169 - WANTING

I don't know about you but I believe this look is that of a typical teenager at a family reunion wanting to be somewhere else. She really is quite beautiful when she smiles.

168 - PRAY

I love this time of the year...although it is running a few weeks behind what with the delayed end of the winter. All the flowers are shining...although not as much as they normally do given the fact that now, after a long winter, the rains keep avoiding us also. Daily as I drive miles back and forth to my place of employment...I pray and hope...that some day I will be able to sit back and enjoy all of this just a bit more.

167 - SECRETLY

She looked over the edges of the boat, watches the seagulls and pelicans from a distance, secretly wishing as quietly as she could, that she could join them in the water on this warm...okay hot....humid day in the midwest. She is a January baby and so prefers the colder months over these warmer ones.

165 - PARTITION

This teenager robin was not about ready to let the fence partition I had around my garden stop him from pulling yet another worm from the fresh ground. I, knowing that he will keep some of the other bugs down, was in no way going to discourage him from romping in and amidst my veggies.

Day 164 - ENTERING

Standing. Waiting. For that last group picture of themselves surrounded by their friends of the last few years. For some....friends of the past 12 or 13 years. Waiting. To throw the hats. Waiting. Knowing. That the step they take off of those bleachers represents the entering into the next chapter of their life. The chapter that will require more schooling. Maybe. Work. full time. Not just part time. Entering into reality of adulthood. Where work is now not just... a way to get of the house, a form of spending money to be received. Work is now...required..for the most part. A necessity. Hopefully a selffulfilling, productive and awesome aweome chapter two.

Day 163 - FEAT

It's a feat any teenager should be proud of...making it through that first important chapter of life. One that many I know, never succeeded at. One that many more will have a difficult time with yet a feat that society so demands these days to get a half way decent job.


At the same time, as we parents know and are all too familiar with, it's a wonderful feat for the parents also...to have been able to 'entice', at times' our children to keep on going. Definitely a feat to be proud of for both parents and children.

Day 162 - BALANCE

There is this one little path way coming off of the boardwalk that wanders through a quaint little foresty area at the marsh I frequent. A pathway on which I know there will always be the chippers skampering around doing what they do best....make me smile. This little guy tried to sit as still as possible and balance on top of this log in hopes that I wouldn't see him. I was amazed how close he allowed me to get. He sat. He watched. He posed. He smiled. He skampered away.