For Grandma

Today, I took a whole slew of pictures of Sydney after church.

I like doing pictures and I often chose funky prints and posses and settings and I know that my mother, for example, would really just like a sweet little girl picture or two thrown in the mix.

So, in honor of the small fortune my mother spends on sweet little girl dresses, sandals, and bows, I thought the least I could do was try to get some good pictures for her.

Of course, Sydney still is Sydney, so in one picture you may find her pipe cleaner magnifying glass that helps her pass time during church services and in all but one picture, she is holding on to her leaf.

(It's a weekly tradition to stop by the big Magnolia tree and find the biggest, best leaf possible. She takes it to Sunday School, puts it in her cubby and then it gets "lost" somewhere on the way to the car.)

In many of the pictures, she is spinning like Maid Marian. My mother, of course, chose the dress in large part because of it's spinning-ness. My mother understands little girls in that way.

I think that Sydney is beautiful in any setting... covered head to toe with paint, mud or flour, wearing plaid and polka dots or dressed to the nines. But I do have to admit that she looked particularly cute this morning in her pretty church dress.

I also like to think of the possibility of a much, much, much older Sydney, with a college degree (or two) standing under that very same Magnolia tree wearing a long white dress. At which point, I will cry nostalgic tears of the day she was holding on to a leaf, pretending to be Maid Marian.

So this post is mostly for my mother, Sydney's grandma, to prove that she did indeed wear the new dress, that I thought it was beautiful, and that Sydney loved it as well... especially with the "bones" in her hair.

(P.S. Mom -- check your e-mail, I sent all the pictures to you via Walgreens so you can order what you like and even make one into a 5x7 or 8x10 if you would like.)