I love taking pictures of my children and this one is so sweet. But you know, it's rarely a planned event at my house. It seems that I capture their best expressions in the foreground of a mess. (Notice the basket of laundry in this pict.) I usually get the camera out on days when the schedule has gone kaput and we're all still in our pj's at 11:30, or 1:30 or later! So, I have an album full of charming children with messy hair in a messy house. And really, it's not always like this. It just seems that if I do get all of the work done and everything put away, there's no time left to enjoy it (since it's probabaly past bedtime). I am whining a little here. I still have a long way to go in learning to be scheduled and organized so I suppose when I get better at it I will have more free time for the "fun" stuff.

Or will I? There seems to be such a fragile balance in deciding the most important priority. There is work that has to be done to care for the family, but there is still a family that needs attention and care. Little by little I'm teaching the children to help and little by little I work through my To Do list, but the work is always there. The children, however, will not be.  I would be heartsick if they were grown and gone and I hadn't savoured the precious times we spent together.

The times I cherish from my own childhood have nothing to do with how spotless the carpets were or how brightly the windows shown. They do bring back the comfort of my mother's lap while she read aloud to my brother and me. (I still picture the sunbeams breaking through the curtains, the sun still low in the sky and a feeling that the day would go on forever.) I remember chewing giant wads of bubble gum while Mom entertained us by blowing big, sweeet, pink bubbles. I remember the laughter and excitement of planning for a fun afternoon with friends or a vacation to the lake.  Even though, in the midst of the mundane, there is not always a lot of time for those types of things, I do not want to relocate them to the superfluous. Father guide me minute by minute!

"It is good that you grasp one thing and also not let go of the other; for the one who fears God comes forth with both of them." Ecclesiastes 7:18 NASB