Lessons from a child for goodbyes - take photos!

Brady teaches me things all the time. It especially surprises me what he comes up with when I don't have the words to make a difficult thing better.

We spent two days with my husband's family in Omaha, Nebraska - his sister, nephew and niece, and their daughter, a sweet 2-year-old little girl. It is no overstatement to say Brady ADORES her.

When it was time to go, he was very, very sad. I told him I understood how he felt and I was sorry and we'd see them again soon, but I didn't know how to really make leaving any better. But leave it to him to come up with his own self-soothing method. "I know! I can take pictures with my DS!"

Sure enough, he took his Nintendo DS which he'd been taking pictures with the whole ride up and snapped pictures of her, her room, her "jewelry box", their apartment. Now he has memories that he can access anytime he wants, whenever he thinks of her or misses her. I'm going to print them and put them in an album for him too.

It's interesting to see what a child photographs, what they deem important. Next time we have a sad goodbye or situation he will miss, I'm going to use his idea and encourage him to take photos that he can look at later. How powerful that he can take his own photographs of what he wants to remember, not memories that have been filtered through me or any other adults. They are HIS. What a great idea, Brady.

Here are some photos that he took with his own Nintendo DS.

His first two pictures were of little Morgan herself.

 The next were of her toys, the slide they went down together and the jewelry he helped her collect from various places in her room and put in one box. He was "teaching" her how to do it. 

Next came the TV show - Bubble Guppies - that they watched together. 

On the ride up he took pictures of interesting things: the Supersaurus from the dinosaur book his Dad got him (that's a person next to it! Wow!) and the Wendy's sign. 

And here had some fun with a picture of Mommy :)