Did This Really Happen????

Well, we made it through our first year of school with our first child.  Her school  held a precious kindergarten graduation ceremony.  It was one of those events that I could have cried ugly cry through, but instead I wrangled my one year old and four year old and tried to take pictures with my camera and my phone.  Plus, there were about 100 people in a small hot room.  Who has time for tears?

 Her teachers gave each child an award specifically tailored to that child's special gifts.  Libby got the Animal Enthusiast Award.  Her stories this year included but were not limited to feeding her pet seal after school each day and tending the pod of dolphins that live in our yard.  We're still working on the difference between a creative story and the truth.  She was so proud of her award.

 She was so proud of her diploma too.  Little did they know that the little boys in the background were up to no good.

 After the ceremony each graduate was given a balloon to release as a symbol of them moving forward.  Now you can call me a sentimental old fool, but do you remember her red star balloon that she lost all those years ago?  Of all the colors of balloons they had she got red!

 Shiny red star balloons are made for floating up.  That is what I told her when she was two.  I would tell her now that I love that she got the red balloon that is dong some kind of happy dance in the sky.

 I love that her balloon is the red shiny one to the right of the picture and that it is taking a path all on it's own.  There is just poetic symbolism all over that!

 I hope that she always goes her own way.  I hope that she is not afraid to be the one and only Liberty Rose that God created her to be.

 Milestones.  They keep rolling in and I keep acting surprised that she's not still in my arms.

 Here she is, all grown and finished kindergarten.

She's my favorite Libby in the whole world.
Precious girl.

Maybe I'll Think Of A Title By the Time I'm Done Writing

 Libby took these photos of herself today.  I love them.  I didn't even teach her about selfies and some how she manged to get these keepers.
Shoo-eee, life has felt busy lately.  Sometimes I feel like I need to care about either everything in the world or absolutely nothing.  Caring about everything in the world and nurturing our family leaves little time for silly little things like writing down my memories in a blog.  I want to care about this place though.  I love it and I hate it.  It is beautiful and it is painful.  The things I have written down here I can remember like they were yesterday.  Like that time that we ran with our daughter on the beach in Bude until the sun went down on her 2nd birthday. The things in-between have blurred in mind like they might have happened, but I can't be exactly sure.  For instance, I think that Maggie was 2 1/2 once, but I can't remember anything about her when she was 2 1/2.  How can that be?  Picking up where I left off seems daunting but I feel  like if I don't write this blog, I don't pick up our big camera and I think that it's important that we have these pictures.  I think that it is important that I take full advantage of these quickly passing days.

We didn't do much today but I decided to stop and take pictures of them playing, that is when Libby would share the camera with me.  We flipped the house upside down this weekend and made the kids a new play area.  They have been perched in their nook the last two days to avoid the lovely summer temperatures.

I love how delightfully little she looks in this picture.  

I don't know if I can keep this blog up anymore, but  I want to.  Maybe I can just come back every six months or so for a massive update.  I hope that I can. I  think that I can remember things like vacations and first days of school with out writing them down. Sitting in the sun with your baby brother and just being little I think this is the kind of thing I don't want to forget.

 Maggie was trying so hard to make her bed and Cooper was not helping one bit.
She knew I was watching her every move.  She knows how to get to me.  She knew that with the way the sunshine was streaming in I would find it nearly impossible to fuss at her for not making her bed.

. That's it.  I'm going to try to not care so much about everything and just try to write something.  Something has to better than nothing.

Grace and Peace
xoxo