Happy 365 New Days (and mercies).

Andy brought this New Year’s headdress home for me exactly a year ago today. “It’s for your weekly pregnancy pic,” he declared proudly.  What can I say, he gets into my projects and I like it.  I ran across the picture last night during some digital reminiscing. I giggled at the hat and the memory of taking these pics while Andy was at work every week…and the steps that went something like this:

1. Set camera up on counter. 

2. Set timer. (And don’t forget this time)

3. Scurry to right spot, just so.

4. Figure out how to pose with this new body feature.

5. Smile. Or half smile.

6. Regret half smile decision. (Note: makes face look kinda chubby.  Always has, always will.  Accept it. You are not Katie Holmes.

7. Take pic. over

8. Take pic. again (Last time, I swear.)

9. Hope someone somewhere saw into our fishbowl home and laughed at the pregnant person taking selfies. 

10. Repeat process next week, all for the sake of remembering this beautiful, awkard season.

I laughed and re-lived these moments along with the tear-jerkers that single handedly made this one of the most magical years of my life...like Marin’s birth, the beach, our half marathon, our tiny little monkey.  And I was amazed and moved by this beautiful little year we got to call ours. I was also amazed at how ironically similar pieces of this year were to that silly photo shoot routine…learning to live in our new roles, super awkward at times and needing numerous re-dos and saying a million apologies.  Some years are just bigger than we are, and this one was- if that makes sense. It stretched us in all the ways we needed to be stretched…as parents, as best friends.  Big resolutions used to really excite me, and in a way they still do a bit (mine are neatly scribbled in my journal), but what I’ve come to on the matter of a New Year is that I’m really glad a New Year, when you break it down, is 365 days of HIS new mercies.  And this is good news for me as a mom, friend, wife, and daughter. 

Happy New Year (and new mercies), friend.