Self Portrait Tuesday # 11

This is simply my favorite picture of my child self and I had to choose it for SPT. What more could a little girl want than an impossibly cute outfit (topped of with a matching crayon hair band, of course!), a day at the fair, and her very own pony ride? My mom loves this picture too, she calls me her little sparrow...mostly because of the way I scrunched up my face like this when I smiled.

I was 3 years 10 mo. in this picture and even at a young age in my life, it was a pivotal moment. Several months later, my father was in a car accident in which he broke his neck and was paralyzed from the neck down. I remember the day my mom got the phone call and I can still feel myself latching on to her leg as she erupted into a panic of fear and sadness. This is my earliest memory in life...

My father is an incredibly strong-willed, physically & emotionally, man and with the grace of something or someone greater than ourselves, he regained feeling in all extremeties and went on to learn how to walk again, tie his own shoes, feed himself, all at the age of 31. To this day he is the strongest man I know and has taught me priceless life lessons, notably to work hard with determination and a well laid out plan and I will get what I want in life.