It's been happening for 26 years

Photography is a way of feeling, of touching, of loving. What you have caught on film is captured forever... it remembers little things, long after you have forgotten everything.

Aaron Siskind

I have been doing a lot of scrapbooking the last couple of months.  It is one of my favorite things to do with my children.  They sit with me in the office.  We will pull up a movie on Netflix or load a DVD into the computer and just hang out.  While I put pictures to paper, they will comment and reminisce about the adventures those pictures represent.  It doesn't matter which of my children is around.  They all like looking at the pictures and sharing their memories.

I am still astonished at the pictures people had of my children that I didn't even know existed until after the house fire.  Last week I finally completed through 2004 with the pictures I have acquired.  While there are still some holes, (read pre-digital era), I think I have been able to put together a pretty good representation of the years.  Looking through the albums and remembering where we have been and what we have accomplished together strengthens the bonds we have with one another.

It's great to reminisce about good memories of my past. It was enjoyable when it was today. So learning to enjoy today has two benefits: it gives me happiness right now, and it becomes a good memory later.

George Foreman

Rick recently went on a river trip with the boy scouts.  Another leader that went with him is a new father.  As they were going along, the discussion turned to all the picture taking people do.  Rick started to brag on his wife and told about the albums that I have put together over the years and how much our family, especially our children have enjoyed them.  We really had a good laugh when he came home and realized that I had spent most of the time he was on the trip doing exactly what he had described.

Today Rick and I have been married for 26 years.  I am not going to say it has always been easy, but I can say it has been worth it.  Sticking pictures on paper, retelling the stories they represent, and sharing those stories with my children, reminds me what a good life we have had and how blessed I have been to be stuck with my best friend for all these years.

To celebrate, Rick and I put together this video of some of our favorite pictures to what has become our theme song*:

*Stuck With You by Huey Lewis and the News