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The story of our precious little girl's 17 months of life with Trisomy 18 (July 4, 2010 - December 15, 2011) and of us, re-learning to live "after Lilly."
"I will praise you for I am fearfully and wonderfully made ...." Psalm 139:14

Monday, March 10, 2014

What book is this? And NILMDTS photo session from a photographer's viewpoint

My brother P. had a comment to make about NC State's BookBot that I mentioned in my post on books yesterday:

They finished the BookBot after I was done at NC State, so I never saw it, but one of our neighbors works at NC State and he helps run it.  I think the main reason for it is that they can fit many more books in the same amount of space compared to if they were on regular shelves--so you actually have more access to books that way.  I believe that only the engineering and science books are in the BookBot, though, so the history, philosophy, and religion books are safe and free to browse for on the shelves :-)

Ha!  I thought that was interesting.  I bet the engineering and science types are the ones that appreciate the BookBot.  (Our resident engineer/science guy (Hunter) is still pouring over the BookBot article and pictures every day.)

Watsonia. Tabby has decided to keep one of the black puppies instead. The puppies can start being adopted out next week!
I have an antique cabinet (1930s?) I got from my mother-in-law's now closed antique store.  The shelves are covered with old pages from books and hymnals.  There is a page from a children's story that I found rather interesting and would love to know what book it is from.  (I tried to google parts of the story but couldn't find it.) It is the beginning of a chapter called "Doing Work Well." (If you by chance recognize this story, please let me know!)  In the below excerpt, the mother of two children, Bob and Louise, is sharing some things that help her work:

One day, mother said, “When I was a little girl, I learned a verse to sing as I worked. Do you want to learn it?”
Of course they did, so mother sang:
When a task is once begun
Never leave it till it’s done;
Be it great or be it small,
Do it well or not at all.
“Tell us something else that helped you do your work when you were a little girl,” the children begged.
“Oh, there were many Bible folk who helped me,” answered mother.
“There was Miriam who looked after her baby brother Moses. She did not leave her job until it was done. I used to help look after my little brother. I played I was Miriam.”
“And Samuel helped me,” mother went on. “He learned to polish the silver and light the lamps and open the doors of God’s house. He found many things to do, to help Eli.”


And that's all I have!  I would love to read more about what other "Bible folk" inspired the mother in doing her work.  :)

The other day I got an e-mail from Lilly's Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep photographer.  He said he had started a photography blog and had up a post mentioning Lilly.  His post was about a particularly difficult NILMDTS photography session he recently had.  It involved an angel baby at the hospital.  I found the post interesting because honestly I never really thought a lot about what a photography session like that was like from the photographer's viewpoint - I've always been too focused on what it was like from my perspective.  (Note that this photographer has a preemie son with Down Syndrome who's twin died.)  You can read his post here.  


from Lilly's NILMDTS photo session
The photographer's concluding section of his blog post addresses people who don't understand why someone would want pictures of their dead baby.  Even though we were blessed to have Lilly survive birth and live 17 months, I still wanted pictures of her dead.  (And posted some to this blog.)  Why?  It is part of the healing process.  And it is something physical to HAVE when you no longer have your child in your arms.  Parents of angel babies may or may not choose to display those pictures permanently in their home.  (I know families on both sides of this.)  But no matter where they have those photos, they help prove that that baby did exist, and remind the parents of the details of the child's precious face and body.  (Even I have flashes of time where I think "Did Lilly really exist?"  I then study some of the pictures I have hanging up and conclude "of course she did!")

Still, I know there are some people that think keeping pictures of your dead child is "warped" or just wrong in some way.  Or that it is "unhealthy" to have pictures up of your now dead child (from when they were alive).  They say things like: "it's time to move on" or "get over it."  That is fine for you to have that opinion.  But please, please, please - give others grace to use their photos (or things from their dead child) as they need to.  We all grieve differently.

Ok.  I really didn't plan to say all that in this post.  But it just came out as I thought of our experiences and other peoples that I have heard about!

"Therefore encourage one another and build one another up . . ."  - 1 Thessalonians 5:11

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