picture day

Do you remember picture day?  Finding the perfect outfit, hoping that your hair will be just right, dreading any oncoming zits appearing on the tip of your nose.  In the 80's there was no such thing as "make up day" for pictures, so what the photographer captured is what stayed in scrapbook history.  I remember my eighth grade picture day and for some reason there was no vehicle for my mom to take me to school so I was forced to walk.  I lived about one mile from school and we walked to and from school quite often, but how could this be happening to me on picture day.  I was just beginning to use make-up and I had spent quite a bit of time "feathering" my hair and plastering it with V05 hair spray.  However on my way to school, it started sprinkling rain and my locks were beginning to lose their 80's big hair look, and of course I wasn't wearing waterproof mascara.  So as I entered the hallways of junior high, I wasn't quite as beautiful as I wanted to be.  I rushed into the girl's bathroom where my friends were fussing over themselves in the mirror and I borrowed eye shadow and a brush to repair the damage.  Lisa only had purple eye shadow for me to use which didn't enhance my brown eyes.  Needless to say, my 8th grade picture isn't my favorite, but it has the best memories.

Now it is so fun to relive picture day with my children each school year.  I have to make sure not to give Zac too short of a before school hair cut, Mason usually wears a nice button down shirt, Tyler surprises us each year with his "turtle" smile where he shows no teeth, Annie flashes her gorgeous smile as always, and then there is Ellie.  

My daughter Ellie is physically and mentally disabled and taking her picture is quite a challenge.  She will not respond to her name being called and she likes to keep her head turned down and tilted to the side most of the time.  On a few occasions I have been able to snap a beautiful picture when a small miracle happens and she looks straight at the camera and all I see is her big beautiful eyes and curly brown hair.  I pray for a patient school photographer who will help to get a good school photo.  I make the teacher call me when it is Ellie's turn to go down to the gym and I rush to the school to help.  Thank heavens for digital cameras, because yesterday we took over 30 pictures of Ellie to try to get the perfect one.  After twenty-five minutes I finally was able to choose one that was nice.  It is my hope that when the year book comes out, the high school kids will be able to see her tenderness and beauty in the photo and not her disability.

a little too quiet

First day of school and the Hayward home is very still.  Around the breakfast table pancakes were consumed, bags were packed, new shoes were laced tight and eager faces were kissed as they headed out the front door.  My oldest son Zac will be a senior this year which frightens me because I still have vivid memories of my senior year and I thought that I knew it all -- these same thoughts have been genetically transferred to my eighteen year old son.  My daughter Ellie will be a sophomore.  I just gave her wheelchair a thorough cleaning and wiped away all the summer dirt.  Annie is an 8th grader and already is holding her head a little higher because she will now rule the school.  It doesn't seem right that Mason is in 6th grade, and he came home and complained just a bit about it not being fair that the 6th graders had to go to lunch last.  Tyler, my baby, was just happy to be home again with enough daylight hours left to watch a cartoon or two. 

While my kids were away, I did a "clean it all" throughout my home and tried to see how much I could get done before the clock struck ten.  If I don't give myself a stopping time, I will just keep going and never quit.  Thank heavens I have enough drawers and closets that keep getting cluttered so I can continue to organize myself into the Organizational Hall of Fame.  I am waiting for them to open up a chapter in Provo so that I can join the club.

I am a new blogger and I think I have spent too much time getting my colors just right and my font just so and the layout just perfect on my page.  Once I figure all of this out I am sure I will keep making changes.  It took me three hours to come up with a name because every typist out there had already chosen the perfect blog address.  I was amazed that "Green Glass Beads" was available.  It comes from a line in a poem that my mother used to read to me in my younger days from a book called Silver Pennies.  It is about a little goblin who wants to take a nymph's "green glass beads" away and the nymph will not give them up because she cherishes them so.  I have many green glass beads in my life that I cherish and will never give away as this little nymph.