"A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember."

Oh dear, it's been one of those weeks. A week during which I'm convinced I flushed my Nikon battery. It was being stored it in my back pocket to keep it out of little hands, instead of running to my camera and putting it in right away (ahem). At least it was in said back pocket before I took a quick stop at the restroom, after which it was nowhere to be found. And now that our daily kid count is at four with the addition of two friends, whom I'll introduce shortly, the chance to run out and pick another up has been pretty slim. In the interim I picked up my old handy digital point & shoot to capture our life- without realizing that the memory card wasn't fully inserted (double ahem). So there you have it, a week of technological shortcomings and one tired Mama from running after the two large kids, and crawling after the two littlest ones. But I shall prevail, and share not one- but two!- crafts with you after the brief absence.

If you store every artwork of your child's lovingly away in plastic bins, I admire you. I did keep every artwork at first, but I realized we make so much of it that I needed to find another use for some of it- or hire out space (smile). It was a good problem to have. And as I look back through the ones I have kept aside, I'm still happy with my choices. Being a bit of an art ed geek, I do usually jot the date and draw arrow with notes sharing the significance. So in the future, if Isia asks me when she first drew something representational I can look back and remember it was a hand. We use a lot of paintings as wrapping paper and cards. But this painting became the holder for something sweet indeed...