Shoes

I know that every single parent has done a lot of soul searching in the last week. No one ever wants to have to do this kind of soul searching for this reason, but the reality is it happened. The soul searching is a way of dealing with the unthinkable and trying to wrap our brains around it as best we can. I've failed miserably with making sense of it because quite honestly, there is no SENSE in any of it. NONE. No matter what "reasons" are uncovered there is simply no sense behind this kind of madness. On the Friday that the Sandy Hook Tragedy happened I was getting ready to go to MN and I was just too busy to allow myself to think about it too much. I talked about it with some friends at a Christmas party Friday night and on the drive to MN is when it really sank in. I had way too much time to think and the one image that kept coming back to me was this little pair of sneakers. These are Myles' new shoes. I purchased and took back 2 other pair of shoes before getting these ones because they just didn't seem right. Silly, but true. When he put these little shoes on he was SO EXCITED that they were "Kentucky Blue". The very first thing he did was run a crazy, silly lap around our house and then climb the stairs and jump down with a little air kick in there. They were THE ONES! Now, I'm not much of a crier when it comes to things I read or see on TV and honestly it wasn't until I thought about these little shoes that I lost it. Just lost it.  I bawled thinking about how horrendous it would be to have to go to his school and to see these sweet little shoes and to know that they wouldn't be doing any air kicks off my stairs or to jumping up and down with excitement at the littlest things in life that delight him. I cried at the idea that there were 20 sets of parents whose little babies' shoes would not be sitting at their dinner table that night. It sank in that now that I'm a parent and I "get" how AMAZING life is and what a gift it is, that I can't EVER allow myself to think of my baby harmed or in any other state than their vibrant sweet self. I just can't allow my mind to go to that place so those sweet shoes are the closest I can get.
It really has made me think about my role as a mom. I KNOW that as much as I want to say that I'll cherish every second with my kids I know this isn't realistic.  I'm not perfect and there will be days when I mess up. I don't want to set unrealistic goals for myself so I decided  to make a promise to myself to document my kids' joys even better than I have been. The one thing I find myself doing is "censoring" what pictures I keep because typically I look terrible and I don't want my kids to remember me looking as rough as I really do look. :-) Joys of motherhood right? In the process though I'm forgetting a lot of the really FUN stuff we do. So from now on please accept my apologies for how we look, but we are too busy making sweet memories for me to stop and do my hair and makeup. :-) Here are the first two uncensored pictures....
In the mean time I will be thanking God for the ability to take goofy pictures with my babies and that those sweet Kentucky blue shoes are still running through my house. Thank you God!

Enjoying the best movie night ever!! Natalie sat and watched almost half of the movie and Myles ate his weight in popcorn.

 Maybe the worst picture I've EVER posted of myself, but we were dancing our little hearts out to Christmas music and her face shows just how much fun we were having. I don't want to forget these joyous moments because they seem to fly by was too fast!