This is a picture of our three kids’ baby books. The album on the left (the one that’s the size of a Webster’s unabridged dictionary) belongs to our first-born daughter Eloise. The blue baby book belongs to our son, the middle child, Henry. And the third baby book (not pictured) belongs to the baby, Maggie. Why is the third baby book not pictured? Because we don’t have one for her, at all.
With our firstborn we were meticulous (sort of) with keeping track of everything she did and when she did it. Her baby book is a reflection of that. There are probably 30 pictures of the day she was born. The album contains pictures of every major, and minor, event in her first year of life or so. There are pictures of her with EVERY relative she has. There are pictures of her at the beach, at a different beach, swim lessons with her mom, and at the Children’s museum. There are pictures of her going on her first stroller ride, first nap in her crib, and so on. I probably would have taken a picture of her first BM if my wife would have let me.
Moving on to Henry’s baby book. First of all, as you can see, it’s about one-third the size of the first book, which seems about right. We probably took about one-third less pictures of him. Not that we didn’t like him, we were just busy chasing around a three-year-old when he was a baby, I must confess too, his book is actually only about a quarter full. Most of the pictures in his book are from the day he was born. The only other pictures in the book are from when my wife was home on maternity leave. I guess after that we were both too busy to actually print the digital pictures and put them in an album.
Which brings me to the third (nonexistent) album. Our poor, poor Maggie. What is this girl going to think when she grows up and there is no baby book for her? Maybe she already senses that she is being slighted a bit and that’s why she screams at me so much.
Don’t get me wrong, we have pictures of Maggie. Lots of them. The problem is, they are all “trapped” inside our Mac. I can open up iPhoto any time I would like and look at all the pictures we have of her. The problem is I also have to sift through the other random pictures we have; pictures of food (why? I don’t know), pictures for my blog, and pictures of the other two kids. So not only does Maggie not have a baby book, but the “digital” one she does have is also full of pictures of her siblings…and building blocks…and ribeyes.
So I guess it’s probably time to get started, a year and a half later, to make that third
baby book. At last check there were 6,969 pictures saved in iPhoto on our computer.
It’s a big job, but I think the hardest part will be just getting started. Just like the saying goes, “How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.”
I think I’m up for it as long as I don’t get distracted. Mmmm that’s a tasty looking ribeye, look at those grill marks!
Happy Parenting!
-Pete
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