Well, after the excitement of getting my first picture featured by Flickr in Explore, I finally relaxed and got back to the business of taking photos for myself instead of for everybody else this week.
I think that sentiment is best encapsulated in this picture I took on Sunday. I adore this wooden cradle. It has cradled all three of my boys as newborns, and Lucas grew too large for it at least a couple of months ago. Before I put it away for good, though, I wanted to take this one last image. I wanted it to be a moody, dark shot, though, because I also wanted to pay a tribute to those years of doubt and sadness back before Tristan was born, when we weren’t sure if we’d ever be able to have the kids we wanted so badly. The darkness of those years of infertility will always be a part of us, I think. And then, of course, there were the three babies lost: the first one at 13 weeks, in 2000; the second one, Tristan’s twin, lost at 9 1/2 weeks in 2001; and the baby we lost in 2006 at 16 weeks. So this picture is a tribute to them, and to Frostie, too. An acknowledgment of what never was, and of the joy with which we have been blessed.
(That’s a really long explanation for a picture I should maybe have just let speak for itself.)
None of the other pictures this week are nearly so laden with meaning or melancholy. In fact, most of them are either shots for a new scavenger hunt game I’m playing (thank goodness, because it provides me with ideas and inspirations I desperately need right now) or pictures inspired by the changing (often hourly!) seasons.
(No, that last one is not me in a blizzard. It’s me reflected in a giant 8×10 sheet of granite outside a local granite and concrete shop on a beautiful day around lunchtime. Neat effect though, eh?)
Love the granite shot!
Not so sure about the crib. Too dark. Your living babies were in that crib, and the photo does not reflect that. That photo is all about death, and the focus is the crib in which your precious babies spent their first days and weeks.
Subtle shadows maybe, but you need more light.