Thursday, November 5, 2009

Days of Old...

Alissa's working on a project about herself for school. As an aside, I don't understand why 10th graders are doing projects on themselves. What are they supposed to be learning - how to scrapbook? How to color, cut, paste? I don't think it's a worthwhile project, I think it's a waste of a 10th grader's time. (Another reason for us to move this summer, the high school here is just ridiculous.)

Anyway, for this project, Alissa needed pictures of herself from the past. Thankfully, we didn't leave our pictures in storage in Tennessee. The girls and I dragged out 8 boxes of photographs and proceeded to pour through them.

Boy did the memories pile in! Pictures I really hadn't looked at in years. Memories that were still in my heart and mind, but that hadn't been visited in a long time. Pictures of Alex and Alissa as babies. It's hard for me to remember some of those times, but seeing them in print brings the memories flooding back.

And wait until you see this picture of Alex. Abby was convinced that it was her - especially since she just wore that same dress last week! If I didn't know better, as their mother, I would easily mistake it for Abby as well. (I'll post some more of the old pictures later today...)

The major differences are Alex's bangs and the fact that Alex and Abby have different eyes. As a smaller child, Alex always had those dark circles under her eyes that Abby never had. (They seemed to have gone away as Alex has gotten older...)

I say this in practically every post, I guess because I am just dumbfounded. I don't feel any older, but my children are growing and blossoming before my eyes.

Too quickly.

I don't feel ready. I'm not ready for them to be young ladies. I'm not ready for them to not need me as much anymore.

I'm not ready for Alissa to be a grown-up. That happens in just 3 short years.

It's selfish. And I'm dealing with that. I will be as ready as I can be when the time comes.

Seeing these pictures makes me grateful for the family I have. Jon, the girls, and our extended families.

Family is everything. I'm so glad that I have never forgotten that, no matter what else has come our way.

1 comment:

RangersGirl said...

I have the family picture of you guys from when Alex was wearing that dress. Its up on my wall with all my family pictures. That was a great picture of the four of you. I can't believe everyone is as grown up as they are either....ahhhhhhh!