*My POTD Journey.. For the next month, I’ll be attempting to take a photo a day of my family, daughter, or activities we do.*

Day 30:

Unfortunately we’ve had some incredibly sad news today. We received a message when we got home that Dan’s grandfather was very ill and was expected to pass soon, but by the time we had arrived home and called, he’d already passed away. I never met him, but Dan’s told me many stories about him. He hasn’t been able to see his grandfather in a long time, and of course now it’s impossible and he’s so very sad tonight.. He had lived a long life and passed at the age of 92, leaving many children, grand children, and also great grandchildren behind. R.I.P Louie. My thoughts are with Dan and his family, I’m sure they’ll all miss him dearly.

On that same train of thought, I was sitting at a cafe with my friend Manda the other day, when this little frail old lady approached us and spoke to her about her pregnancy. She was just the most sweet natured lady, but gosh, she reminded me so much of my own grandma who passed away a year and a half ago. My heart still aches for her, she was one of my most favorite people in the world and I still miss her dearly. A week hasn’t gone by when I haven’t thought about her. I don’t know what I believe about the afterlife, but if “the other side” exists, I hope she’s there to meet me when my turn comes!

Well, I know this blog post has been somewhat full of sorrow, but it is what it is I guess. I do have one quirky little thing to share though. Today while we were out shopping, we were sitting at some tables in a food court when a big blow fly caught our attention. It was buzzing around on the table beside us, sorta minding its own business when this little fly buzzes along and lands beside it. Well, I think he was just sizing the blow fly up, because no sooner had he landed and looked, he jumped into the air and literally pounced onto the big blowfly! this little guy was seriously going to take on this big fly!! I must admit, it was SO humorous to watch, I’ve never seen a little bitty fly attack a big one before. It had us quite amused for a little while, and Gwen thought it was spectacularly funny.

Look at them! The little one lands, checks him out, then takes off, only to bomb dive him and try to beat him up! He kept bullying the bigger fly for a good 5-10 minutes lol

And just because I can, here’s a photo of Gwen with her Daddy. I wasn’t going to take a photo of them, but Dan asked me to and I’m glad he did.. It’s one of my favorites of the two of them together yet.

Once we’d gotten home and Dan had received the news on his Grandfather, I took Gwen outside to blow some bubbles to give him some time alone.  It worked well for me, because all I had for my POTD was some a snapshot, and some photos of some lousy flies lol!

I love the colours the bubbles reflect. Some bubble mixes don’t show much colour, but this one was great! On another note, Dan seen this shot when I processed it, and proclaimed that Gwen looked like a monkey.. Nice! It’s hard to look good when you’re blowing bubbles!

Every time she blew some bubbles, she made a mad dash to run around and pop them all…

… But occasionally, some got away!

But thats ok, because we can always blow some more!

Check them out! She was blowing with all her might here. I love how the bubbles never, ever look the same.

Our little friend come to say hello again!

Hah! I laughed when I seen this one, she looks so crazy lol.

The wind gave her a helping hand on this one..

It felt like we were going to be blown sideways, the bubbles got carried away the moment they were blown.

And there’s the look of surprise when the fly off so fast and hard that she has no chance in the world of catching them!

She’s quite cranky here, because the little bottle of bubble mix was empty and she’d run out of mix in her dish.

*My POTD Journey.. For the next month, I’ll be attempting to take a photo a day of my family, daughter, or activities we do.*

Day 29:
What a week it’s been this week.. In fact, what a month really. It’s been go go go all month it seems, but the first week of school is finally over. I think it’s going to take me a while to get used to not having her around! Well…. Having said that, with afternoons like I had today with Gwen, I can understand why some parents *love* to have their children in school! I can’t believe how terrible she was!! After doing the school pick up, we ducked down to the shopping center to meet my brother.. Good lord, I was actually ashamed of her.. She made me *so* sad today.. I really hope it was just because she’s tired from having such a huge week, especially the last 3 days, and that she was just lashing out at me. Anyhow, here’s to a better day tomorrow, eh??

On another note, I realised today that in 2 days I’ve been with my husband for 7 years! Wow, it certainly doesn’t feel like it. It seems the older I’m getting the quicker time just flies by. I want it to slow down a little! We’ll have to do something special on the weekend to celebrate our anniversary, Gwens first week at school, not to mention my birthday next week!!

Today’s POTD was one of my most unmotivated, cranky about having to pull the camera out days yet. I really wasn’t going to do it. I was sour with Gwen and her behavior, it had been raining, it was muddy, I was tired and had a headache.. Gosh, it was just a crappy afternoon in general! Having said that, I’m glad I didn’t pike! I’d never forgive myself for missing a day SO close to the end lol.. It was still a painful experience though. I gave up after about  3 or 4 minutes.  Poses by her again, god forbid if I asked her to do anything I wanted her to do this afternoon! I do love the photos though, even if we were both big fat grumpy cranky pants!

I love that you really can’t tell we were angry with each other here.. She seemed to REALLY want her hands in the photos today lol.

Her hairs very messy here, but she had the most beautiful curls around her face today, I love wet weather!

Love this candid one of her.. She was watching a car pull in a driveway across the road and then proclaimed that some school kids hopped out!

Ahh.. We both put our cranky pants on and gave up right after this shot.. I do love her stern looks though.

Side note: It seem’s I’m still favoring the right hand side in my photos. Even the two of these that had her on the left, I cropped to have her on the right lol.

*My POTD Journey.. For the next month, I’ll be attempting to take a photo a day of my family, daughter, or activities we do.*

Day 28:

I don’t really have anything interesting to say I’m afraid! It’ll all be prep talk again… Oh no, wait…. I want an iPad!!!!

Well, day two of Prep has come and gone and Gwen took it like a champ. She’s starting to make friends it seems, she’s talking to two little girls, and of course her friend connor is there as well. I had another wonderful day relaxing with friends, I’m lucky I have them or I’d probably have spent the whole day at home wallowing and lonely! Tomorrow I’m planning to kick into gear and clean up our pig sty of a house.. I’m going to do a BIG clean out, for I am a little bit of a hoarder and I just seem to collect rubbish lol.

This afternoon I collected Connor and Gwen from their class room, and they had an exciting day apparently. Two of the children had birthdays today so that was TWO pieces of cake, and oh my goodness, the best part of the day.. They got to play with playdough!!! Yes, out of the whole day, apparently playdough was the highlight for both of them. Once we piled into the disgustingly hot car, the kids giggled all the way to McDonalds to have an ice cream and run around in the playground for a while. Geez, they’re got a seriously deluded view of a school day today, didn’t they? Cake twice, finish early, ice cream and playing to finish.. Hope they don’t think its going to happen every day!

When it came time to leave the playground I had two very upset little children (because you know, they hadn’t been playing all day already or anything!), so I bribed them with the prospect of playing under the hose for a few minutes when they got home. Wow, I’ve never seen two kids beam from ear to ear so quickly! You wouldn’t think so much joy, laughter and giggles could come from a bit of water. Gwen hasn’t gotten to play under the hose since she was about 1. What a treat!

Be warned, today’s photos are full of closed eyes, and open mouths!!

Nothing like stripping off a sweaty school uniform to run under the hose!

Love this one of Connor, such a funny shot lol.

Connor looks so confused as to why Gwens bending over.. It looks like she’s trying to flash me her bum, bu t she just didnt like the water in her eyes LOL.

Love this one!

I can hear them just looking at these next three photos, gosh they were giggle pots!

Especially Gwen!! I’m surprised she didnt wet herself lol.

More giggles and closed eyes!

Ahhh refreshing!

I gave the hose to Gwen for a quick turn.. I almost gave it to Con, but I thought Gwen might end up with a hose sprayed directly at her face.. That just would have caused SO many dramas! At least Con was happy to be chased with the hose.

Hmmmm it was right about here that she turned into a feral little monster with the hose, kept sticking her finger inside to make it spray everywhere, including me and my only camera so I got the poos with them and turned the hose off lol! Ah well, they had SO much fun, They couldn’t do it for long anyway with the water restrictions here. It’s such a shame, it was one of my favorite things as a kid. Running under the sprinkler or hose!

She must have been thirsty!

*My POTD Journey.. For the next month, I’ll be attempting to take a photo a day of my family, daughter, or activities we do.*

Day 27:
No prize for guessing what my photo of the day will be about today!! Today was the bitter sweet day that our lives changed forever, dramatic sounding I know – but it’s true. My little 4 year old girl went to school for the very first time, and she loved it just as I thought she would. I’m incredibly blessed to have such an amazingly out going (and sometimes outspoken!) girl, I have no doubt she’ll hold her own in the classroom throughout the year. The reality finally hit home for me today that this is it. For the next 13 years, she’s off to school for the majority of the year. I don’t think that realities hit her yet, we’ll see what it does I guess!

Today when I dropped Gwen off, the teachers wanted it to be short and sweet, so we found her name on the bag rack, she kindly informed me her bottle was meant to go over there with the other ones, not in her ba where I foolishly put it.. Silly me! Once she found her way to her name on the floor, I kissed her good bye and off I went. I was able to snap a couple of quick shots before they closed the front roller door of the classroom. The amount of times I’ve been asked if I cried is amazing.. I must admit, I didn’t at the time. Once I walked to the front gate to wait for our friends, I did feel that sadness welling up, but once Manda and Connor arrived the day was so full on and go go go that I just didn’t have time to be sad. I had an awesome day here just chatting to Manda and Nic, the day just flew by! It’s not until now that I’m sitting on the computer a lone at nearly 2am that I’ve had a chance to process the day, and I think I’m more on the verge of fighting back tears tonight then I was this morning! Ah, it’s funny what being a lone at night with your little big school girl sleeping like an angel in the next room can do.

It may seem so foolish to be sad about your kid going to school and a month or two ago I would never have imagined I would be one of the parents that would have so many feelings of sadness, but it really is the end of an era for me. The majority of people still have that other child at home with them, or have at least been through the emotions before with subsequent children, but I’ve spent practically every day of the the last 4 and a half  years with her, so I think I’d be a little cold a heartless not to feel anything at all!

With all that gloom aside, with sadness comes excitement! Excitement on what this year ahead will bring for Gwen, for my family, for me personally, and my business. Even though I’ll miss her so much, I’m so incredibly excited for Gwen, I know she’s going to blossom in school (not that she needs any help coming out of her shell!!), she adored her first day and she’s pumped and raring to go for the morning. We did however have a little bit of a late first school night, so I guess we’ll see how grumpy she is in the morning! I have no doubt she’s going to have an amazing year, and I know I’m going to work damn hard at making the year pretty amazing for me too!

Proud as punch in her ginormous “school perform” (school uniform)!

All ready to play.

Waving bye to me as I’m leaving the classroom. She sat still for about… 20 seconds.

Every single other kid in the classroom (except for the little boy in front, he had to move because the roller door was coming down) was sitting cross-legged calmly, quietly and un-surely. It’s a physical impossibility for Gwen to sit still, even when she’s watching tv she can’t do it. This will be a major task for her I think! She had her legs in the air, she was moving back and forwards on her butt, moving her feet, shuffling about.. Oh dear.. lol

Before they kids were allowed to go, they had to go and tell the teacher who they see so that he knew who was picking them up. There’s Gwen telling him “” I see my mummy!”, and there she is walking up to me after  along hard hot day. The heat was disgusting  here today, poor little things, so hot on their first day.

I asked Gwen if I could have a photo of her and Con smiling for me, because I didn’t get to have one in the morning.. Well… She snarled at me LOL..Then a mediocre little smiling.. Thanks kid! I know, I know.. They really were SO hot.

After school, I needed to get Gwen some new googles so treated her to some yummy ice cream as her first after school treat!

If there’s one thing I’ve learnt (or more had reinforced to me) about Gwen in the last month over my POTD, is just how incredibly expressive she is both verbally, and with her expressions and actions. She has an such interesting expressions, and I find myself captivated by them at times. The faces she pulls out of the hat never cease to amaze me. Like this one, we were merely chatting, but there’s just something about her quirky face that I just adore!

Enjoying the ice cream!

*My POTD Journey.. For the next month, I’ll be attempting to take a photo a day of my family, daughter, or activities we do.*

Day 26:
First of all, Happy Australia Day!!! What an incredibly hot and sticky day it was, typical Australia Day weather I think, don’t you? I’m going to try and keep my post rather short and sweet today. Firstly because I know I’m just going to ramble about Gwen’s first day of school tomorrow, and secondly, it’s 1am and I still have to make a school lunch and get all her stuff together and ready to go. Instead of staying home tonight I went out for a lovely girls night in with some friends, although I did feel a huge twang of guilt going out on the night before Gwens first day of school. Luckily she was really only awake for less then half an hour after I left.. Still.. I’m such a guilty person sometimes!

Because we’re not terribly exciting people, we really didn’t get up to anything fantastic today, we just relaxed at home, and Gwen and I sat together while I labeled all her school things.. I’d ordered her some stuck on you labels but the STUPID company didn’t sent them to me in time.. 4 days my bum! It’s been two weeks, still no labels.. I’m sooo angry.. No labels on her uniforms and hat etc, and no pretty labels for her lunch boxes or books. I didn’t want her to have no labels at all, so I made her so my little pony labels on the computer and she was stoked! She’ll probably like these better then the stuck on you ones anyway! While we were at the shops this afternoon, I spotted one lone little packet of Aussie flag tattoos.. I tried to get some yesterday but everyone was sold out, so I took seeing them today as a sign that we had to use them for our POTD! Gwen was excited to wear these, she declared when we were removing them that she wants a REAL tattoo.. Like heck! She isn’t the most um.. Patriotic child.. She’s dead set that she’s Canadian like her daddy, not Australian lol.. When we were telling her how Aussie and patriotic she looked, she just said, yeah, but when’s Canada day? lol

Gwen picked her poses again today lol.. Love this cheeky one of her!

I told her to put her game face on.. Notice her raised eyebrow (our left, her right)?.. That little eyebrow comes out to play whenever she’s telling me off, giving me attitude, being a smart-alec, or whenever shes angry.. I often have to tell her to put her eyebrow down!

Cheeky grin! She was so excited to have those flags on her cheeks lol.

I have noticed throughout my POTD posts that I’ve come quite accustomed to chopping off her feet, and keeping her to the right of the frame in most photos.. Must try and stop that lol.. Love her little smile!

*My POTD Journey.. For the next month, I’ll be attempting to take a photo a day of my family, daughter, or activities we do.*

Day 25:

We’re on the count down here. Just one more day until school starts. What a strange feeling -  I’ll no longer have my little girl by my side every day. Even when school holidays roll around, she’ll no longer be my little girl who’s just there all the time. She’s going to be my big school girl who’ll probably want to hang with friends on the holidays.. Oh dear, I sound like a clingy, over-bearing mother.. I swear I’m not! I’ll just miss her being around all the time, even though sometimes I want to throttle her!

I’ve been a bit cranky with myself over the last month. It really only seemed real that Gwen was off to school in the last month, and I do feel like I’ve kind of wasted a lot of the last year or two with her. I should have done more with her, taken her more places, seen more things! I’m speaking like lifes over, I know! I just wish I valued her presence more over the last year. None the less, I value her so much as my sweet little person, I’m sure we’ll pack lots into the weekends now that she’s at school.

I’ll stop whinging about that now that I got it out of my system! We had a lovely day today. Gwen was so good this morning (LOVE it when that happens!), and after we took Dan to work we headed to the shops for a little bit of shopping. We run into our friend Manda and her boys while we were there, so that was great.. Milkshakes with great company, thanks for shouting us! It’s my turn next time! We headed over to our friend Nic’s for one last afternoon swim before Gwen heads to school (there I go again!). The pool was gorgeous this afternoon. Gwen’s turned into quite the little fish this month! I’m so proud of her.. Not only can she pick up objects from the bottom of the pool, she can now do it by herself without help, in water so deep I can hardly touch! Well done chicken!

Once we left at about 6 o’clock, I was trying to think of what I was going to do for my POTD on the way home. Every time I drive home from Nic’s, there’s a vacant block of land that I see and I think GOSH that rivals my little corner of fieldy grass I use down the back, I must stop there and try it one afternoon. I tried out the short green grassy area on ummm, day 17 I think it was.. But right next to it, it’s like a completely different place. Beautiful long fluffy grass which catches the afternoon sunlight.. Just gorgeous. If I could pick one think about my photography that’s so me, it’s that I adore back-lit photos, and I’ll use it wherever I can… Find me a field or a grassy spot where the sunsets and I’ll be there!

I wished I had a beautiful, long, flowing dress in the car this afternoon, but instead all I had was yesterdays pants from the beach (or the incredibly ugly skirt she was wearing at the time.. lucky the shorts weren’t too muddy lol), so we had to make do.. It’s not like I was aiming for perfection with these. I had a cranky kid who didn’t want a part of it, and I really was only seeing what it looked like there.. I’m definitely going to keep using this place until whoever owns it mows it!

Love her piggy tails flying high here.. Lucky she’s not in yellow, it’d be a bit like where’s wally!

She was starting to get a little cranky with me here.. Lucky I love her serious faces!

This is about all she’d give me of her face today.. Looking at fluffy grass while she picked it off, and a grumpy little duckbill mouth with closed eyes lol. For that second shot, I said to her something a long the lines of.. Look at all that beautiful long golden grass, doesn’t it look so pretty in the sun! Why don’t you imagine you’re a beautiful angel happy in the field.. Umm… Yea… That worked...

Ahh.. The power of a mentos. Pitty I only clicked once before the smile disappeared!

*My POTD Journey.. For the next month, I’ll be attempting to take a photo a day of my family, daughter, or activities we do.*

Day 24:

I’ve discovered that staying up until after 4am blogging, having a busy afternoon the next day, and then late night editing plus blogging again just does not agree with me. I nearly piked on tonights blog post. Not because I didn’t take anything, but because my eyeballs are hanging to my knee’s and I keep finding myself in those little twilight sleep stages at the computer! With that said, it’s off to bed I go shortly, I’m absolutely knackered so I wont blab on!

Gwen, Dan, my mum and I headed off to the beach this afternoon. I don’t think we’ve all been to the beach together since before Gwen was born! We really need to start doing things like this more often.. Life’s so short and Gwens growing up so quickly..

Checking out the water.. The water was actually really warm.. Not refreshing at all!

It was high tide here, the water looks so disgusting.. 2 hours later once the tide had started to go out and everyone had stopped swimming, it was crystal clear! There she is being a ham again..

She was excited that she climbed some big fig tree roots lol..

I can’t remember what she was looking at here, maybe one of the parasailers?

Check that look out.. Is that a look of disapproval, or what??

I double dared Dan to pick up this little crab.. He did, but not long enough for me to take a photo.. It must have taken him nearly 10 minutes lol.  What a chicken! Mum picked it up in one foul swoop. This is the closest Gwen would get!

It took some convincing, but she finally picked up one of the little sea snails…

… Then discovered that it tickles!

Oh dear, she’s such a lady sometimes lol.

Watching a kite flying.

She was FAR too busy to look at me for more then a split second, so this was all I was allowed.

Searching for little critters.

Checking to make sure the shells she so lovingly had stuffed in her pocket were still there.

Gosh she can pull some faces…

Right before we went home. I really must learn to remember to take those damn crocs off!

PLEASE mummy may I have some ice-cream?

*My POTD Journey.. For the next month, I’ll be attempting to take a photo a day of my family, daughter, or activities we do.*

Day 23:

First of all, I think I’m going to cry.. It’s 3:30 am, and I just lost my whole blog post which I’d just finished.. I have to do it all again

Here I go again.. Please do excuse any horrendous typos.. Im tired second time round!

Goodness, what a day! What started out as one of the worst mornings I’ve had in quite a while turned our to be a fantastic day! I won’t dribble on too much, because it’s past 3am and I’m so tired! I’ve spent most of the night processing photos for my POTD.. If theres been a day I’ve gone overboard with a POTD share, today is the day! The planets must have slipped back into alignment today in child behavior galaxy land, because Gwen was remarkably good after yesterdays disgrace!

It got to about 5pm today and I thought I’d be doing a bit of a dodgy snap shot POTD again because I’d run out of time. We were due to go out to meet friends for dinner so I wasn’t sure what I’d do. Anyhow, Gwen had chosen her dress to go out to dinner so I asked her if I could take her outside for a photo.. “Ohhhhkkkaaayyyyyyy, JUST ONE!“.. I pushed my luck and asked if I could take 3 photos, and she argued and said no, 5. I didn’t give her time to process what she’d said before I had her out the door lol.

Theres something a little special about these first photos for today..

Wardrobe: Gwen
Location Scout: Gwen
Pose Chooser: Gwen
Director: Gwen.

These first photos are all her. She picked her clothes, she decided what we were going to do for our photo, where we went, and where I was supposed to stand and how I needed to take her photo.. Oh yes, she picked her poses too. The original concept? Take photos of her and her toy butterfly. I got much luckier! =). By time time we’d walked down the back, she was being such a sweet heart and she informed me I could have TEN photos!

This was here original idea for our POTD. Here she is cuddling her butterfly.

Tickling her butterfly. I was assured that this would make a great photo!

She was so wonderful for me today.. Eye contact, and a smile! How lucky am I??

Can’t remember what she was doing here.. Which is annoying, because I could the first time I wrote this post.

Here she is telling me “You can have TEN MORE mummy!!!”

She put her serious model hat on for me here and she started to work it!

I love her for giving me this shot.. I can’t remember why she was cuddling herself, but I love it!

Ah now this.. This is a trademark Gwen pose!.. When she’s singing to music, she gets very theatrical.. There’s always lots throwing the head back and neck touching?.. I was lucky enough to get given the same pose without the singing lol.

This is her serious model face that she pulls out when she’s really trying make me happy lol.

Wasn’t she being such a sweet heart for me??

She had enough here and started picking at weeds.. I really need to hop to it and finish mowing our lawn..I’m kinda glad I hadn’t yet!

When my grandma passed away, we were left with her cat Little Black (original, I know!).. She’s such a sweet affectionate little thing, but she’s far too dominant and tries to beat up our other two cats, so unfortunately she’s an outdoor only cat. She’s a bit attention deprived, and once she seen Gwen and I, she trot on over and made herself right at home rubbing herself all over Gwen. She ended up covered in black cat hair right before we had to go out for dinner!

Making herself right at home on Gwens lap..

If you stop patting her, you usually end up with a drooly cat mouth rubbed right up the side of your face, and a head rubbed under your hand demanding you keep on stroking her.

There she is leg rubbing (Note to self.. Do not attempt or experiment with textures at 2am when you already suck at them.. Its not a good idea!)

Getting all cosy on Gwens lap.

Face rubbing again!

We ran inside and grabbed our things and we went to our local RSL to meet some friends for dinner. While we were waiting, the light in the carpark was so awesome, so when Gwen was making her shadows move, I took advantage!

Once our friends arrived, Jack and Alex joined the fun, although Alex really thought the whole thing wasn’t for him and left after this photo.

“Make some really tall shadows!!” … “Make some really short shadows!!” .. “Make some really silly shadows!!” … I can see Gwens ridiculous face in the last one, even though I don’t have her in focus lol.

More silly shadow fun!

I must admit, this one made me chuckle a little. I said “Make a hugging shadow!” .. Obviously I wasn’t too clear, because this is what they gave me!

Once we clarified, they hugged each other for a hugging shadow.. They posed themselves, and ended up looking like a 4 year old couple on their wedding day lol.

Theres the happy couple!

*My POTD Journey.. For the next month, I’ll be attempting to take a photo a day of my family, daughter, or activities we do.*

Day 22:

What a day it’s been today! I’m trying to remember the last time Gwen was SO naughty.. It’s been a quite a while, but my goodness, today certainly made up for it. What planets were out of alignment today?? This morning wasn’t *too* bad. We started off with a Swim at our friends places which was wonderful, (so once again I have pool pictures to share, I need to stop repeating!), and Gwen swam the length of the pool with ease. It’s longer then the other pool we’ve been swimming in so that was great!

By the time we’d been home for half an hour or so, that damn planet decided to slip out of place. I don’t know what was wrong with her today, but boy I wanted to throttle the little monster (I mean that in the most loving parent way possible!). She managed to excel herself in the car today too. Does anyone remember that ad.. Ummm which one was it.. RACQ insurance maybe? Anyway, the womans in the front of the car, and her two little monster children start mocking her in the back seat - every word, every movement. Well, I was mocked. Well and truly, seriously mocked. Every word, every movement. In the most frustrating, spiteful way a 4 year old could manage. Once I hung up the phone, with all she could muster she let out an almighty roar of laughter like it was the funniest thing she’d ever done. I was so cranky with her, but I had to turn my face and try to hide my smirk amongst the “That was SO rude Gwen!!” lines.

Gwen and Con in the pool.. They’re both um.. Very competitive, so once they’d jumped in the pool it was a vicious race to see who could make it back to the step first. I swear Gwen nearly hit her head on the wall every time she jumped in, she’d try to jump along the side of the pool to get a head start and not out into the middle then across.. She’s going to hurt herself one day!

This photo of Gwen and Connor is so perfect. Not technically maybe, but in every other way. Connor has quite a bad anxiety problem, and while it’s gotten so much better over the last few months, it’s still there. (I feel I have to explain this a little, so he doesn’t just look like he needs to go to the loo LOL).. Anyhow, when he’s nervous he.. How to put this delicately.. He holds himself. So there he is, nervous about me with the camera obviously (although I did try to get one with his hand down, but it was there in every single photo lol), and there’s my little chicken, cheeky as all get out like always, squinty eyes, tongue hanging out her mouth like an idiot. It’s just so them, that its perfect.

That second photo of Gwen.. I don’t know what it is about it, but wow she looks so different there to me.

What a friends for. Well, they’re for helping you onto the trampoline when you can’t do it, and you don’t want your mother to help you! That photo of her turned to the camera, she’s telling me “DON’T help me!!”, mean while, she’s calling her hero to come to her rescue and help her. I think she likes playing the damsel in distress!

Gwen loved Con for starting this game I think. It doesn’t look like he’s having too much fun but he was actually laughing throughout the game lol.

She’s getting brave! She’s willing to jump off the side of a trampoline now.. Well, as long as one of her boyfriends go first of course!

*My POTD Journey.. For the next month, I’ll be attempting to take a photo a day of my family, daughter, or activities we do.*

Day 21:
I’m afraid I don’t really have anything all that interesting to say. It’s been one of those afternoons for me today. Today really did start out lovely, with a trip to the cinema to see The Frog Princess with Gwen and our friends, but I think half a handful of crispix for breakfast, followed by popcorn, a big frozen red fanta, a lollypop and other sugary goodness just wasn’t really helping the 4 year old behavior today.. Don’t get me wrong, she was brilliant in the cinema.. But gosh she hit a wall after the movie finished.. Ahh well, not to worry!

I don’t have much to share by the way of photos today. I’ve had a completely uninspiring afternoon, and I was going to pick up something at the shops tonight for our POTD… Well.. I forgot it. Bugger.

Now, people often comment on Gwens hair and how beautiful it is, and my reply is usually something a long the lines of yep, and its high maintenance too! Replies vary, I sometimes receive a sympathetic nod, a laugh, or sometimes a look of disbelief.. Surely hair isn’t too hard to whip up quickly and put in a pony tail?? Anyhow, this is the little face that greets me every morning when I walk into her room..These photo’s really don’t do it justice lol. I was going to snap some shots of her with her bed head this morning for my POTD, but that was fizzled when I went to switch my camera on.. dead flat batteries. (well, thats another whinge.. My SD card reader in my computer just stopped working all of a sudden, so I have to plug the camera in to retrieve my photos.. I forget to unplug it every single time and end up with a dead camera – every single morning.. Gah!) I had to resort to the oh so terrible camera on my little nokia phone.

Here’s Miss Gumble Pants with her big fluffy lion mane that I have to tame each morning. Well, usually by lunch time it needs retaming (not that I always do it!).. I really wish I had a photo of the back.. It’s even more horrendous then the front! That hair was freshly brushed and platted before she went to sleep last night. I think someones a mover in bed! When you walk through a shopping center next and see a kid with bottom long hair.. Please do think of her mother.. It’s not easy being motivated to brush a rats nest out of hair this long every day when all the kid does is scream and grumble at you! Someone on one of my flickr uploads said I must have the patience of a Saint.. Why thank you, whoever that was! I think I do lol.

She was extra gumbly when she first woke up, she somehow achieved a cracker of a split in her lip overnight  One mention of cotton candy lipsmacker.. Crisis averted! (and wow, lips heal SO fast, it’s practically gone tonight!).

And here we are again, at the end of the day. I told her to go and pop into bed and she could read a book or two before sleep. Instead, I walk in 10 minutes later and shes smothering our cat again. That poor cat, she never catches a break lol.

Doing what she was meant to be doing.. Odd choice of book, its more words then pictures! I think she was hoping I’d read a heap of it tonight..