embrace the camera: may 24th

I persuaded them all to sit still for a minute…

And E was happy to hang out with me a little longer, batting her eyes at the camera:

She has a lot more patience when Mama wants to get her shutterbug on.

I am loving these late-spring days, sun-drenched and perfect. We are outside every possible minute…and the kids are happier, and I breathe more deeply–and actually sit down sometimes. And I carry my camera around; sometimes I get a few pictures, and sometimes I have to set it aside to mediate disputes over buckets and sand shovels and tricycles. But even so, life feels better in our back yard in the spring. I’ll keep carrying my camera, trying to catch the memories when I can.

the boys, right now

I love this picture because sports are not currently C’s strongest suit–but in these long summery afternoons he has several times toted out the baseball tee and gone to work practicing his swing, entirely unprompted by me. That determined expression tugs at my heart. He is radically, mind-blowingly good at some things (like constructing intricate Lego projects) and then some things are hard. But look at him try. This picture makes me proud, and hopeful.

I love this expression, too. Those are B’s “super-fast shoes”. When we were trying on shoes at the store, B preferred a garish pair and the salesman (an old hand, obviously) asked me which I preferred and then proceeded to point out that my chosen pair were clearly the very fastest of them all. B was utterly convinced and now approaches everyone (friends, babysitters, even amenable-looking strangers) and announces, “I have super-fast shoes.” I have to issue an ultimatum to get him to wear sandals instead. It looks like we’ll be seeing a lot of these shoes this summer.

Unlike their sister, these boys can barely stand to be still long enough for me to take a picture. By the time I have my camera settings figured out, they’re long gone. It’s a rare moment when I actually capture the soulful eyes and shy smiles.

After a long, hard play, the way to these little boys’ hearts is through small chilled water bottles. We don’t normally have cold drinking water (by choice–I think it’s easier to drink enough water when it’s not cold), so this is a special summertime treat. Please don’t tell them about pop, okay? They think this is the best stuff known to man. Of course, they’re right.

Ahhhhh.

embrace the camera: may 10th

She was so cute yesterday, bopping around in her new bicycle t-shirt from Oma, with sparkles on the back pockets of her jeans and her ponytail nodding behind her, that I had to take a picture. And since I had actually taken a shower before 9 pm, it was something of an occasion–so I got in the picture, too.

The self-timer is magic for my kids. She was squirming and whining in the chair until the flashing light came on, and then she was mesmerized.

Her bunny was an absolute necessity for the photo shoot. We had to go and find him before she would even be coaxed into the chair. Never mind that bunny hadn’t been the flavor of the week for several weeks now; suddenly he was indispensable.

While I was fiddling with the camera, someone else arrived to join the fun:

Now she brought out her best grins:

I asked him to give her a hug:

Giggling at each other:

Then I asked her to give him a hug:

Her “hugs” involve closed eyes, a tender expression, and a head-first dive.

Everyone decamped soon after this, and I put the chair back just in time to avoid a scolding from Miss Neat and Tidy, who follows me around closing cabinet doors behind me and likes to pick up toys for fun. She had been quite concerned that I moved the chair in the first place. We have to watch our step around our little domestic princess. My mom will laugh over this, I’m sure, and tell me I’m getting what’s coming to me. We all thought I was neat and tidy–until E came along!

…

spring morning

Where am I going? I don’t quite know.

Down to the stream where the king-cups grow–

Up on the hill where the pine-trees blow–

Anywhere, anywhere. I don’t know.

Where am I going? The clouds sail by,

Little ones, baby ones, over the sky.

Where am I going? The shadows pass,

Little ones, baby ones, over the grass.

If you were a bird, and sailed up there,

You’d sail on water as blue as air,

And you’d see me here in the fields and say:

“Doesn’t the sky look green today?”

Where am I going? The high rooks call:

“It’s awful fun to be born at all.”

Where am I going? The ring-doves coo:

“We do have beautiful things to do.”

If you were a bird, and lived on high,

You’d lean on the wind when the wind came by,

You’d say to the wind when it took you away:

“That’s where I wanted to go today!”

Where am I going? I don’t quite know.

Why does it matter where people go?

Down to the wood where the blue-bells grow–

Anywhere, anywhere. I don’t know.

…

–”Spring Morning” by A.A. Milne, from the poetry collection When We Were Very Young. 

Milne’s poems have always sounded to me like the voice of childhood. I read them and think, “Yes–that’s how it felt.” I had forgotten, and then I read and remember.

I read this one to my children while they ate lunch on the deck yesterday, armed with baseball caps and water bottles, and thought these seemed the right words to pair with the pictures of our spring morning. Though I may feel that life is swirling, I hope they will remember days like these: pigtails with a backwards cap and a flowery purse, trips up a climbing rope, poking around together for bugs in the dirt, B’s first voluntary and successful trip on both his tricycle and his bike (at last…), and the endlessly fascinating way a roly-poly curls up at the prodding of a little finger.

That’s where I wanted to go today.

embrace the camera: may 3rd

We actually managed to get a little picture of the two of us at Easter!

…

easter 2012

On Easter Sunday I set out to get some pictures of the family.  I thought getting just a handful of good shots could hardly be impossible, right? Looking back over these pictures later, I laugh–both at my children’s inexhaustible store of non-picture-perfect expressions, and at my foolish optimism in thinking any other outcome likely.

200 pictures on my camera yielded a few cute ones; but I think the imperfection is lovely, too. The comic relief is another dimension of memories worth keeping. I imagine my children laughing over these pictures as adults, teasing each other about weird expressions and Mom’s fashion choices. Seriously, she made you wear that hat?! I hope they have that sort of relationship all their lives, and that joy in a shared history, goofy family pictures and all.

On the back porch swing at my parents’ house–where I used to perch with a book on balmy afternoons.

I could not get all three to smile at the same time.

She smiled…and they chose that moment to consult together.

Loving brothers…and skeptical sister.

One great smile, one pensive look, and one evaluating her exit strategy.

At last–the shadow of a smile on E’s face.

This is the best family shot we could muster. B was talking (no surprise there), C was thinking about something, and E was yelling. And her hat and dress were both askew.

Actually, this is representative of all their personalities. So maybe it’s the best family picture possible!

She was only standing still because she was being shy with my parents’ kind neighbor who came over to take a group picture. (I promise I fixed her hair. Those wispy little locks defeat me.)

The Easter gathering: it wouldn’t be complete without a Cardinal hat.

After lunch the kids raided their Easter baskets: pinwheels!

And noisemakers! They sound like the dying croaks of very sick animals, but the kids love them.

Puppets!

E roaring like a lion. She looks quite dainty, but she produces a tiny guttural growl and it is very serious business.

The boys proceeded to run back and forth across the yard and up and down the sidewalk, clambering up the hill in the front yard and then tearing off again.

B navigating the underbrush…

And giving me his ladykiller face.

…

Holidays are never perfect. This morning I read a post about another family’s also imperfect Easter; and I was struck by her point that holidays seldom turn out as we expect, and we then tend to dwell not on what we can love in that moment but on what we thought it would be. I know I am guilty of this. These high and holy days never look quite as I imagined. The pictures aren’t heart-stopping. I forgot my daughter’s diaper cover. (Yes–classy.) Food is spilled. The afternoon goes by too fast. Children have the audacity to argue and complain on Easter.

This year there was a bigger imperfection–a new hole. For the first time my brother was not just absent from our table, as sometimes happened on holidays, but absent from this life.  This is not as it should be, as it would be in my head or as it was meant to be when the world was made. The past year has been heavy with this and other losses, with deaths and griefs. Holidays bring us together, and they also bring up the sore and empty, echoing spaces. I remember holidays from my childhood when the ideal image was marred: someone didn’t show up, someone stormed out, someone was far away behind bars and could not come. All that felt wrong–because it was wrong. That special day is just another slice of life, marred like the rest of it, but still sparkling, here and there, with something beautiful to remember.

And so I’m happy I have these pictures: signs of small good things, and reasons to laugh a little, and steps–I hope–in the right direction.

embrace the camera: april 26th

Somebody loves his daddy.

I love B’s suspicious gaze here. Those narrowed eyes slay me.

A handsome pair of boys.

 

because I want to remember…

Pigtails and shining eyes…

Peekaboo belly buttons…

Toothy grins and her favorite chair…

A fluffy bunny on her head…

Silver shoes (which she cried for at the store, and which she is now sporting with assorted Dora bandaids because the constant wearing of said shoes is blistering her little feet)…

Her imitating my photoshoot antics…

An adorably scraped nose…

Soulful eyes… (It’s tiring being so handsome, you know)

Brothers trying to figure out how to put their arms around each other…

Brown eyes and blue-gray…

The bedlam that ensues when I try to get another picture…

Dissolving in giggles…

The near impossibility of getting 3 pairs of eyes to look in the same direction at the same time…

And the utter certainty that at least one will be goofy–every time.

embrace the camera: march 29th

Somebody didn’t want to wait any longer for her pancakes…

She got out a plate and brought it over to the stove. “Right here, Oma! Put it right here! I want PANCAKES!”

I think she knows that when you are the third child, you don’t wait for things to come to you. You seize opportunity by the horns.

Oma is a third-born, too, so she takes it all in stride.

by hand with love

Four years ago, in the heart of a midwestern winter, I was piecing strips and squares of fabric together on my mom’s dining room table.

My second baby boy was due any day, and I knew I wouldn’t have the quilting finished for his birth, but I was confident it would be ready for his first birthday.

Last week, four years later, I pulled the last stitch taut, hid my knot under the binding, and snipped the thread. It was a work long in progress–but there is love in those stitches.

Here’s the whole quilt, spread out on my bed. I’m relieved that I still love the fabrics four years later!

The pattern is the same one I used for C’s quilt, and they have one fabric in common–a smoky blue printed with red umbrellas and rain boots.

The quilt is backed with a vintage alphabet print, from which I cut squares to show his initials–plus a random Y because I liked the yacht illustration. It turns out I should have picked a different letter, because B’s favorite part of this four-year labor of love is–wait for it:

…the letter T, which is (thank God) illustrated with a toy train.

He loves his quilt. At bedtime he wants it spread atop his other covers–reverse side up and with the top edge folded under so he can have ready access to his “T is for train” at all times.

Happy quilt day, my B. You are worth it–even if you do only like the back.