Yep, we all went to church yesterday. Diane came out here to drive us in the minivan, since I still can't drive. I'm grateful to her. I'm getting tired of this whole broken ankle thing, though. It's been five weeks, folks. Five looooong weeks.
Anyway, I had to take a few pictures of the boys in their nice clothes, particularly Andrew, since I have already fallen into one of the best-known traps of the Parent of More Than One Child. You may also know it as the "Mom, why did you take so many more pictures of my older sibling?" phenomenon.
Oh sure, I had great intentions of being the exception to the rule. I started out strong, too. I took dozens and dozens, maybe even hundreds, of photos in the first month or so after Andrew was born. I even put a bunch of pictures from Andrew's first six weeks or so into an actual album. I mean, wow, right? I didn't put photos of William into an album for, er, years.
But then inertia set in. Plus, the broken ankle kind of hobbled the whole effort (no pun intended...mostly). Every time Andrew was doing something cute, I'd be stuck on my butt, wondering if he'd still be doing that cute thing, whatever it was, by the time I hoisted myself up on the crutches, hobbled into the other room to get the camera (it was always in another room), limped back and then managed to get the camera out and ready to take photos. Boy, I'm panting a little bit right now, just remembering how much effort it took.
I did get lucky a few times, of course. But mostly, it was a challenge that even I, the shutterbug ordinaire (can't call myself a shutterbug extraordinaire...gotta set myself some goals, you know), couldn't overcome very often. Plus, there are only so many pictures you can take of a baby in a stroller in the same place in the same room. Although you have to admit that the ones I took last week really are amazingly cute. Right? Right??
I even took Andrew to Sears to have a portrait taken. No small task, given that I also brought William along, ostensibly to help baby-wrangle but mostly because I didn't know what else to do with him. But then, just like my mother had to do 30mumbleyears ago with me and my little brother, I ended up inviting William to be in the photos with Andrew. Okay, but I should get a pass on that. The pictures of William and Andrew together are gorgeous. They really are. And I got some good solo pictures of Andrew, too, so it wasn't like there are only pictures of the two of them together.
Anyway, now that I'm more mobile, I am renewing my vow to take more pictures of Andrew so that he doesn't whine, in 20 years or so, that I have so many more pictures of his big brother than I do of him. I probably will still have more pictures of William, but I'm going to try harder to make sure the discrepancy isn't too great.
But really, I can't resist taking some photos of both boys together. I just can't. They love each other so much, and it just makes me happy to see them like this. Those are the sorts of moments that make this parenting thing all totally worth while.
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