The Big Picture

       Yesterday I spent two hours of my "quiet" time trying to get the photo slide show attatched to this blog.  I was literally going mental uploading pictures and pushing every button necessary to make it work.  Finally I got it to work.....quite stressful!  Now why are these pictures so important?  Why the intense need to share them with strangers reading this blog?  I love pictures...I love my childern and since the beginning the two have been inseperable.

        Anyone that knows me, expects a camera in my hand and new photos on the computer at least four times a week.  During the twins' four and a half years, I have snapped more than 10,000 pictures.  I was determinied to document each and every moment of my children's lives.  Not just the "BIG" milestone moments, but the tiny ones that no one else would notice.  Then the pictures would have to be placed into scrapbooks....someday they would want to see them.....(well maybe more for me than them).  With family literally all over the country, I then decided to send pictures across the internet so that everyone could celebrate my children. 

       I remember a time when I would literally have to stand on my head to get the babies to look at the camera, never mind smile.  Today the kids naturally pose where ever we are.  "Mom, take my picture next to the elephant."  "Mommy take our picture in front of our school."  "Mom take my picture eating this donut."  Why are these images so important to me?  Why have I made them so important to my twins?

       Pictures document the good times, the family trips, the fun times, the new homes, the first steps, the first day of school and everything in between.  They create a record of our lives and remind people that we were here, on this Earth, after we are gone.  Pictures allow us to hold loved ones close even when they are gone from our lives.  They give us the opportunity to share the past with the present and the present with the future.  Pictures help us prove to our thirteen year old that we did do fun things....that we were not always boring.  Pictures help us deal with the "empty nest" and help them remember home when they leave.  In old age pictures become the life line to our past as our own memories stumble.

     Find the camera, take it out, point, shoot and DON'T FORGET TO SMILE!