is it ever going to stop snowing?

snow today,
snow tomorrow....
it's enough to make a sane girl cry.

i took a drive on saturday...
15 wanted to go see his friend
{who happens to be a girl}
so i put my camera in the passenger seat
and after i dropped him off
at his friend's
{who happens to be girl}
i allowed myself to get lost
on back country roads...

when i picked him up
he told me that they made their own version
of "burger love" at home
and that he helped with the spinach
(i am certain my boy has never seen spinach
before in his life, other than in a popeye cartoon
i am not sure that i have ever seen spinach...).

and i marveled at how they grow up
instantly
right before your very eyes.

the light was perfect as we drove home...
15 picked the music (nirvana for the most part, fine by me)
and i asked him at every stop sign
right?  left?  straight?
let's just get lost.
and the sweet thing is he totally put up with it...
even when i stopped the car
multiple times
to lay in the ditch and take photos
of farms
reflected in mud puddles.

i'm a lucky girl.
 

365 photo-a-day project {april 2015}

365 photo a day project...
while i wait and pray and hope
for spring...


i am not a juggler

yesterday i felt like hell.

15 had a toothache...turned into a root canal...
worried about how school is going for him,
behind on the photo editing
constant emails from people wondering about
scheduling a session or when will photos be done...
tired all the time...busy at work with my "real" job,
full to the brim with guilt and never-ending-nagging feelings
that i am falling behind
and i cannot catch up.

and then
i went to parent teacher interviews for 15
and they could not say any more nice things about him
if they tried...
he is funny, he is kind, he is doing ok socially,
polite, well spoken, no bad attitude, no trouble at all in class...
lack a little focus "but no more than all teenage boys do".
when i mentioned how the guidance counselor in his junior high
suggested VERY STRONGLY that he may ADHD (& yet, kept calling him by the wrong name)
the teacher that has him for 3 hours straight every morning,
5 days a week, said he just didn't see that in him...at all...not even a little.

i felt like a weight of 6000 lbs was lifted from my heart.

i felt like people were actually really seeing him this year.
they were getting to know him.  they know he is unorganized....
they are working with him on that without tearing him down on a daily basis for it.
they encourage him and they see the good parts of him.
the parts of him that i see every day.

and it changed my whole outlook to hear that....
i came home and shared every little bit of it with him
including how when he was absent for the root canal
his teacher told me the other kids in the class kept saying
"it's not the same...15 is not here...."

:) :) :)




mothers day and may...

already the beginning of may...
where did april go?

i feel like i have been all over the place.

did i tell you that i went to children's writing workshop
and how absolutely fantastic it was!
i left feeling excited and inspired and full of ideas...
there was a lot of talk around the process of writing your piece
then going back through and marking "scenes"
then using those markers to create storyboards...
and i found that this made me feel really excited...
like i could picture it coming together.

i also went to another workshop this weekend on
writing to surprise yourself...
the basis of this was the use of prompts
{which i love} and different tools you can use when
 you are just getting started or
feel stuck...
i came away from that one also excited and inspired...

other than that, the weekend has been busy
with family get togethers
and birthday partys
lots of card making
and going through old photo albums
and sharing lost stories...
meeting new relatives
and watching my kids interact on their own
so grown up, so capable...
ice cream and onion rings at the dairy bar
garden shopping and plant pruning...


things have been good, very very good...


and now i am looking forward to my first photo sessions of this season
as well as this e-course...i can't wait {squeal}
and to an upcoming workshop with this author
and a chance to meet this blogger...


may will be sweet, i can feel it in my bones.

no poem today...instead i am random and inconcise...

easter is over
the long weekend done
back to work in the morning...

i am happy and quiet and full of solitude tonight
and tangible silence
{but wordy in my own head}
{if that makes sense}

{i feel like posting but i don't feel like talking}

i spent the day today just hanging with my 15 year old
bright and shiny girl...talking and napping and
giggling and sharing...and it was good.

the laundry didn't get done
and neither did the dishes
but i wouldn't have traded this afternoon
for any amount of money...

these small moments of
imperfect and unexpected connections...
these are the moments
that i guard and i steal and i hoard
like tiny bits of sweet sunshine
for the days that feel like the rain
will
never
ever
go
away
and i will never be warm again...

and then she surprises me
by leaning in close,
by lingering after supper to share stories,
by tickling and crawling into the bed
between her dad and me
to watch silly chocadooby videos on his iphone...

and i'm warm and happy and basking in her sunshine smile.