and hated this photo. I loved it for the honesty and realness of a mother in a moment of little patience with three children five and under and I have hated this photo because it captured me at my worst. Yet looking at this photo now as you turn twelve I have a different appreciation of this photo. Since the day you were born you carry our dreams and expectations. Your five was different than Penny’s five and Oliver’s five.
Tagged: birthday, childhood, family photography, Lucas, photography
