Five Minutes

I read once that a great way to challenge oneself as a photographer was to commit to taking pictures for 5 minutes a day. While we all know that my record for completing much of anything other than eating chocolate for 365 days in a row is not too impressive, nothing turns my heart around on hard days (and our Thursdays are almost always hard) than taking pictures, and staring at said pictures during nap time.

So, for 5 minutes this morning, I embraced that challenge. I grabbed my camera and tried to capture where we're at. I'm glad I did.

 Pretty quickly, my girl spied the wireless remote and wanted in on the photo taking action. Elias was nearing nap time, so after a few clicks together, we put the little guy to sleep and had a second go at it.

Which, when you compare these to the first time I taught her how to use the wireless remote, it makes motherhood feel all sorts of  incredible and helps me realize this is all happening at warp speed.

It  was just a year ago (March 3rd!) when we first got in front of the camera together with her clicking away. It's a good reminder that this all happens so, so SO fast. Which is something I needed to remember this morning. 

Today has been hard. Like taking a break too many times to count from my toddler and trying to breath and pray and think through how to handle defiance with a gentle heart. While in the process, I got a nice nose bleed from my apparent inability to handle stress well.  

Score:

Toddler - 1  Adult Parent - 0  

Which leads to yet another life lesson: Trying to train your toddler is completely ineffective when there's a giant wad of toilet paper hanging out of your nose. 

"Mama? Boogas? Nose?!" 

" Yes, Eowyn, Mama has a nose bleed, but that's okay. We need to talk about how we need to listen with our ears and not hit Elias with the recorder...."

"MAMA, Boogas? Nose? Otay?!?"

Needless to say, I'm grateful for these pictures. And the reminder that it really is all sorts of messy (both literally, and figuratively) and beautiful.  

All that from just five minutes.