Thursday, September 23, 2010

A wonderful Gift

I had to show these.... a friend of mine is a wonderful photographer and gave me this photo shoot as a gift. She did it to give me a day to myself and about myself at the end of the deployment.

It was such a fun day with a very special lady. She lives 3 houses down from me and is also South African with a husband in the military. Its a small world, my South African network of friends is slowly growing here.

I also love her work and love having these. I am going to love them even more when I am 90! So it was the gift that will keep on giving.
We plan to do family shots soon, and I’m really looking forward to doing those. I'll post them as soon as we have them done.













A letter to my Son


Devin… Oh my dear darling Devin….

I have been taking stock of things over the past 21 months and I have noticed that I have taken about half the pictures of you than I have of your sister. There are less than half of you and me together and most of the stories on the blog are of your sister.

I would like to take this moment and tell you my side of the story. It does not have anything to do with the way I feel about you and certainly has no indication to who is my favorite.

Here is the deal, when Kai was born I had nothing else to do but to look at her. Your Dad had nothing to do but look at her. Nini had nothing to do but look at her. You’re your Dad was getting ready to deploy six weeks after your sister was born and he was trying to take as much with him as possible.
Then we moved to South Africa where your Nampa went camera crazy, and every moment he could take a picture he did – of her, of me and her you name it.

When we moved back to the US and you were born, Kai was 22 months. Let me explain what a 22 month old does…. Everything, none stop, always on the go (actually as I write this you are almost 22 months and now you never stop). I had a lot more to do and a lot less time to do it in. So when you were sleeping I could not just sit and take as many pictures of you as I did of Kai. Your sister was always around and usually became part of the photo opportunity.

Then your Daddy deployed when you were 9 months old and I had no one to take pictures of us. Not only that but when we were on outings I was holding you and your sisters hand all the time and no extra hand to pop out and take a picture.

So if you read this when you are older and see that things are not exactly equal – think that you are my left lung and Kai is my right. I need you both to breathe everyday.

So from now on, I will make sure that things are more equal in pictures and news.
I would like to have a family tradition as you get older…. I would like to have slide show with all our pictures from the past on Christmas Eve. We do it in SA and I love the tradition

To end off… I think you are the most delicious thing I have ever met, you are the most special gentle soul and I thank God daily for the gift of you. I would not change a single thing or one day with you. You make my heart light and full all at once and I love you more than you will ever know …