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Lindsay Teague Moreno

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My Girls

Our Weekend in Black and White in Project Life

August 21, 2017 by Lindsay Teague Moreno Leave a Comment

I realize that I never shared my 2016 Project Life page for my Weekend in Black and White project I do throughout the year.
our-weekend-2016 Lindsay Teague Moreno Project Life
I love capturing the girls in their natural environment. Just being who they are at this moment — doing normal things. On this day we played dolls, we went for pedicures, we played in the basement, we hit up church and sang in the car. Completely us on a Saturday.

Here is a close-up look at both sides. I like to mix bright quotes and elements with a little bit of story and really contrast-y black and white images. As always, i build my pages with Project Life kits and Ali Edwards elements.

Right side:

our-weekend-2016-left Lindsay Teague Moreno Project Life

Left Side:

Don’t freak out about being behind on getting your photos into your albums. I am behind too. Just start where you are and work backwards.

Filed Under: Project Life, The Good Life Tagged With: Crafty, Family, My Favorite Things, My Girls, Photography, Photos, Project Life, Scrapbooking, writing

They Grow Up Fast

October 26, 2016 by Lindsay Teague Moreno 24 Comments

My little ones are funny. Especially, the smallest of the little ones, Kennedy. She tells me all the time she doesn’t want to get older. She asked if she could stay five this year when her sixth birthday rolled around in the serious way that five-year-olds talk about Disney Princesses being actual, real human beings. She believed it so it could be.

Kinda strange.

I can remember being a kid and I couldn’t wait until I was older to be able to make my own choices and not be parented. I could eat all the snacks and watch all the movies. No, I did not want to remain a kid. I wished those years away and you know? I wouldn’t go back to that.

Maybe that means M and I are too easy on our kids? I don’t know. We expect a lot from them and often I think we forget how young they actually are based on what we require of them. Our list of rules is long but I think they’re really good girls. I have to credit that to the standard of behavior we require and not my actual parenting skills because, friends, I’m severely lacking in the sympathetic mom category. I more closely relate to that tiger mother but without the actual follow-through because ain’t nobody got time for that.

Yesterday, Kennedy kept coming into my office at the end of my work day and kinda whining at me. Like a half cry and half whine but she didn’t know why, so I asked her to leave and check her attitude. Again, not sympathetic. She walks back in about 5 minutes later and says, “mom I’m tired.” School recess. That will do it.

I’m not cold to them but I don’t always love my kids touching on me and laying all over me. I like my space. I have 2 little girls who are touchy, feely, girly, sensitive and just generally affectionate. They look like me but I think they’re soft and sweet inside like their daddy. They want me to let them lay directly on me at all times including but not limited to eating dinner, watching a movie, work, picking up, driving the car, talking on the phone, showering. You name it, they want to be on me. That’s not usually Kennedy though. That’s her older sisters. Kennedy likes to play alone. Her teachers were concerned about it this year (even called us into a meeting about it) but  we know that’s just who she is and who she always has been. She doesn’t like to do what everybody else is doing, she’s fiercely independent. She asks a kid at church their name before she leaves just so she can assure us she talked to SOMEONE else that day but left up to her? She’d find something that nobody else was interested in and do that.

As my twins reach the ripe age of 8, they understand personal space and social norms more and more. So the demanded snuggle and consoling is less and less, which I’m both thankful for and fearful of in a strange twist of emotion. I opened my arms up to see if Kennedy wanted to sit on my lap yesterday while I finished work and she crawled up just like this.

addy-snuggs

She wrapped both arms around my neck and shoulders. She laid her chest on my chest and she just put her head on me. I think she just wanted to hear me breathe and to hold her. I realize that soon she’s not going to be this small and she’s not going to want to crawl up on me when she’s tired. I had to let it happen. About 5 minutes later she was done, she unhooked herself from me and she smiled the rest of the night. This is not something I can ever remember doing with my mom as a kid. I don’t think I would have asked her to let me lay on her. Emotions and touching = awkward and uncomfortable. Better just avoid it.

I breathed in every moment of this time with her. I think I needed it as much as she did. Sometimes, as a mom, I don’t feel overly skilled or equipped. Often I feel awkward in motherhood. Sometimes, though, the girls tell me exactly how they feel about how I’m doing. This is one of those times.

I have to be doing something right. I’m reminded that we’re all doing the best we can with what we have. Many of us…ME…grew up in a crazy situation and our model of parenthood was anything but healthy. We’re trying to figure it out, aren’t we? Take these little hugs as a sign that you’re doing it. Give yourself some grace. They may remember that you yelled at them once and completely lost your shit but they’ll also remember that you hugged them and let them just be tired on you. They need to see that anyway. What kind of situation are we setting them up for if they think we always got it right as a mom? They’re going to be miserable when the reality of parenting smacks them across the face and kicks them in the chest on DAY ONE. They need us to be flawed.

I snapped this photo with my computer not 24 hours ago and I’m already at my end with my kids today. This feeling is fleeting. Capture as much as you can. Tell yourself to remember it. Try to think about it when you’re ready to let the neighbors have one of them for keeps.

That thing that moms with grown up kids say to us that we hate? The dreaded 4 words: “THEY GROW UP FAST.” We curse that horrible phrase when it’s said to us standing in Target while the kids beg you mercilessly for things they don’t need and then throw a complete attitude when the answer is no. The stranger looks on our terrible reality wistfully and sighs that annoying “you’ve got the life” sigh. That’s not what we want to hear but you know it and I know it…

She’s right.

It’s going by fast. Just look back and see how fast and yet how slow. As a mom, I tend to forget when I get it right and remember all the things I screw up. There’s got to be more grace, moms. When I say grace I simply mean forgiveness without merit. More grace from us to ourselves. We’re never going to be perfect so why are we expecting it from ourselves? Don’t pretend it’s all going to be 5-minute hugs and great manners. It’s the trenches. It’s hard. You’re doing it right, even when it feels all wrong.

Lindsay Teague Moreno

Filed Under: #LadyBoss Life, The Good Life Tagged With: Family, Me, My Girls, Work at Home Mom

Our Weekend in Black & White

August 1, 2016 by Lindsay Teague Moreno 16 Comments

I used to be awesome.

I used to take my trusty Canon 5D MarkIII out with me all over the place and capture my girls being who they are. The great thing about that is that they got so used to me taking pictures, they stopped posing. They just went about their business and pretty soon, I was just a fly on the wall. It has made for some great photographic moments. Like this one…

boston crying

Look at her tiny little crying face so mad because she couldn’t have something. She doesn’t really do this anymore because she’s older. She’s 7 and not 2. She doesn’t make the same sounds. She doesn’t have the same cheeks. She doesn’t hang on my leg like she used to. And this one…

teagan makeup

There’s still chubby in her hands. She was wearing my scarf on her head because she wanted long straight hair like me. Oh my gosh I miss these days. I can remember them because I took these pictures. It almost makes me lose my breath because, moms, how is it possible to miss it when all we wanted was for it to be gone? Is that not the most unfair and confusing feeling? To look back and miss what you only wanted to make it through alive? How? It’s a question I have for God because I cannot make sense of it.

In 2013, I stopped carrying my camera everywhere and started working everywhere. Isn’t it a cruel thing to do something for your kids at the expense of time with them? It’s turned out to be the right thing but as I was sifting through my old hard drives trying to organize them, I realize how much my creative eye has missed. I haven’t watched them though my lens and I see them the best though that tiny eye-piece. I see them as a beautiful piece of art, as a moment gone forever and not as a kid who’s whining and won’t be getting her way anytime soon. I see them as subjects and not my kids who must be “mommed.” I’m better with my face smashed into the back of my camera.

As I did more sorting, I decided now is the time to get back into it. To see them though my lens again and not just through the snap of my iPhone shutter button. It’s not the same, for me at least. God gave me the love of photography for a reason and I think it was to be able to give my kids the gift of their story before they were old enough to tell it.

So this weekend, I decided to do what I used to do and capture it. I used to call it “Our Weekend in Black and White” and that’s what it shall continue to be called. So here it is…

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

©Lindsay Teague Moreno

I challenge you to see your kids though your lens this weekend coming up. Just observe them and take pictures of what they do at this age. I’ll give you my black and white conversion tips this week so you’re fully prepared. It’s easy as pie. You’ll appreciate it in a couple of years when they’re 2 years older and 2 years closer to not being around to document.

Here’s to the hardest job I’ve ever had, Moms! This is just one step we can take in the name of doing the best we can.

Lindsay Teague Moreno

Filed Under: #LadyBoss Life, Click, The Good Life Tagged With: #LadyBoss, Family, Me, Michael, My Girls, Photography, Photos

Inspiring A Love of Reading

July 28, 2016 by Lindsay Teague Moreno 14 Comments

You guys, when I was a kid, I did not love reading. I am ashamed to tell you that I didn’t finish one of the assigned books for high school or college. Not one. Not even ones I liked. Worst student ever. I was a school failure. I didn’t start loving reading until I was about 25 and I started picking up books that appealed to me.

Authors like Jen Lancaster that made me laugh out loud in public. Authors like Jim Rohn and Zig Ziglar that made me think I could do something more. I like authors that make me feel things.

I don’t want that for my kids though. I want them to pick up a love of reading earlier than 25.  I wonder if loving reading is something innate or something they can learn? I wonder if I do better about reading in front of them, with them or basically making that a part of what we do, they’ll love it more?

Boston Reading

I can already see a couple of my kids gravitate toward the discipline of reading more easily than one. Boston, my little love. She wants to draw and create and make things. She’d rather sit with a blank sheet of paper and I want to foster that, too. Momming is the WORST sometimes. What’s the right thing? The girls’ new school is really pushing hard on academics so she needs to read but is that more important than drawing and being creative? I don’t know.

Do you remember the BookIt program from when we were kids? You got futuristic glasses and free Personal Pan Pizzas from Pizza Hut for reading? You best believe I did that as a kid. This summer, the library here in Denver, did that kind of program and my girls all did it. One begrudgingly and the others happily.

Reading Ivy + BeanHere’s Kennedy with a series she’s loving right now. If you have a little girl, Ivy + Bean and Bad Kitty are house favorites.

Ivy + Bean Books

BadKitty Books

Do you have any tricks to helped your kids love reading? Do you think you can inspire your kids to want to read more? How about other books your little girls loved? There’s nothing I think can inspire and help us be better at this thing called life like a book can. They’re necessary. They’re like air and water. We need the mind’s of genius people who share their truth with us.

I know my daughters can do better than I did on the reading and I really want that for them. Maybe I’ll go read a book on how to make that happen.

Lindsay Teague Moreno

Filed Under: The Good Life Tagged With: Family, My Girls, Read, school

A Child Bride

October 21, 2015 by Lindsay Teague Moreno 7 Comments

Here’s something you should know about me up front, I’m not a birthday person. I think it’s great when other people are, it’s just not how I was raised. So birthday parties are always an afterthought for my kiddos. I much prefer to celebrate Christmas in a big way. I do try to give my kids a little family celebration with a cake and a theme.  Each year, I decorate the table after they go to sleep so they can feel special when they wake up.

This year, for her 5th birthday, Addy (her name is Kennedy but we gave her the nickname Addy so people wouldn’t shorten her name to “Ken”) wanted a wedding theme. Yea, you read that right, she wanted to be a bride. A visit to etsy while on the road, a party store and hobby lobby back at home and we were set. She was going to marry her daddy and “it would be cute,” I thought. I didn’t expect the kind of emotion it pulled out of this self-proclaimed cold mom. I’m not really “cold,” that’s dramatic, I think, but I’m not in-touch with them feels that many women carry on their sleeves.  Not on this day, though.

little girls big dreams Lindsay Teague Moreno Blog

It’s little unexpected moments like this that make me breathe deep and know that I am so blessed to have the kids I do. Sometimes they drive me straight to the loony bin (and I’m not sugar coating that…sometimes I don’t like being a mom) but every once in a while I feel so overwhelmed with love and pride I can’t breathe. Today was one of those moments. As I took this picture I cried into the back of my camera.

Child Bride Wedding 5th Birthday Party

How is she mine? How is she so grown up? How will I make the most of the last 13 years I have with her in my house? How can I keep this feeling?

Child Bride Wedding 5th Birthday Party

I can see myself in 20 years pulling out these pictures of my little baby as she’s about to get married (if she decides she wants to…no pressure from me). I can see me crying then just like I did today as I watched her pretend to be grown up. I saw a glimpse of my future today and it was so sweet and beautiful.

Here are the pictures from the day. We tried to do everything a real bride would do on her wedding day:

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Child Bride Wedding 5th Birthday Party

Child Bride Wedding 5th Birthday Party

Child Bride Wedding 5th Birthday Party

Child Bride Wedding 5th Birthday Party

Child Bride Wedding 5th Birthday Party

Child Bride Wedding 5th Birthday Party

Child Bride Wedding 5th Birthday Party

Child Bride Wedding 5th Birthday Party

Child Bride Wedding 5th Birthday Party

Child Bride Wedding 5th Birthday Party

Child Bride Wedding 5th Birthday Party

Child Bride Wedding 5th Birthday Party

Child Bride Wedding 5th Birthday Party

Child Bride Wedding 5th Birthday Party

Child Bride Wedding 5th Birthday Party

Lindsay Teague Moreno

Filed Under: Click, The Good Life Tagged With: Dream Big, Family, holidays, My Girls, Photography, Photos

Nope.

October 17, 2015 by Lindsay Teague Moreno 3 Comments

I’m that mom that wants so bad for my kids to be older and self-sufficient and at the same time gets upset when the kids actually become older. Anyone else? Nope. Probably just me.

IMG_7546 copy

This picture tells that story. So dang cute now but the drool and the crawling everywhere and the diapers and the terrible twos and the mess and the decibel level. It’s like I want them to be able to tie their own shoes and feed themselves but remain 2-foot-tall, hilarious toddlers walking around the house without clothing at all times of the day, too. Where did that go? I can’t get my kids to stop with the dress up and the clothes now. Wasn’t it just yesterday I couldn’t force a pair of pants on them?

IMG_8332 copy

Motherhood, I find, is full of this contradiction. The days drag on (painfully at times, if I’m honest) and yet the last seven years and blazed past me. I haven’t gotten that “seize the moment” and “enjoy this time, it’s the best time of your life” thing down. Nope. I’m the mom that misses my kids like a crazy woman when I’m traveling and then about 10-minutes after I’m home the noise and the fighting and the 3 little voices talking over one another and the sass…oy, I want to retreat to my office. How is it possible to feel 2 opposite emotions about motherhood at the same time?

We had our homeschool first day of school a couple of weeks ago. I finally got around to editing one of them. It’s the first photo of the girls where I can see what they’re going to look like as adults. The 20-year-old version of Teagan is in her eyes now. The 35-year-old version of Boston that has these same feelings about her own kids is staring at me in this picture. It’s almost easier to see these older versions than the 1-year-old versions of the past, now.

Moreno Girls
They’re getting older. Time is ticking by. I want to freeze it right now. For me that means I stare at this photo for too long while they sleep quietly in their beds. Tomorrow, I’ll have moments where I want them to be able to drive themselves to soccer practice. Not right now though. Right now I love the little 6-year-old and 5-year-old girls and I never want them to get a second older. Nope, not one second older.

Lindsay Teague Moreno

Filed Under: Click, The Good Life Tagged With: Family, motherhood, My Girls, Work at Home Mom

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