Thursday, November 12, 2009

ELEVENTY BAJILLION THINGS

Eleventy Bajillion - that's how many things I think about each day regarding our adoption. Big things, little things. Important things, silly things. My current thought and wonder is photography.

I am a documenter. I document everything, it's what I do (hence this blog!). I have two great cameras - one little, one big. I have a camcorder. I blog. My children have baby books that I actually write in. I stress if I can't photograph a moment or if I forget a date before I can write it down.

So imagine my concern on our upcoming (however far it may be in the future) trip to China. I know that I am going to be consumed with my new little girl, I am not going to want to be messing with a camera (at first, at least). I am going to be needing a photographer and a videographer. How will I ever pull this off?

I am mostly just concerned with our Gotcha moment. I am going to be a basket case. Not to mention I am going to be busy smooching my new little one. I will have a lot of smooches to catch up on, I can not be bothering with a camera.

So BTDT moms, tell me, how did you capture those moments? I will pay an innocent bystander on the street if I have to, but I would like to hear what other's have done or plan to do?

**DISCLAIMER** For the record, I am well aware that "eleventy bajillion" is not a real number. I also am well aware that "documenter" is not a real word. I just wanted to put minds at ease, especially those that know I homeschool my children.

6 comments:

Kathy said...

Thank you for such sweet comments !
I have thought the same thing about capturing all THE MOMENTS. It is very important to me to have every aspect of our China journey documented. Who is going to do that at
Gotcha ? I think I have heard of other families(that haven't met their child yet) taking turns videoing...Not sure. I will let you know when we are in China.

TanyaLea said...

LOL!...so glad you cleared up that grammar...we were pretty concerned over here! ;) Actually, I was love'in the the title of this post!! :)

I can't offer any suggestions, as of yet... but I am certainly anxious to hear what others have to say!! Since we plan to take Breanna and Dawson with us, I was going to train them in for the 'gotcha moment'...and then we'll pass the camera around so that they can be in 'the moments' too!!

Hugs,
Tanya

Beth said...

My sister traveled with 2? other families getting their children. The way it was done in Russia, they got their children one at a time and so the other families were able to document the gotcha moment.

Tara. said...

The moments that you capture in your heart and in your memory will be much more lasting that those you catch on camera or video. :o)

Meet and smooch and praise God first, the camera and camcorder can come out after the initial greeting. And I'm sure the orphanage workers are so used to taking over and doing that for you-they do it all the time.

I can't wait to see those moments captured. I will cry for joy and praise God. It will be amazing and beautiful. ♥

Jeanette said...

You post sounds exactly like me. I thought the very same thing about the gotcha moment and friends even warned me to have a back up plan and MAKE SURE we had someone lined up to take pictures AND video tape the moment. Well, all I have to say is just don't have any expectations. Turns out there were only 2 families in our province so we couldn't ask them to take pictures or video for us. Sara Beth was already in the room before we got there so when we walked in I took some pics and my hubby took some video (actually, he thought he was video taping but actually wasn't). In all honestly, the last thing I was thinking about once we saw our daughter was making sure I had the moment captured on film. The most important thing was her. It was such a traumatic moment for her and the fact that she was scared of cameras didn't help either. Anyway, we did get a few pics and some video but not the way I had imagined it would be before we left and that is ok. We have a lifetime of taking pictures and videos together. My advice is plan, but don't stress about it and expect your plans to totally go out the window once you see your sweet girls face! How exciting for you!!! Blessings,
Jeanette

Blondie said...

My thought is an expensive one...is there any chance of another family member or friend that can afford to travel with you? It would not only give you a documenter but an extra pair of hands with the other kids. (FYI - my Mac doesn't tag documenter as a nonexistent word. Eleventy bajillion, yes, but I personally love both eleventy and bajillion. And I homeschool my children. And I have a degree. Just not in English grammar or spelling! LOL)