Read more about New & Gold co-founder Rachel Creighton's Lenten promise to capture more of the seemingly small moments unfolding in front of the lens. Scroll down to view the documentary photo series.
For Lent this year, my husband, Mike, told me he wanted to put his phone away when he was home with the kids. He decided when he was with them, he would not be opening it to check work emails or texts, or even to take pictures or videos. It was a way to be fully present with them. I found his Lenten promise to be thoughtful and admirable. But it did make me laugh a little because as the primary caretaker at home with our kids, I don’t need to ever put my phone away because I literally never know where it is 99% of the time! Some days it’s in the couch cushions, or in the middle of a pile of unfolded laundry. Sometimes I find the twins trying to eat it. Other days I catch my almost three year old hacking into it and casually swiping through whichever of his apps he finds most appealing that day. Bottom line is, when I’m with my kids, I basically never have time to use my phone. Mike would often come home and ask me to show him pictures or videos from the day and I found myself feeling sad that I didn’t really have much to show. Nothing to replay to myself after bedtime when it’s finally my time to unwind and all I seem to want to do is see glimpses of the kids I just spent ALL day with, again.
“The days are long, but the years are short.” We’ve all heard the saying before. I feel like with three kids under the age of three the phrase should be adjusted a bit. It’s more like “The days are an exhaustingly endless shitshow, but the years are a fucking blur.” After our twins turned one this past February I thought to myself, seriously, what the fuck just happened?! At least that’s how it feels in my house. So for my own Lenten promise, I decided I would come up with my own version of being present. A way to make the ordinary, mundane, and often maddening days feel a little less blah, and a little more special. As a photographer, I pride myself in candidly capturing beautiful moments for other families. Images they can look back on that make them feel warm and joyful. In the midst of my own chaos, I’d forgotten that I didn’t need a styled wardrobe and a picturesque backdrop to highlight special moments in time with my kids. Ultimately, the moments that made me really feel something, were the simple ones. The ones that brought me right back to that connecting glance, that infectious laugh, or even that deafening wail. These were the truly beautiful but always fleeting moments in the midst of our crazy everyday life that I wanted to remember. For the last 40 days I kept my camera by my side and sought those moments out whenever I could. The collages below are a collection of some of my favorite images from this time. When I look back on them, I'm transported right back to behind the lens and reminded of these views from this season in my motherhood journey.
