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Extravaganza - twilight on the shore of my favourite beach. It means so much to see my girls playing here at the place I love so much. We can only come south for a few weeks a year but it's such a precious time. Here my Extravaganza, six going on sixteen, is loving the feel of a vintage silk petticoat and a soft as soft jumper in a very gentle twilight. We let them stay up late for their last night by the sea, to see the sun set.

Giggle-Bear  She loves this hooded top. The hood kept falling off and each time she would stop and wait for us to put it up again. She is very precise about such things. I love seeing how she reveals herself - her precision, her bravery (she has no fear of the water at all - terrifying but exilerating!) and her constant joy and wonder. 

Wonder-Girl - our wonderful, she spends her time in wonder as she studies the world around. Here she's sleeping in the front room of the coast house, the late afternoon light spilling through while the sound of the sea surrounds her.



Last year was hectic, and hard, but amazing - growing and birthing and getting to know our latest and last (this time we really mean it) while running to keep up with the other three. I'm watching our Wonder-Girl now, lying n her bassinet as she plays with her fingers and looks in complete awe at the ceiling.

I discovered it is a lot harder to take photos when keeping an eye on two wilful school kids, a mischievous toddler and growing or carrying a little one. There just aren't the hands free and the bulk of the camera is just one more thing. Carrying the camera around became something strictly for those times when there was someone else (preferably two someone elses if all four are around) to help carry random stuff, scoop up runaway toddlers and keep an eye out for Life Limb and Sanity Threatening Events.

I started using my phone camera a lot more - which is so handy and the photos you can get with a phone now are incredible- but I did miss playing with the light, the settings. I missed experimenting, really playing with it, to get what I see in my heart.

This year, I really want to take it up again. My little ones are growing so fast, and I forget so much, so quickly. So I'm really going to try to capture one moment a week of at least the three youngest - our eldest boy is so quick-silver he's a little hard to capture every week.

So - here's the first week of fifty two - a little late, which I'm sure will become the tradition. Start off how you intend to carry through so there's no false expectations!

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-My Poppet. Heading into the New Year. Or rather making a rapid exit from the beach as we race to the toilets during our beach ramble on New Years Eve. I am loving having two toilet trained kids.  I think only parents who have been there can truly understand the wonder of this. Of course, in another three months I'll be back to changing nappies, but pah - little baby nappies, and only for one kid? That's nothing!
- My Sprocket. About to dig into fish & chips at Port Melbourne. We met the cruise ship when my Beloved's folk were in Melbourne for a day and had a glorious time along the shore. Sprocket is displaying a new toy from a little vending machine. Haircuts are on the agenda for both kids! 

It's such a lovely feeling starting a new year, fresh and new and full of promise, rested from time by the shore and lazy. We are all revelling in lazy starts with no rush to be anywhere or do anything, and going on lots of adventures.

I love being able to look back on a whole year of portraits and am really looking forward to participating again this year and then looking back next New Year and seeing all the changes through the year. Looking at the first portraits from last year, my little ones look ridiculously little!  And I know I'll cry again next year when I see how small they look now! This year I want to really concentrate on capturing the funny things they say and do and what they're up to.

Tonight Poppet has been planning her wedding. She's purloined a loose white shirt of mine as her 'wedding dress', instructed me that I'm to make a bouquet of beautiful flowers and her Nana that she's to make the cake, and decided to marry the little girl she met in the op-shop today. Unfortunately, she didn't ask the little girl's name while they were playing, but this appears to be a minor point.

Sprocket. He is badly missing his Daddy, who is up in Queensland. We'll join his Daddy in a couple of days, but in the meantime Sprocket's needing lots of hugs and long Skype sessions.  He is completely melting my heart (and flattering my ego!) by telling me at least once a day that "You're beautiful, mummy. I think you're gorgeous." His Daddy has trained him well!

Joining Jodi, and all the other wonderful bloggers taking part, in the 52 Project for this year. A photo of my little ones once a week, every week, in 2014.

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Last year I greatly enjoyed looking at Jodi's project on her blog, Che and Fidel- a portrait of her children once a week for a year. This year, (along with many others!) I've decided to buckle down and do the same.

So - this is week one of fifty two. 

My Poppet, looking older than her two years in an elephant costume I found in a Lifeline shop in Brisbane. (This year is also the year of my challenge to tread lighter on the earth and buy nothing that isn't second hand of hand made - or food. So far, it's been going well)

My Sprocket on New Years Eve at Bribie  Island - pretending to take a photo of me as I take a photo of him. 

I'm so looking forward to reaching the end of the year and being able to look back and see how they've changed and grown through the year!