Picture Perfect

Written by Kristin Orphan,

FHF Founder and Director

kristin@finallyhomefoundation.net

I’m sitting at my computer staring at the screen saver.  It is a picture of my family.  We are all smiling, wearing matching clothes and the scenery is beautiful.  My kind of day!  Today’s reality is quite a bit different. Two of the smiling children from the picture are downstairs yelling at each other.   Ironically, in between poses, there was quite a bit of bickering on picture day, too.  That’s life, I suppose. I have a whole row of family pictures throughout the years.  My favorite is the first one we took when our daughters joined our family through adoption.  I love to look at all the pictures and see how much everyone has changed and how far we’ve come as a family.  The pictures are like markers on a timeline. There’s so much of the story that happens in between.  Some memories are painful and there’s a lot of hard work involved getting to the next marker.  But, it doesn’t keep me from treasuring those moments when everyone laughs at a shared family joke.  Or, like last week, when my three teenagers got up early on their first day of summer to attend their little sister’s fifth grade graduation.  It was an hour and a half ceremony!  And yet, they perked up from their teenage stupor when their sister’s name was called and clapped loudly.  Yes, we have our moments and as my grandma used to say, “we sure do clean up well.”