new. {Project 52}

We spent last week in a place called Paradise Island. The name speaks for itself.

It's a place we've been visiting every year since Dylan was a baby (and once before he was even thought of, the getaway when my parents bought the timeshares -- on a cool, overcast day -- that we now enjoy annually).

So while the setting is more or less the same year after year, the characters keep growing, evolving, changing.

Each year, we do our best to take a family picture. (Well, Matt and I do our best; the other three are generally an over-tired, under-napped, sun burnt, ornery, don't-care mess.)

A long time ago I stopped shooting for perfect and now we go for good enough.

My take on the Project 52 theme this week? A new family picture, to kick off the start of a just-begun year, representing a fresh set of memories from a familiar, well-loved place.

2013 'Hamas Memories

Ella's lost tooth (she's now missing her two front teeth, that proverbial six year old rite of passage) and the Tooth Fairy scandal that followed.

Hours on a white sand beach spent sifting and searching for sea glass.

Mady's muddled, mumbled, adorable take on the English language. (One thing that's crystal clear? Her emphasis on the word now at the end of nearly every statement she makes.)

Beach football -- and the taller, leaner little man now holding his own with his Daddy. Most of the traces of my baby boy are gone.

An emergency orthodontics extraction (by Mommy, for Dylan) complete with a call to the orthodontist, at his home, on a Sunday afternoon.

Celebrity sightings to add to Matt's roster: chatting with Troy Polamalu, bumping into Michael Phelps. 

Traveling without a stroller, for the first time in eight years.

One of my favorite post-vacation activities -- in between fighting through the mounds of dirty laundry... which is not my favorite part -- is sorting through the photographs, smiling at the memories, and filing the fresh, new memories away alongside the old in my mama's heart.

A trip, vacation-style, down memory lane.
{Alas, no family picture last year, but I'll count one of all three kiddos as good enough.}

Click here to take a peak at how my friend Autumn sees "new" through her lens.