This entry was posted on Monday, October 6th, 2008 at 7:19 pm and is filed under Feelings, Friends, Pictures, Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
I started reminiscing the other day about how quickly the girls are growing up. It seems like every day they’re into something new, a little taller, or talking about what they did so many years ago. Looking through our pictures - we have slightly over 27,000 in the last four and a half years - brought tears to my eyes from laughter and joy. Seeing their faces and remembering is an amazing experience and one that I hope to relive over and over again. Here, and in their gallery, I am sharing these photos for you in hopes that you will also get some of the joy and laughter from your own experience with these kids.
Of course, looking through these pictures allowed me more than a minute to reflect and I decided to grab a few of my favorites from their early years (some of Sofi at a year so that they could both be in them) and put them up into their Gallery and in this post. There are so many that it was difficult to decide which ones, but it was a heck of a lot of fun looking through them. I alo tried to put some in of our family and friends (with our children) in hopes that they too might take a moment to reflect what we and our children have brought into their lives. (I wonder how many of you can name each of them correctly.)
Some of you will see the changes that I see in these photos, too. You’ll see our looks have changed, our weight may have changed, and certainly our hairstyles have changed, but what you can’t easily see is how we have changed inside. In the photo above, for example, I am cutting the Natalie’s umbilical cord. While it may sound silly, I was too afraid when we had Sofi and I wouldn’t do it. She seemed so small and fragile, and frankly I was aftraid that after all we’d been through to have her a part of our lives I didn’t want to break her before the experience even began. One year (and ten days) later I didn’t want to miss the experience or the opportunity to be that close to my daughter, Natalie. I saw it simply as my part of bringing her into the world (in addition to the conception, of course).
I’ve tried really hard to make this blog a sharing of my life and experiences, without including too many of my views on parenting, but frankly they’re very difficult to separate. Even now I’m looking back thinking, wow, we did so much with our children. So many things that many parents seem to avoid. We took them out early after birth, we shared them with our friends and family - having anyone over that wanted to see what we made - and we put them into these weird postures and poses so that we could take their picture. Of course, Farmber Bob (Sofi) on the tractor was happier than we were at getting to “ride” around in Sears. Mind you, the tractor didn’t move, but after 8 hours on the road heading to Oregon it was a hoot just to be out of the car, and I think she appreciated it, too.
Of course, with Halloween on the way, we’ve done our share of goofy things, too, and I’m sure our children will have some “our parents are so weird they…” experiences in their life. Hopefully, like we’ve come to appreciate ours, they will come to appreciate these things as what makes us family and as simple representations of our parental love expressed. Simply - that’s what so many of these things are for me. They are simply ways that I can express my love and thanks for all they have given me.
Papa
October 10th, 2008 at 8:27 pm
You are the BEST Papa in the whole wide world!!!
We love you!!!!!
Sofi and Natalie
(and Mama too!)