Rules Schmules

I am breaking my own rule (briefly) to share a picture of my boys with you.

Because even I, who make dire pronouncements about pedophilia and the monsters who lurk in the dark shadows of the interweb, cannot resist showing off my offspring from time to time.

This is the photo that will grace our family Christmas card this year. Gone are the days of perfectly coordinated outifts, cheery holiday backdrops, and kitschy but holiday appropriate props.

This is my boys as they are. Diminutive One with his truly unique style, his cheesy "there's a camera pointed at me" grin, and the still discernible traces of my little boy in him; and Pre-Pubescent One with his Zac Efron hairdo, his too long limbs and not yet straight teeth. You can see the emerging adult if you look closely. It's in his bones, the promsise of the man he will be.

I wish you could see Diminutive One's eyes better. He has absolutely amazing eyes. They are sometimes grey, sometimes blue, sometimes green. They are enormous and have the most incredibly long, dark lashes. Also, he has the cutest freckles. Naturally, they are the bane of his existence, but I adore them.

You can't tell from this picture, but Pre-pubescent one is all legs. He is not quite 13, but stands almost 5' 5". He hasn't an ounce of fat on him anywhere. He is all angles, long and gawky. Sometimes he can't get comfortable in his own body. Sometimes I can't believe he is the same tiny creature that swam from between my legs at a mere 5 lbs. 14 oz.

As you can see, they are as different as night and day. One or two tactless individuals have even asked me if they have the same father. They do, incidentally. They are just fantastically unique individuals. And I like them that way.

Times up. I can't let them dangle out there in the peril of cyber space forever. It goes against everything I believe in as a mother. Thanks all for looking at my babies.

Aren't they handsome?