Peter Pan Meets Cinderella

April.  The time seems to go by so quickly between posts.  It seems like there is never enough time to catch up in the family journal while life seems to be going at 100 mph.

The boys are 4 1/2 and 16 months now, caught in that perfect age of innocent splendor.  Everything centers around what is in the moment and next week is a long time away.  It's April and TJ is looking at toys for Christmas with no concept of how far away that it is - next Friday, maybe? 

On our staircase are an arrangement of photos from the last seven years.  There is Samantha at 7 in an inner tube in Cayuga Lake.  TJ, at 18 months at the Cortland Pumpkin Festival.  I have memories of those days, but so much has taken place since those pictures were taken that it's hard to remember what the kids were actually like as toddlers and kids. 

It's almost possible to fathom them in five years when we see the other kids who are nine-ish around the block, but imagining TJ and Grant at 14 and 11 - ten years from now, is difficult because there are only the slightest of hints of the boys they will turn into.  And so they are trapped in the here and now, forever a little boy and forever a toddler.

It's hard to remember Samantha at 4 years old since I am giving her, her first driving lessons this week.  Ten years ago my life was still in transition and I was not on the same solid ground as I am now.  I was absorbed with my own here and now and my memories are fuzzy.  And that's why I want these two to stay this young forever.

Forever sweet and adorable.

As a sign of everyone getting older, "Auntie Tina" came to town with her son, Hanson.  She holds a special place in our lives.  Tina was Lisa's housemate in graduate school in San Diego and was the maid of honor at our wedding.  Tina was also once Cinderella at Disneyland (and Alice in Wonderland).  Given our affinity for Disney we think that's cools.  We told TJ about her alter ego but TJ didn't really have the ability to connect that Cinderella was not actually Cinderella.  I mean, how could she possibly be Auntie Tina too?!

Everybody grows up.  Some do it better than others.  The boys and Samantha stay forever young in the photos and home movies we have of them.  A ransom against their own kids one day, but for now a great place to start to tell the stories from when they were young.