Party of Five

It was inevitable.  Two nights before family pictures little Noah tumbled out of bed and ended up with a bloody and puffy lip and a good scrape on his chin.

The night before family pictures Noah and Sophie pulled every trick in the book to stay up and finally fell asleep three hours past their bedtime.  Only to wake up to Noah's crying at midnight due to a bad cold and cough coming on.

"We're going to have to cancel first thing in the morning you know, Kara," Darryl says to me.
Long silence.
"We are giving them Pepsi for breakfast.  The pictures will go on," I say.

The morning of pictures it occurs to me that maybe Noah's hand-me-down shoes to Evie might not look so charming in pictures.  And what to do about Sophie's shoes?  I guess just use the old tennis shoes...with a dress?   

Sigh. 

The kids smile and have fun running around looking at the fish and birds.  Evie waddles about in Noah's old sandals, Noah holds onto his pants carefully safety-pinned together, and Sophie dashes about in her sparkly pink tennis shoes and dress.

It makes me laugh when I look through the pictures.  The details of our lives are mismatched and imperfect.  But we are alive, happy, healthy and blessed beyond measure.