Capture the Mess

Last Saturday I wanted to have a mostly screen-free day. No phones. No movies. No tablets. Just books, toys, coloring, more books, and imagination. I had my phone in another room all day so I wouldn’t be tempted to randomly scroll mindlessly but I still wanted to capture the fun of the day. This forced me to get out my big camera and capture the mess that is our house and showed me all the things I never want to forget about the season we are in:

• The way my daughter is obsessed with my Blue’s Clue’s doll.

• The way my husband has to lay our dog down to do his nails and is the only one who can do them.

• The way my son loves to shovel and helped shovel the front and backyard for us.

• The way Everly thinks her brother’s sweatshirts are better than her own.

• How Liam has to stand on the stool to fill his water cup up.

• How my husband takes the kids out in the snow because after day one, I’m over it and become a hermit.

• How forts in the house have a minimum three day stay.

• The excitement in Liam's voice when he reads a new book all on his own.

• I want to remember making them all hot cocoa for their return home.

• The silly faces Evie insists on making for almost every photo.

• All of the small details of our current home, like the way the sunshine comes in through the windows in the evening.

• The way our dog puts his chin on the couch and waits to be invited up.

• The way the kids randomly hug throughout the day.

• How they jump like crazy on our new trampoline.

• Our bunny and going into his room to read and the way he comes up and sniffs at us.

• My love of dried flowers in the windows.

• All of the little pretend games they play throughout the day that are mostly animals like wolf, tiger, or anything else ‘ferocious.’

Instead of tidying the house for an at-home session, why not leave it? One day these crazy kids are going to have houses of their own with their own messes and ours are going to be clean but…quiet. They’re going to be completely different and we’ll barely remember the mess but instead these memories that filled the house with joy and laughter.