SUMMER AND A PHOTO A DAY

I’ve been gearing up for January for a few weeks now. Anticipating (or quietly dreading) the challenge of taking a photo a day of the kids, for a whole month.  It’s something a group of online friends and photographers have been doing for a few years now, every January.  I skipped last year, as I’d spent the previous one taking a photo a day for a whole year. Yes. A WHOLE year.  The kids were totally over it by the end, and I’m still not sure they’ve recovered.  But at least this year they’re old enought to understand the concept of bribery.
I had the thought yesterday morning that this will be the last of our days together before the kids head off to school – Jaedon to 4 year-old Kinder (3 days a week), and Alicia-Rae to 3 year-old Kinder (half a day a week), and a big part of me wants to remember this time. Sweet and bittersweet moments together.  I’m not quite sure how it will go, as the kids definately have a love/hate relationship with my camera, swinging unpredictably and dramatically in either direction, but I decided to start there and then.  And continue through until their first week of school.  Wish me luck – I really think it will be a  challenge, but one worth taking up.  As tough as the days can be at the moment, and as much as a part of me looks forward to getting past these days that seem so full-on and tiring, a part of me also wants to hold on to them, and hold on tight to my babies while they’re still young and innocent and free of influences that aren’t ours. And the only way I know how to do that is to take photographs – picture memories that will become more precious as time marches on.  Hopefully I won’t have to give up too much of my chocolate stash as bribery along the way.

Yesterday got off to a bit of a doubtful start – with a look of stubborness (which he gets from me) and just the hint of a smile from Jaedon, and an I’ll smile if it means I get chocolate, but I don’t really mean it kind of look from Alicia-Rae.

It didn’t get much better as I begged them to sit still on the couch for me, just for a minute or two.

But as I captured some more photographs of them throughout the day, as they were simply going about doing their thing, I got less of the intolerence and impatience, and more of them just being them.  Without the need for chocolate. Happiness all round.

I think I learned a valuable lesson that these next few weeks won’t be so much about making sure I get a photo every day, but simply being with them and capturing a memory or two as we go along.
It’s about living the moments, not making them.

Narrelle x