Old Photos

It's summer, I'm not working, so I am trying to catch up on things.  Things that need to be done, and things that I want to do.  My desktop computer has so many pictures on it, there is little memory left.  It is a fairly new computer, and when I bought it, I got extra memory.  Needless to say, I take TONS of pictures.  To the point where my husband told me on our vacation this year to stop taking so many pictures because I was ruining/missing the moment (something to that effect).

While that may be true to some degree, I do believe that there is nothing more precious than old pictures.  They capture a moment in time, that you can never get back.  If not for photos, sometimes you forget those moments.  For example, the very few photos I have of Adelyn are priceless, even if I don't really like any of them.  If I didn't have them, I think I may have forgotten the details of how she looked by now. Some days, I think I forget even with those pictures, because they didn't really capture how she truly looked (to me).

So I have been slowly uploading all my pictures to Snapfish.  This way, if my computer crashes, they are saved online.  If after I print them out, my house burns down, they are still saved online.  I do want to print them all out and put them in albums, I finally decided this last summer.  Scrapbooking is great, but too time consuming and expensive when you take as many photos as me.  I thought about going through and only picking the best ones to print, but that would take forever also.  Plus, even the imperfect ones capture a moment, and I couldn't leave out one precious picture of my kids.

Right now, I am on the year 2010.  It has been hard to look back at these pictures, photos of me happily pregnant, of Sierra almost the exact same age that Adelyn would be now.  I almost don't recognize those people.  So happy and naive. 

At the beach in 2010 - our happy family.  It was super hard looking through the pictures from that vacation.  It seems like way more than 2 years ago.

This picture just proves my point - if I hadn't taken this picture, I may have forgotten how after my niece was born, Sierra became obsessed with "swaddling" her dolls.  Here she was trying to do it and got frustrated, some things never change!  And the plastic doll cradle/swing/highchair is in the basement with the garage sale stuff now :(  I never really thought about the fact that Adelyn would be at the perfect age to be playing with it right now.  I wish I hadn't just thought that!

And here is Sierra the month before she turned 2 - exactly how old Adelyn would be right now.  I can't even imagine her at this age.  Looking back at these pictures, makes me realize how fast time goes.  I almost don't remember Sierra this little , and it was only 2.5 years ago.  It's also just another reminder of what we missed out on.....I LOVED this age.  And how cute is my girl?  Her "pony tails" melt my heart. Again, I forgot I used to do her hair like that.  On the other hand, looking at old pictures reminds me of what I DID get to do with Sierra.  Sometimes I get very caught up in all the girly stuff I can't do because Coen is a boy.  I really looked forward to all the hair bows that are so in style right now, because they weren't quite as easy to find when Sierra was little, and the ones I had left marks on her head so I didn't use them much.  But looking back, I certainly did have my fun dressing her up and putting bows in her hair.....so for that I will always be grateful.  I always dreamed of having a daughter, two would have been awesome, but one is better than none.......

I could go on and on....but my point is, going through these old pictures, while emotional, has also been therapuetic.  Reminding me of moments I may otherwise have forgotten, little moments that I didn't realize at the time would mean so much.  Since losing Adelyn, I try so hard to remember every single little moment with my kids, because I appreciate them so much more.

I'm really thankful that I take too many pictures.  I have been slacking since we got home from vacation, so tomorrow I vow to take lots of them!