Its that time of the week again and this week its our 4th baby's birthday. She is 3 today. So in honour of her birthday..see if you can come up with a caption for what she might be thinking here…

As always you can go to the fabulous mammasaurus blog to see more. 

The theme for the gallery this week was 'eyes' and again i was a bit stumped at what photo to choose as this is so much of what i photograph. I love eyes..(not the whole squishy membrane thing….*gag*) but the depth to them, the emotions that flow from them sometimes despite of what the rest of the face is trying to portray. In children it is perhaps my favourite thing to capture. 

So i have hundreds of photographs of my own kids wide eyed and other people's who i have photographed. So i was somewhat stuck until i thought of this image..

this is not actually one of my photographs, it was taken by our friend and photographer Richard Joyce. It is my first daughter when she was probably just over two. Richard was doing a photography degree and was doing some family shoots to raise a bit of money and this is my favourite. 

What i love about this image and what probably started my fascination with capturing emotion is even though you can see little else of her, her hand is concealing her mouth and there are no clues as it is such a close crop to her face. Her eyes tell you her story, you can see her cautious curiousness of what the photograher is doing. A little playfulness lingering, twinkling. The sweet honesty and wonderment of little toddler characters. I remember she was happy as long as we were all in the front of the camera with her but this was taken when Rich had caught her on her own.

It is still one my favourite pictures. 

It also gave me that valuable insight that, as a photographer, you need to be able to see past the 'everybody look at the camera and smile' snapshot and try and help your clients too as well :).

As her mother i can look at this image and tell you that there is a more true and honest capture of who my child was then when she was so little and still is in many ways now she is 7 than there would ever be in a 'cheeese' shot. It has depth. You can capture a complete story in someone's eyes without ever needing to say a word. 

and that is why i love eyes….

that this little girl is a healthy and happy (okay not all the time) but she can run, climb, fall, follow, copy, dance, shake, cry, scream, pout, giggle, grin, hit, reach, tickle, strop, play, skip, feel, shout, whisper, sleep, read, kneel, be tender, be hard, fight her corner, love on her siblings, smile and frown…..

she can do all that and she is nearly three….

Today im thankful that she has life and mindful of just how fortunate we are…

1. I noticed the other day that my daughter, who had got a lovely two pack of PJ's for christmas, wasn't wearing the second pair. When i asked her why she was schlepping around in old, ill fitting PJ's when she had sparkly new ones in her drawer. She said to me a bit sheepishly…'well…um…it takes a long time to get them back'

me: puzzled "from where?"

Her: 'when you wash them it takes such a long time before they are back in my drawer again that i thought i wouldn't wear them so you won't wash them'

Yeah..so the washing turn around isnt always the fastest in this house but seriously……

2. So i mentioned last week that my youngest school goer has switched to school lunches…did i also mention that i suspected that the other two would eventually start to develop an interest…? huh? Can i get some sort of award for how well i know my kids. Less than a week before we  'can i be a hot dinner?' from the other two. pffftt. 

3. I worked normal office (ish) hours today. Thanks to a study day at work and it made me realise why i work nights. Good grief…rush hour traffic, I am clearly not suited to it. That and having to navigate two drop offs, splitting the kids – no-one has a big enough car to take all of them plus their own! 

4. Music? Yeah…go on:  my son loves this song at the moment and watches the end of the movie over and over to listen to it. Really does anyone here say 'bobbies' anymore?…anyone?

5. Talking of Pixar..we have a developed a game at our dinner table called the Pixar Quiz (imaginative huh?) but each of the kids takes turns to answer Pixar movie questions. Even our soon to be 3 year old can answer the basics 'what colour is Holly Shiftwell?' 'Who is Woody's best friend'…

Yep.. who needs reading and maths when you can know the important stuff like this……Mwahahahahaha

6. Whats that you are looking at sweet girl?

cute isnt she? yeah but the thing is i walked into the bedroom and found her standing on that ledge and banging on the window. ;-O

7. My OH is a member of a forum for Gaggia coffee machines….yes..i know…

anyway….our inbox is clogged up with updates from threads of people worrying about things going wrong with their special coffee makers. *knocks head on desk*

8. I watched Call the Midwife on BBC1 early this week. I have actually read the book, i found it at work once and picked it up absent mindedly and read it through really quick. Such a fascinating look at health care in the 50's. Just as the NHS was being born. I really enjoyed the BBC version. I think its on sundays but its always on the iplayer. 

9. Today, for tea, we have been reduced to tomato soup and toast…there is nothing left to eat and i can't be bothered to shop…that isnt the truth but thats what my kids probably think.

My son was suitably put out that he had to use the 'baby toothpaste' AGAIN!...because i haven't yet got to a shop to buy some more. #badmother (you know with the hash tag it means its not really true right!)

10. This was one of the games that went down ever-so well at my daughter's birthday party…..all you need is a mattress and a slippy floor. Simples…

Just check out my baby girl at the side..yes she did that ALL the time, we largely ignored it or laughed at it…AHEM!  i think the sports coaches were worried sick…heh heh..chaos!

linking up with the ladies:

hannah

Lucy

Helen

Jo

and not forgetting my blogging super star friend:

theoriginalbritgirl