A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words...and then some.

I love pictures.

If you know me, you know that I am never very far away from my camera. Not only do I take a lot of photos but I am also very enthusiastic about displaying them in creative ways through memory books, picture frames, slideshows, videos and collages.

In our home we have at least 30 photo books full of precious memories...big and small.

In an effort to really capture the memory I often include words with my photos. These captions explain the event in detail, capture the emotions of the day, and describe funny or poignant details.

Recently I have displayed some amazing photos on facebook and this blog. Many of them are Christmas card worthy and full of sunny skies, beautiful parks, sandy beaches, big smiles. They are not staged or pretend. They are real. They are beautiful memories. But they are also worth ONLY a thousand words. Our story each day is comprised of thousands and thousands more "words" than these pictures can tell.

The reality is we have some great moments that we will cherish forever and celebrate daily, but we also have some really hard moments...many really hard moments.

Here are a few "snapshots":

• Gabriel is angry and homesick. He misses control. He misses Ghana. He misses his first mom. He is less tough to live with than he was 6 weeks ago but he is still VERY tough to live with. The pictures of him on the beach burying me in sand and riding piggy back are authentic, unaltered photos but they capture about 30 minutes of a 2 day vacation. Most of the rest of the time he was disgruntled, or argumentative, or sick, or annoyed. We love him so much and know that God will give us exactly what we need to raise him one day at a time...
• I had a great time at Sea World with my entire family (mom, dad, sister, brother, nieces and nephews) but that would not have been the case at all if Adam hadn't been taking care of Gabriel the entire time. I am so grateful for a wise and patient husband.

If you look closely you can see Gabriel's red shirt poking through between Cael and Kaleigh. Stinker.

• We can eat out as a family now! Chick-fil-a and Kuroshio are definitely the favorite spots for this crew. Yay for nuggets and chicken fried rice!
• When all the kids are together they all want the attention. We are still working on don't-talk-when-someone-else-is-talking in our family.

I will keep taking photos and documenting our journey and sharing our life with people who care. But, please remember for the thousand words each photo is worth, there are thousands more that you can't see. 

(I would like to add that Inga Finch is a miracle worker to get these photos of our family. It wasn't easy work people and she made it seem easy. Thanks Inga!)