July 31 - August 7, 2010, Al and Karen treated their kids and grand kids to a vacation at Lake Michigan. Their were 18 of us and it was our first vacation together. We had so much fun enjoying the beach and the lake which happened to be the warmest it had been in twenty some years. Most days we followed the same routine...beach in the morning, pool in the afternoon, dinner together outside, beach after dinner, kids to bed, adults play cards until lights out...wake up and repeat with slight variations. I love routine so it was perfect for this gal.
I could share thousands of pictures from our vacation, but I will just share these few. I literally do have thousands however. My sister-in-law, Kristen, has an amazing camera, one that I someday hope to have once mine bites the dust. I LOVE photos. I LOVE memories and I believe that photos are such a great way to capture memories and pull them from your subconscious as you get older. I hope that this will prove true for my boys.
Whether it be pictures of Judah after his first bee sting, Jonah and Judah playing around in the sand at the beach in Michigan, watching the sunset in my lap, wearing daddy's swim caps and watching he and Uncle Danny train for their next triathlon in Lake Michigan...each memories is captured in these photos. I realize how much photos mean to me when I recognize that (besides my kids) the one thing that I would want to get out of my house if a fire were to occur would be the back up disks of all of my pictures. I am certain that pictures became more valuable to me after losing Zoe and Micah. I can look at my photo books of them and vividly imagine my time with them and those moments of connecting with those memories are incredibly special to me. So, I will keep taking pictures and keep asking my kids to smile at times when they would rather stick their hands in front of their faces...just for the sake of capturing memories.
These are my boys, loves of my life. They have been keeping me quite busy lately and quite entertained. They chase and wrestle one another and hug and cuddle. Judah thinks he is older than he is and therefore is constantly pushing the limits of his safety. Just this week he learned to "fall" in and out of his crib. Fortunately, he has yet to do it in the middle of the night. Jonah is literally growing up before my eyes. In less than a week, he actually begins preschool. He is completely potty-trained, drinks from big boy cups, wants to help make meals, has adult conversations, and now he is starting school. Boy, sometimes I desire for time to slow down and at other times, I am quite content with the new stages we are entering. I have recently comes to terms with the thought that our family is growing up and I kind of like it. It is nice to not have to plan as much around nap times and to know that I will not have to carry my kids as while if we go on an outing. Love today and Live today. I have always known that and I think I am understanding it more and more.
