In a recent post, I shared two photos. This was the first one, taken in early December 2006.
It's a picture of a little girl discovering Christmas as something magical for the first time. My daughter was fascinated by the baubles and strings on the tree and I told her more than once to be careful by the tree. That's why she has that little smile on her face, with her just touching the pearls.
While I was browsing my folder of December 2006 photos, I came across a picture that was kind of fuzzy and barely in focus. (I didn't have a smartphone at the time and my camera … you know, the kind they used to have, with film … had stopped working the year before.)
Taking good pictures was hit-and-miss and I often depended on other people's cameras. So, I was confused for a minute as to when I had taken that picture of Jessica sleeping; she looked unwell.
I browsed through a few more pictures and checked the date. The “Christmas” pictures my husband and I took with our daughter and infant son were taken a week after Christmas. Then it suddenly all came back to me. My daughter had measles over Christmas. I had forgotten this completely.
She was sick for the better part of two weeks and had a fever for several days running. We had to keep the curtains closed so her eyes wouldn't be affected (I’d read measles can do damage to the eyes). Jessica loved flipping through books and I was teaching her to read, and it was hard not allowing her to read or watch anything.
That picture I took of Jessica sleeping was taken the morning after Christmas. The Christmas season was always very busy, as I mentioned in my last post, so the day after Christmas was when we had planned a nice brunch with our friends and coworkers.
Then Jessica got sick, which meant I had to stay home with her and “baby Allen,” as she called her little brother at the time. This was Christmas from my perspective that year. In a darkened room with my feverish daughter, and trying to keep my four-month-old son occupied and happy, yet not disturbing his sister.
Have you ever watched the movie Inside Out?
It came out during a phase when I was not really into kids’ cartoons and wasn't watching many of them with my kids, but then we ended up watching it at the recommendation of a friend. I was stunned at how meaningful it was for me.
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