Best Baby advice
Before my son was born I remember buying 80 large boxes of
diapers and having them stored in the closet of his room – ready for his arrival. I thought I’d never have to buy another box
of them again. I had no idea whether I had the right ones or
not. In fact, I had no idea there was a
difference in diapers. The only thing I
knew was I did not want to use cloth diapers.
It was at difficult thing, having to figure out was which diaper would
work best for his little bottom.
Not all diapers are created equal. In fact, we found several that were a real disaster
and it didn’t seem to matter how much they cost. It was about the way they were made and fit.
We tried brand names like Pampers, Huggies and Luvs as well
as store brands. The Pampers were too
small, too slim cut for him. The Huggies
gapped at the leg and that was really a mess.
But the Luvs seemed to be the best “fit” for us (no pun intended) and the bonus was that
after we purchased the ten millionth box we got a free “Cookie
Monster” stuffed animal. My baby
boy loved “Cookie!” I still
have that little stuffed animal, even today.
Maybe one day I’ll have a grandchild to share him with.
Which diaper works for you little one?
Photographers want to include photographs in every post but sometimes a good blog post can just be good content.
Today’s good content comes in the form of sharing a story of my very own reality check.
Yesterday was a particularly challenging day for me. It seemed that one thing after another was not going quite right. To top it all off, I didn’t get a chance to eat anything. It was a very long, exhausting and frustrating day.
At 5:30 I decided I just needed to walk away from it all. I called my husband and said let’s go to Ruby Tuesdays for the salad bar which is usually a pretty good choice.
As I began to fill my salad plate, a woman in the line ahead of me said she loved my skirt. I thanked her and told her I got it at SteinMart for a really good price. She proceeded to tell me about how her husband loved a bargain. He was the one who went through the Sunday paper clipping all the coupons and finding all the best deals. As we continued to fill our plates from the salad bar she proceeded to tell me more.
My husband took care of so many things for me like cutting the grass and making sure my car was in good running order, she said. You could hear in her voice that something was wrong. ”You see” she said “my husband died 14 weeks ago and I’m trying to adjust to life without him and learn how to take care of all these thing myself now but it is so hard. “
I don’t think it actually registered that she had just said 14 weeks ago.
She told me she was an accountant. She has some very nice clients and co -workers who are supportive and wonderful to be around – but “I still miss him so much” she said.
“I’m just 56 years old. We were married 14 years. We had no children and I have no siblings. The nights are very long. “. She paused, looked down at the floor and took a deep breath. I reached over and touched her hand. We said nothing more. She smiled and walked away.
I took 2 steps and stopped in my tracks. My eyes filled with tears and suddenly I realized that the terrible day that
I had was insignificant compared to the sadness this young lady had been feeling for 14 weeks.
In a moment I realized that tomorrow my day would start over anew with all the possibilities of good things happening but her day would still be filled with loneliness and loss.
This chance encounter did not make me forget my troubles it reminded me of my many blessings. Tonight I will say a special prayer for her and everyone who is experiencing loss and loneliness and I will thank God for the chance meeting with this woman – who has reminded me to always count my blessings.
Caroline is a middle child
Psychologists have a lot to say about the middle child, some good some not so good. But any way you look at it the middle child is often simply “caught in the middle”. Old enough to know better but too young for many things.
Stereotypes about middle children are hardly flattering. They’re often described as confused underachievers, overshadowed by older and younger siblings, and overlooked by their parents. But in The Secret Power of Middle Children Catherine Salmon and Katrin Schumann argue that many middle-borns have hidden strengths and are agents of change in business, politics and science.
”If you think about it, parents have expectations for their children, and they often have very specific things that they want them to do or don’t want them to do. And so being under the focus of that can be a lot of pressure for kids. So that’s one negative of being, for example, a firstborn. There’s an awful lot of pressure on you from your parents in terms of what you’re going to achieve and what you’re not going to achieve.
“But there’s also a freedom that middle children have by virtue of not having those parental expectations on them. In a certain way they’re free to find out what they really are good at on their own time and in their own way, and then excel at that.”
Salmon: “If you grow up in a family and the firstborn tends to have a certain amount of authority that’s given to them by the parents, and they’re physically larger, they tend to get what they want or get their way through physical force or the authority parents have given them. While for the last-born, as anyone who’s had to deal with a lot of last-borns often knows, they tend to whine to the parents or get very upset if they don’t get their way. And so that’s their particular strategy for working out what needs to be worked out.
“For the middle child, neither of those strategies are available. So they often get very good at negotiating, figuring out what the other person wants and needs, and then managing to get them what they want and what the middle child themselves want at the same time. And, of course, one of the things that middle children often want is peace and calm and quiet and for everybody to get along. And so those traits then serve them well when they leave the family and go on to form their own families, and in the workplace.”
This month we had the privilege to photograph, 7 year old Caroline and she is a middle child 1 of 5 but in the middle just the same. Two older and two younger. Caroline was a pure joy to work with.
One of the special things about what we do is that we often get the opportunity to work with each child individually. Therefore we sometime see a very different side of the child than the parents do during a session.
Caroline was very quiet, gentle, tender and co-operative. She was tickled to be getting the “special treatment”. We know exactly how to work with these children. They want attention but not too much attention. It can be a little uncomfortable for them to get too much attention directed at them too strongly. So during the session we spent time talking to her about what she likes and whether her front teeth were about to come out yet (which was a concern of mom’s and partly why we did the session when we did).
I believe every child has a unique spark within and if we take our time with them, it will be revealed in a most beautiful way.
Thank you Caroline for spending the day with us.
Tell us about your middle child…
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Attending Kiki & Alex’s wedding as guest. Beautiful couple. http://t.co/CjMeKIXr
Over the next few weeks I will be writing about families working together. This may not be exactly what you think it is. But I promise it will be interesting.
Why families?
I remember when I was a little girl, my mother owned her very own hair salon. This was a rare thing for a woman back in the 60’s. My mother didn’t have the luxury of staying at home. She was a single mom and it was a very different world than today.
There were no daycare centers and most women were stay at home moms raising their children. When my mother had to work (6 days and evenings a week) and I was not in school, she would bring me to her salon. I learned so many things there. I learned how to deal with people – all people, happy ones and unhappy ones. I learn how to have a sympathetic ear is someone just needed to be heard. I learned how to shampoo hair and sweep floors and take out trash. Oh yes, it was no free ride of fun and games. My mother made it a point of keep me busy and I was a welcomed addition to her business. Even at the age of 8, I remember her customers asking for me to shampoo them and how they gave me a huge tip (usually 25 cents – which bought a lot back them) and I remember feeling important and useful in the world and “very grown up”. I loved it. Having the opportunity to just be near my mother was the best.
Occasionally today I see families working together in their business. It touches my heart when the kids are young, just trying to help out. When I see one who has grown up in the family business and managed to stay in the business – it makes me smile.
Years ago I met the Hobbs family. they are wonderful photographers and friends in the Great Bridge area of Chesapeake.
One day I noticed a remarkable family working together – the McConnell’s from JoJacks Café from the Churchland section of Portsmouth.
Recently I met Drs. Jeff and Clay Weisberg, Father and son dentist from the Western Branch area of Portsmouth. It was a sheer joy to see them together.
I’d like to share my observation of these three families with you in my next couple of blog posts.
In the meantime, tell me about your family business and how you manage to teach your kids and work together and how it is a blessing to you. I can’t wait to hear your story.
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