1 Second...Every Couple of Days

Once upon a time, not very long ago at all, I didn't have an iPhone or any kind of smart phone. And still I fell in love with the 1SecondEveryday app when it was a Kickstarter project. This little app embodies so much of what I love---snapshots of everyday, memory-keeping and EASY.

In July 2014 I FINALLY got a smart phone, because we were moving and I needed Siri in a very real way. The power of being able to ask, "Directions home"  in a new town cannot be underestimated. 

It wasn't until I saw Elise Cripe's first 7-second video on Instagram that I remembered that Kickstarter idea I had loved. So I started 11 days into 2016, and there have been some weeks when I capture only one or two seconds. I let go of perfection and embraced capturing what I can. And I love it.

Golden Seconds from 2016 Part 1 from Deirdre Keating on Vimeo.

Tuesdays Unwrapped: a child’s handmade card

There are so many stories from our road trip to Chicago. So many gifts to savor from our time in the city and with family. Today I want to unwrap just one small one.

When my dad pulled into his garage on the drive home from my brother’s house after Thanksgiving dinner, I was struck by the sight of my mom’s handwriting on a pair of plastic drawers. One drawer was labeled Maria and the other Elizabeth. In March it will have been two years since my mom died, and so I have become accustomed to grief’s unexpected, spontaneous strikes. Surely I’d seen those drawers before, and Mom’s handwriting everywhere in Dad’s house, but that night, the sight left me breathless and tear-stained.

One of the tasks that nagged at Mom during her illness was sorting through old papers and she often talked about wanting to give each of her children a box of their papers that she had kept. She often asked me to come home to help with this task, but then, once I was there, would have no interest in it. I assumed these two plastic storage drawers held old class photos and birthday cards of my two sisters. I assumed I reacted to their sight because they brought to mind how my mom would doodle while on the phone, and her favorite doodle---a list of her children’s names.

So I didn’t go out to the garage with them in mind. I was looking for a ladle. But I opened one and found all the letters I had written my mother while in Russia. I’d never even thought of asking for them, and didn’t realize just how much I wanted them until they were in my hands. Thank you, Mom, for keeping them.

I also found this card.

 

I was in 2nd grade when I made it. My dad was in the hospital with an infection in his heart, the only time I can recall him ever missing work. I love so many things here---the random circle sticker, my rendering of him smiling in bed, my creative spelling, and the offering of a prayer (poor banished children of Eve, indeed) that I only half-knew so it concludes: the end.

Most of all, I love the back image:

People joke about the messiness of parenting young children, the mundane tasks, the bedtime sagas and endless questions. It’s much harder to describe the love fest. As a young girl I was in love with my dad, as I assume all daughters are. I needed him to be perfect and so he was.

Each of my sons went through a phase when they would ask me to marry them. When they’d hold my face in their small hands and whisper how much they loved me. Nolan is in that phase now, pausing at random times in our dashing through the loop to take off his mitten and ask me to plant a kiss on his palm. Sitting on my dad’s couch, I held Nolan on my knee while he threw his arms around my neck and laughed in-between kissing my cheeks. My dad was sitting next to me and he smiled watching us. “He’s exactly like you,” he said, and I know he didn’t mean Nolan’s blue eyes or chubby cheeks.

To parent well means to soak in all that unconditional love children give you, to enjoy that brief time when you are the sun of their solar system, and to gracefully let it go. To know you’ve done your job well if you are no longer the center of their world. I am in awe of how my father managed to do that---I can’t fathom how hard it was---or will be---to move from the being the sun to one of many moons.

 

This post is inspired by Emily Freeman of Chatting at the Sky and her invitation to Unwrap Your Tuesdays during advent.

The Rest of the Story

Part 1 of our camping trip to Warner Lake was featured in yesterday’s post. That was about the good stuff. This post is about the not-so-good-I-may-never-camp-again stuff.

You see, I was very hesitant to take my boys camping this weekend. I grew up in the suburbs of Chicago, and at heart, I’m a city girl. I fell in love with nature more via the words of Henry David Thoreau than I did via the woods themselves. Brian, despite also growing up near Chicago, didn’t need Walden to teach him about the power of nature. He has always felt more at home outdoors than indoors, and even when we first met in Chicago, he was intent on heading to the mountains as soon as he graduated.

I had never camped before I met Brian. He quickly remedied that.

We camped in Galena, Illinois. In Yellowstone National Park. Glacier National Park and Yosemite. We’d been married two months when we took assignments with the Forest Service on Mt. Graham in Safford, living in a rustic cabin at the Columbine Ranger Station for the summer. One way to solidify a marriage is to be cut off suddenly from all friends, family, even mail and radio stations (since this was back in the day when people used mail and radios). We celebrated our first anniversary camping in the Dragoon Mountains of the Arizona desert, and another camping on Humbug Mountain on the Oregon coast.

 

All of which is to say, I’m not a camping novice. I can do rustic. I did live in a Russian village for two years with an outhouse and no running water, so I’m not some kind of Lisa Douglass type. And yet, in the 20+ years since that first Galena trip, I have never camped without Brian. Unless you count when the boys set up a tent in the backyard…or the living room.

            I did particularly enjoy that camping trip.

In June the boys listed their summer bucket list and, of course, included camping. Brian’s summer schedule is unpredictable, depending on where and when his fire team is called. So I thought it was a brilliant idea to rent the Forest Service cabin at Warner Lake for our last summer weekend. If Brian was away, I could manage. With no tent to worry about, even the August monsoons wouldn’t be an issue.

As the date moved closer, and the fires in Idaho confirmed that Brian wouldn’t be with us, I grew less confident. I usually prepare all our clothes and food for camping, but Brian does all the actual packing and all the “what-if” thinking. He’s also an intuitive guy who doesn’t have a master camping list. My friend Christy shared her packing list for river trips, which was a great starting point for me. Another friend, Natalie, laid out the biggest priorities: water, TP, food and bug spray. I packed and prepped food and felt ready as we headed up the mountain.

As yesterday’s post showed, it was beautiful up there. Warm with a breeze. We didn’t see one mosquito. The boys ran, Duke barked at every deer, and I started to feel cocky. I made a fire and cooked steak and asparagus on it for the boys. We climbed in our sleeping bags and I read Harry Potter by flashlight to all three boys. They fell asleep and I congratulated myself. I can do this without Brian! We should make this an end of summer tradition!

And then the nightmare began.

We weren’t the only inhabitants of the cabin.

I tried to convince myself that the noises were coming from outside the cabin. I tried to pretend I didn’t hear them. Then Sean woke up and asked, “What’s that noise?”

I got up with a flashlight and went into the kitchen. Ooooh Lordie. They were on the table having a party.

M I C E

Duke, who was begging us to let him take down every deer that ran through the camp, must have some sort of peace treaty with mice. He didn’t so much as bark at them. He did however stay up with me most of the night, despite my admonishing him with wishes that he was cat. Then worries about Hantivirus changed my mind and I considered him wise. The food was all packed up so they weren’t able to get into anything, but they’d been trying. When I flashed the light, they scattered. My scream woke up all three boys. I lied that the mice were all gone now and they could go back to sleep, which they did.

In retrospect, I should have piled us all into the car for the night but it was pouring with sporadic lightning and I didn’t want to leave our stuff alone in the cabin while the mice were at play---nor did I want to try to pack it all up in the middle of the night. So Duke and I sat on border duty all night. Every so often, a mouse would dart out---heading right for our bedroom---and dart back once I shown the flashlight on its face.

My apologizes if this fuss is ridiculous to you who can catch a mouse with your own bare hands. I get queasy even remembering it. My sons have caught frogs, snakes, spiders. I can handle any of those with ease. But not mice. I felt like Indiana Jones, only my lament was: “Mice. Why did it have to be mice?”

I couldn't wait for the sun to come up but it was raining most of the morning. I repacked everything before throwing it all in the van to be sure we weren’t bringing any unwanted guests home with us. We ditched the pancake batter and strawberries that I had prepped at home for a breakfast of hot cocoa and poptarts---out in the rain because anything was better than being in the cabin. Once it stopped raining we took a hike and made s'mores (the boys refused to leave the mountain without having made s’mores), then booked it home before another storm moved in.

I have never been happier to be home. Scrubbed/bleached/cleaned everything but still freaked out. Grateful we safely made it down the mountain despite my scary sleep-deprived state. And never camping without a tent again.

And I’ve come up with a better end-of-summer tradition: a guys-only camping trip! Duke and I will stay home, get out the flashlight and toast to our memory, and sleep in peace.

Celebrating Friends, Family, and a Boy named Sean

 

Three weeks ago today my mother-in-law, Marilyn, flew into Moab after a day of flight delays. The next day my dad arrived, as well as my soul sisters, Mary Alice and Angie, and their families. The occasion? This sweet boy’s First Communion on the weekend of his 8th birthday.

It took me two weeks to fully recover from the whirlwind, the abundance of love and people, the party of over 40 friends and family who gathered to celebrate Sean. I talked to a friend in the days leading up to the celebration, sharing my anxiety about finding enough time to prepare the food, enough time to spend with so many of my favorite people here all at once, and enough time to focus on Sean. She had the most interesting response: “Wow, you’re going to learn a lot, I bet, about yourself this week.”  She was right.

Mostly I learned I am richly blessed.

Bear with me as I share the photo highlights, even the ones that aren’t in sharp focus or that might have high noise---because while they are technically flawed, some of them are emotionally perfect.

That’s me, Angie and Mary Alice. Friends for over 20 years. We’ve only lived in the same state for two of those twenty (not counting the 3 months Bri and I rented Angie and Jeff’s basement), but time and distance aren’t deal breakers for real friends. I came back from Russia for Angie’s wedding; Angie and I flew to LA for the premiere of Mary Alice’s first feature film. They took care of my boys when I had surgery for TN. So much of friendship is just about showing up, as these two have taught me time again.

I love how Angie’s kids’ ages match so well with ours. Aidan and James are almost the same age, Sean and Charlie are only nine months apart, and Meagan is thirteen---just the right age to melt a five-year-old’s heart.

I jest---Jeff was the Ping Pong organizer, coach, and ultimate champion of our single-elimination tournament. I just hope he finds the above photo as funny as I do! There were some tears, however. Especially when he defeated 2nd place winner, Wendy.

I like to think Wendy is really just lamenting the horrid florescent lighting.

I love this shot of Angie, MA, and Wendy---right after they realized James had been photo-bombing them. Wendy made us all an amazing dinner with her mother’s secret steak marinade, rosemary potatoes and grilled asparagus. The airlines lost their luggage at first, but the box of wine they brought made it just fine---glad to see Great Lakes Airlines has their priorities right!

I know, we’re out of focus. As we were in the next five cutest-photos-we’ve-taken-in-forever. Oh well. I still love it.

Love this shot of Jeff, Angie’s husband, getting interrupted while talking with my dad. Classic parenting moment. I think my dad really liked knowing there was a cardiologist in the house. That’s Brian’s mom on the couch. She spent the day on the river with the kids (those photos to come---I was home cooking!), and she did my least favorite job the next day (shredding all the pork for the party). I am so very grateful for the time, expense, and energy both of our parents put into being here. Every memory our children share with them is priceless.

Sunday morning was the big day. As the only 8 year old in our parish, Sean was the sole child making his First Communion this year. He spent the past nine months (and 8 years in a way) reading, learning, memorizing, and preparing. He was ready.

The Episcopal Church welcomes anyone, at any age, to share in the sacrament of communion. It’s a beautiful thing. But once a Catholic, always a Catholic…at least in some ways. I’d guess at least 50% of our parish are Catholic refugees as well, so they understood the value we place in this rite of passage. Fr. Dave, who also happens to be our town’s mayor, is such an inspiration to our three boys and made the entire mass a special celebration for the children.

Can you tell I just embarrassed Aidan in the above photo by asking him to put his hand on Meagan’s shoulder? I love how it is just frozen in midair instead.

Sean refused to take off his tie for the rest of the party. He knew he was stylin’!

I wish we lived close enough for Sean’s aunts and uncles and all this cousins to be with us. Even though we aren’t able to give him that, I am so grateful for the community we have here, for all the people who love Sean as if he were family.

Miss Bobbie, as the boys call her, and Nurse Mel (who happens to be married to Fr. Dave). When she returned at the end of the party with the glasses a friend had left at the church, she also brought us two dozen eggs from her backyard coop. I love small towns.

 

Before all the festivities began, I made myself a promise--- in a post right here on this blog: “not to stress out about what isn’t done or however I see myself falling short compared to the phantom idea in my head of how to be a good host.”

Well, I did stress, of course, but I believe writing that here and in my head did help. Angie and I have joked that we’ve talked more over the phone from our different states in the week that followed than we did during that weekend. That’s just the nature of having lots of kids around.  But I did get at least one moment to soak in each person---my dad in his graciousness, the way he shrugged his shoulders for the punch line of a joke, or the way he connected with Wendy who not only knew “Double Indemity” but quoted it back to him. Catching Aidan and James moving a mattress together. The way Meagan taught Duke to roll over in less than five minutes. Marilyn’s big quilt for Sean in his favorite color green. The drive with MA back to the airport. Angie helping me set up the Sundae station---and her adoration of my dad that almost resembled my own.

See that cake topper in the corner? It’s from Brian’s First Communion, some 35 years ago.

When the weekend was over, I kept thinking of all the things I had meant to do but didn’t. I have a bag full of white t-shirts & fabric markers for our boys and their god-cousins, which means we’ll have to gather again before they’re all bigger sizes!  The tags for the buffet table never got put out, nor the balloons, and we never did make s’mores. I made my mom’s 7-Layer-Bars but never even cut them until just before our parents left for the airport. At the end of the night I found the beautiful cake (see above) the St. Clare’s Guild provided, 3/4ths still untouched. Early in the day Brian had rescued it from the hands of a 12 year old who couldn’t quite carry it. He then left it (for unknown reasons) in our master bathroom. He was running the grill at the time and perhaps the vanity seemed like the only clear flat surface? I had to laugh remembering several people who had asked to use that restroom when the guest one was in use---- bad enough the tub still had river clothes in it from the boys’ rafting trip the day before, but how to explain the huge sheet cake next to the sink?

My friend was right---I learned a lot. I learned that you can’t be the host and the photographer for the same event. I learned that while a Life is Good t-shirt couldn’t be more comfy, it also couldn’t be less flattering in photos. That if you’re gonna spend all that time making the pulled pork, then the cole slaw really should be homemade too (and don’t believe the deli clerk when she says you’ll need 10 lbs. of it!). I learned my dad is more accepting and resilient than even I give him credit for. That you can’t trust a “self-defrosting” fridge (those quotes indicate a big lie). That grief can sneak up on you during the most joyful moments and the gathering of loved ones makes the absence of those no longer with us even more acute. That every thing is made easier by having a great partner to share the work and the joy.

Mostly I learned what I always learn when I pay attention: to be grateful. For this beautiful place where we gathered, for these people we broke bread with all weekend, for this community who embraced Sean, for the words and ritual passed down from generation to generation, and for this sweet eight year old boy, who completely forgot everything he’d practiced and just stared earnestly at our priest while keeping his hands tightly folded together until Fr. Dave finally offered him the sacrament the old fashioned way---feeding it to him. Afterwards he reported that he didn’t like the taste of the wine, and that once back in his seat, he had prayed to God for everyone in the church, “and Grandma too” he said.

I am grateful to be his mother.

The Evolution of Memory-Keeping and a Giveaway

Our grandparents used to paste small photos with white boarders onto black pages with photo corners.

My parents filled magnetic albums, and, in the days of “Free Double Prints”, filled shoe boxes with envelopes of  photos.

This is the story of my memory-keeping evolution, but if you had your first child in the late 90s/early 2000s, it might look familiar.

I had always loved photos and journaling, but had never combined them. My mother-in-law first introduced me to scrapbooking in 1997. Brian and I had just returned from 2 and a half years in Russia as Peace Corps volunteers, and she had just been to a Creative Memories party. For Christmas that year, she set me up with a giant paper cutter and a travel-themed album.

I never finished that album. I remember feeling overwhelmed with wanting to accurately describe our experience in Russia. I wish I had done more back then, because those stories are less vivid now. That summer my friend Angie came to visit and I scratched my head at her passion for this hobby---she had all her supplies spread out on our living room floor and wanted to stay up all night “scrapping.”

And then I had a baby.

Once Aidan was born, I couldn’t take enough photos, and I couldn’t capture enough stories. Those early stages move so quickly. I also escaped what were (at least in 2002) the narrow confines of Creative Memories and discovered Simple Scrapbooks (which continues on in a different form at Write Click Scrapbook). I fell in love with this hobby that combined two of my favorite things: words + photos.

Over time---and more pregnancies, my approach to memory-keeping changed. With three little boys, I no longer had the luxury of spreading out lots of supplies and that led me to discover digital scrapbooking (to learn more, check out the free guide from The Daily Digi).

My very first all digi layout. Templates by Katie Nelson.

As my photography skills grew, my interest in the embellishments of a layout decreased. At the same time, my appreciation of the stories increased. I could look back at pages from Aidan’s first year and see the value in the pages that captured some of his personality and told a story that at the time I was sure I would never forget but which would have been lost if I hadn’t written it down.

Template by Rebecca Cooper.

In 2010, I took a photo every day that year, and added them to an album designed to hold short journaling cards beside the images. It was the best thing I ever did for my photography, and my favorite thing I’ve ever done for memory-keeping. I still remember that year better than most---not just because I’ve looked at the pictures and re-read some of our stories but because just picking up the camera, just writing the words, seals memories in my mind more clearly. My boys still suggest shots to be our “photo of the day.”

(Sorry about the photo—my 1st time photographing with page protectors. I have new admiration for those who do it well!)

Becky Higgins created that photo project and then simplified it even more to create Project Life. Memory-keeping has evolved and branched out to include art journaling, as well as video and blogging. But Becky’s Project Life system is the development that has taken scrapbooking by storm and made me fall in love with photo+words all over again. She describes it best herself here.

It isn’t about taking a photo every day. Some use it to capture a week at a time, others a month. I’m using one for each of our sons--- to collect the little things they want to save and mixing it with larger digi layouts too. What’s magic about it? It’s simple, it’s easy, it’s fast and it can be whatever you want it to be (if you want to be blown away by people much more creative than me, check out some of my favorites here, here and here!). Looking at my layouts from different years, I see a pattern of using grids, straight lines and short journaling---all of which Project Life combines.

Here’s my confession: Aidan has a huge baby album. Sean has a half-completed one. Nolan has none. I took photos and I blogged to capture Nolan’s first year (still archived here as Baby#3), but I haven’t printed any of it. How I wish this system existed back then! To be able to add photos quickly to a page projector, with small journaling cards so you don’t feel like you have to write a novel. The Baby editions of Project Life even include short prompts to help you capture milestones and stories.

This is a great example of a Project Life Baby Edition by Catherine Davis of Design Editor.

I’m not affiliated with Project Life or Becky Higgins other than being a fan. I just believe this system of memory-keeping works, especially for a new parent who wants to remember the big and small moments from a child’s first year. As part of celebrating DOK Photography’s first anniversary, I’m thrilled to give away one Baby Edition Project Life Core Kit.

 

This doesn’t include the album/binder or the page protectors (there are lots of styles but I prefer the original Design A page protectors and We R Memory Keepers 3-Ring Binder). I will include the Month Dividers for whichever edition the winner choosers: Neutral, Boy, or Girl.

**UPDATE: Becky read this post and sent a message that she would like to provide the Core Kit + Monthly Dividers, AND a Big Pack of Photo Pocket Pages! Woohoo! Now all the winner will need to create a complete Project Life Baby album is the binder----so I will also provide a $25 Amazon gift card for Project Life Binder - Seafoam Edition or the edition of your choice (lots more being released this May!). Thank You, Becky Higgins!

Please follow the Rafflecopter prompts in the widget below to enter. Basically, you need to follow/like DOK Photography on Facebook and leave a comment below by February 28th.

You can also enter Monday’s giveaway of Kelly Rae Robert’s special edition of Brene Brown’s Parenting Manifesto, and if you were photographed by me in 2012, enter Wednesday’s giveaway of a 12x12 gallery-wrapped canvas from your session!

Be sure to check back on March 1st to see if you won!

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