I wanted to peek out from behind my desk and hundreds of files I want to edit (today! ok, this week!) to say hello. The quietness on the blog means I've been scurrying around in these cold months happily photographing babies and weddings.
When I'm not behind the camera with a client, I'm amazed at E's transformation to a little girl. One day, around New Year's, she just started talking. A lot.
Friends that hadn't seen her for a few weeks could suddenly understand her and she all of a sudden loved their attention. How do things like this happen over night?
I'd like to remember the phrases ("doe-doe bad; no eat poop." Ahem. Yes, she remembers when our dog Chester found her diaper and Mama gagged for an hour.), the frilly pink skirt she suddenly loves, and how many times a day she asks, "Mama hold you". Pronouns are still confusing.
These are the small, lovely moments of my days.
They aren't productive or clean and I now get why mountains of laundry is a common phrase among authors who write to moms. ;)
I've had to go back to a few friends and apologize for disappearing for a month or two. The calendar and to-do lists calling from within my (rather close together) four walls loomed large around the holidays. It's ok to have busy times, but I look back and see I threw away the things that usually are built in to my days to keep me sane and grounded, and I felt it.
I usually treasure the first few weeks of January as slow times to purge the house, read, drink tea, clean up a bit - you know, hit reset. Those slow weeks are coming a little late for me this year, but I'm more sure than most years that I need it.
Those friends didn't go anywhere (do they ever? It's why they're the good ones.) and I'm grateful for them and to have some dates on the calendar to see them and a little more bandwidth to get over the hurdle and start regaining control of my mornings.
So, here's to January! To new beginnings, good friends, amazing (and wise, generous, caring) grandparents, to times of prayer, to growing as a person and a photographer, and to living with a looser grasp on things I can't really hold on to anyway.
How are you? What are you looking forward to in this new year?
A friend of mine had this verse written under the brim of a favorite baseball cap in college: "...his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning...".
Wishing you joy in 2016 and new mercies every morning. xo.
