You can't go to the Carolinas without visiting a waterfall. And if you do, shame on you. Or, hopefully you found a beach or something. We've been to this one once before, but it was too cold to get into the water. This time, we took full advantage of the summer heat, climbed up the rocks and slid right down this natural water slide. It was so much fun, I could have stayed there all day going again and again. 

I wish these photos were better, but I was battling quite a bit of humidity and my camera was a little foggy on top of the weird lighting. Bear with me through these bad photos, and I'll be back with prettier ones tomorrow. For now, these are for the memories. 

I remember taking these photos three months ago. This was around the time Ruby developed her love for the stairs, and really all things climbing. The light was pouring into the room, and I took way too many photos.

I remember sorting through and trying my hardest to pair down these photos. I love all of them, the blinking eyes, the blurry ones, and the funny faces. 

Though, it's amazing what time can do. Now she climbs up and down the stairs daily, and I have many photos of her on these exact stairs. 

Today, it was easy to comb through photos, and pick a handful of my favorites. But, I learned why it's so hard for me to erase these memories. 

It's my responsibility to savor all of these moments. I need to be the memory keeper, to tell her one day about our simple moments. The little ways we spent our day. 

& her goofy chuckle

I am mostly waiting to declutter sentimental items in our home, like notes & photographs once we get through everything else. Though I have been working on creating a system for organizing, storing, and backing up photos on our hard drive. Please let me know what works for you, especially what has worked for the long haul. & please tell me I am not the only one frantic about preserving all these sweet smiles. 

p.s. i didn't mean for this post to be about simplifying, it just took that course when i started writing out words. probably because I am currently working on simplifying our home, you can read more about that HERE 

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