Eyes-Open-Photo-Shoot

Yesterday Fern had her eyes open for quite a while.
I propped her on the couch and started snapping away.

I'm not sure how obvious it is in the pictures, but this girl is going to have red hair!  Her eyelashes and eyebrows prove it, if nothing else.  I'm so excited about this!  The name Fern wasn't official until I saw her-I wanted her to have red hair with a name like Fern.  For as long as we've talked about children, John and I have always imagined red-headed baby girl named Fern.  And here she is.

I'm always taking pictures and trying to record as many moments as I can.  As the unofficial, somewhat annoying, photographer for the family, I'm absent in the natural moments.  I try to create those natural, special moments, hit the self timer, run to be in the shot, only to realize it's blurry or off-centered or I zoomed in way to close-or just very UNnatural. 

Just recently, I gave up.  I gave up on creating those perfect, "natural" moments and went for the posed ones.  The ones where I'm posing for the camera, hoping everything works out.  It might not be a direct record of the special time I was going for, but it will still stand as a reminder.  

It will remind me of the time we were playing and having fun and I paused for a few pictures.
It will remind me what life was like with babies.
It will remind me of having them home with me.

The picture above.  Well, I was hoping she would be looking at the camera, flashing an accidental smile.  Instead, she's totally distracted by her hand.  At first, I thought this picture was a failure, but I couldn't stop looking at it.  She's so cute, she's so small, and she's so real!!!  Quickly, I feel in love with this, posted it as my facebook profile pic, and showed John as soon as he got home.

This is a memory made.  This is my moment captured.  Now, this picture will serve as a reminder of a floppy little thing that I had to prop up while she tried to chew on her hand.  I won't be able to fit my hands all the way around her tiny little body for long.  And I think that I'm going to have to print this out and frame it.