I began recapping our weekends on Annapolis in May of 2011.  {First one is HERE.}  When I created my first 9-square grid in photoshop {with heavy help from the tech guy around here} I had no idea it would stick and I would find myself in this new year ready to forge on ahead with it.  I had no idea some of the implications it would have on my perspective and our life.  But this weekend thing has been one of the best overflows of blogging.

{Photo from May, 2011…our first weekend I started photographing.}

Sometimes I don’t feel like dragging out my big camera for our errand runs {no iphone over here yet!}.  And sometimes there is that initial “treading thin water feel” when you ask your friend after coffee if you can snap a picture…what will she think of me?  Will she think I’m really into myself?  Will she never want to do coffee again over this weird hobby of mine?  {Turns out, friends don’t dump you because of it.  It ends up turning into some really great laughs!}

Awkwardness and big cameras aside, as I sit here looking back on all my weekend photos, I’m really glad I’ve done it.  I look back on the year and relive the best parts of life.  Skipping all the schooner whining…our grownup fights…our bad days…just seeing the simple memories we made and the places we got to visit makes me grateful for life and 2012.  And that, in and of itself, is so worth it.  Our weekends have taught me a few things too…

It’s caused me to be intentional about our Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays.

It’s awakened a creative gene in me for photography.

It’s created an online scrapbook of photos for our family.

It’s helped me to see life with a greater perspective, the bigger picture.

It’s taught me to be disciplined and consistent.

It’s helped me get over a lot of fears about sticking my face behind a lens in public.

Until that blessed day when I break down and invest in an iPhone, I’m going to keep digging my DSLR out of my diaper bag, snapping photos of our weekends.  In the library.  At the aquarium.  The grocery store.  The Starbucks coffee date.  The weekend trip to Dallas.  It’ll all be recorded for the somedays when I need a reminder that we lived life.  Full.  And it was a good ride.

Will you join me on Monday???

Grab your iPhone, DSLR, point and shoot, whatever you have this weekend. And snap your memories.  The mundane.  The special.  The everyday.

You’ll be so glad you did one day.

{Come back tomorrow for a tutorial on how to get a square photo box for your weekend pictures.  Don’t worry.  You don’t have to have Photoshop.  But you can.  I’m stoked to see you in class tomorrow.}

*Cupcake courtesy of Alter Egos Cupcakery.  

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