First off, everyone needs to know that I am not a scrapbooker.
I would love to be but can not find the time or the creative energy to do such massive projects. They overwhelm me. My husband, I think, knowing this-- with the help of my kids, and a few other family members --made me a scrapbook for Christmas.
It is wonderful and I love it.
As I was flipping through it, I began to see a pattern. All of the pictures of me are pre-army wife or taken during R and R (EML). I am missing for a good five years in the photos. There are pictures of my kids, dogs, neighbors, family members, field trips, one of my daughter for every day that my husband was in Iraq the first time but very few of me. Heck even the picture on this website here is a self photo!
It saddens me that I am missing from our photo story during those times.
Years from now, I would love for my kids to see me interacting in the activities that we did.
For them to know that we still lived during deployments and that I could smile for them and the camera even when my world was chaos. My sister-in-law first recognized this when she was trying to set up something for me on the web that required a picture (not a dating site☺). I never really thought about it again until now.
I wish I had.
I know that they will recognize that I was behind the camera and preserving their faces for their father while he was away.
I know that they will have memories of the camera constantly clicking and me saying “One more for Papa.”
And I will now figure out how to work the timer on my camera. (If it has one?)
Take pictures, lots of them, even if they are self portraits.