*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 31:

Wow, I can’t believe it’s over.. And I can’t believe I made it! At least a photo a day for the last month.  I had plans of at least one self portrait this month, and at least one family shot I loved (because we don’t have ONE!), but it just didn’t happen. Perhaps I can make a family shot February’s endeavour, although I do think the next time I get my camera out, Gwens going to crumble into a heap on the floor and start rocking thinking “happy place… happy place” to herself. No, seriously though, we’ve had so much fun this month doing these photos. Sure we’ve had our rocky days, and days that neither of us have wanted to do it, but I’m so glad we both just sucked it up some days. It’s been an amazing bonding experience with Gwen, I’ve learnt so much about her, and the little girl she’s grown to be.

I’ve learnt that she can be such a story teller with her face and body (not to mention her brilliant story telling talent, I really should write down some of the stories she tells me!). She’s such an expressive kid, in more ways the one. She has such a fantastic imagination and such a creative soul. I hope more then anything that she continues to let me photograph her as she grows. I’ll truly cherish every single photo from this month. They all tell a story, and as I look back on them in 20 years time when she’s grown and gone from the nest, I know I’ll be able to look back and think of that day, and remember it in great detail.

I’ve enjoyed so many photographers POTD this month as well, it’s been such fun seeing what everyone else has come up. I hope that I’ve made other people smile as much as I’ve smiled following and checking on others!

Anyhow, on to today! We decided to head down to the bowling alley and take Gwen bowling for the first time. Mum’s been bowling since I was a little girl and I have many memories of it. She still bowls now, but I’ve just never gotten around to taking Gwen. I think I’m going to have to put in an effort to take her more.. She loved it!! Knocking down pins never got old, every pin was a joy. It took her a few frames to warm up and figure out how not to get a gutter ball (even with the bumpers up!) and sometimes we thought the ball wasn’t going to make it, but she loved it none the less!

Getting revved up by daddy ready for her first turn!

This was one of Dans only good frames.. He must have had 7 or 8 gutter balls lol.

Having a quick lesson on how to make the ball go faster then snail pace!

And she finally knocked some pins down! How she got 2 gutter balls while bumped lanes were on is beyond me.

Shes her own cheer squad!

Ah, yes, Dan the legend actually HIT some pins! See that pose on the end there? Oh boy, what he started with that. Gwen got down and done the same pose – Every time she hit a pin!

Getting ready..

She got some!! She was *SO* happy here.. Little bummed the first one’s out of focus, her expression is priceless!! Now… You know that pose?..

Well here it is!! lol

Love her cheekyness here.

And now she’s starting to get REALLY happy that she’s hitting more pins.

That mouth sprung open every time some pins fell down!

These photos make me laugh *grin*..  She’s so theatrical and dramatic lol.

I adore this second one of her.

Here’s her “I knocked some more pins down, I’m damn good” pose.

Ahh, her first game of bowling ever.. Time to take off the little shoes (on that note, her feet are so wide, and the shoes were so narrow that they hardly done up!)

I can’t describe how much I love this shot of her. I don’t know why, it’s nothing spectacular, but it’s SO her. She’s in her own little world. When she dances and sings, she throw’s her head back just like this, and her arms and hands are always doing something girly and posed.

I told her to give me some tude’. Mission accomplished. (Oh.. And the outfit?? I chose the skirt (although I did have other location ideas, but no no, had to be the logs), she chose the rest! We ended up having a skirt over the top of a dress….. Very pink.. Very frilly.)

This log was so high up, and without wanting to hold my hand (quite the opposite actually!), she balanced and walked all the way a long many times, then jumped off at the end. Quite an achievement for her!

Hmm.. She got very dirty doing this.

Such a ham.

Another one of her girly poses.

We jumped our back fence and headed back to the little field I use. She’d jumped into a huge pile of grass taller then her to try and hide from me.. I found her, hence the cheeky grin.

Caught!

Love this photo of her twirling. Her gross motor skills are awful, and she’ll usually fall over whenever she twirls. This twirl was awesome, and she landed on her feet!

We really only got to take a few pictures here, because it actually started to pour on us. I said to Gwen it’s raining, can you feel it??.. No sooner had she put out her arms for me to snap one photo, it absolutely started to bucket down. We had to run across long wet grass, I had to life her over a barbed wire fence (and she’s getting heavy!), climb though myself, and run to cover all the while trying not to get my camera wet or let her fall lol. It was certainly eventful! We live on five aceres, so it was a bit of a way to go to get to cover! It was just our luck that half way back, the rain eased back off. Must have been a rogue cloud. You can even see the rain drops in the picture.

Ah, she was going to hold a little sign for me, but it got far too late. My last photo for my POTD challenge…

Thank you for all of the support from anyone who’s been following my blog, and especially to anyone who’s left any comments. It’s especially encouraging to know I’ve sparked an interest in even one person enough for them to come back just to see the next day!