17/52

These two.

It looks like he is being admonished, but they have just separated from a kiss.

I was not at all enamoured of any of the (decidedly few) shots I took this week, and am growing desperately frustrated with my camera woes. Not to mention the internet woes which have prevented me from working towards a fix for my camera woes. I wasn't going to post this - too blurry. But a quick drag of my heels fumble around Lightroom may have just saved the day. Let's call it dreamy?

Charlie Brown from out of town - one of our many names for him - turned 21 months over the weekend. This is where I would usually say 'that means 19 months', but I feel we're done with the two-months-behind thing. He is 21-months-going-on-seven, talks like a three-year old (or more?) and has suddenly discovered his imagination. The day I took this, he told me he saw a hippopotamus outside our window.

It has been a hard few days with him. We have both been moody. He is bursting at the seams for independence, and has been on a hair trigger. 

I have tried to be zen about many things. 

Oddly enough, my zen runs inverse to requirements. The more serious the situation, the more levity I command. The fishing sinker he wouldn't release from his mouth? The floury asbestos in his paw and the military game of persuasion to get him to wash his hands?

Zen!

Instead I lose it watching our precious rainwater gushing down the sink, and our hard-won food plants being torn to shreds.

I am on a learning curve too.

16/52

Sunset light on an uncharacteristically slow weekend for us.

We spent a long, leisurely weekend.  In between visits to the beach, we pottered at home and in the garden. The weather has been divine: warm days, gentle breezes, cool nights. 

Usually we'd be spending most of our weekends travelling to the city (six hours one way) and rushing from appointment to supermarket to wholefoods store to here, there, and everywhere else in between. And home again, whereupon we launch into The Great Unpacking. 

This fortnight we stayed home. It means a month-long stretch on our little corner of island paradise. A drive to the boat for a fruit and veg delivery. And a weekend of rest and domesticity. Just what I've been craving. I really want to simplify this life remote. I think this alternate fortnight at home thing provides the perfect balance.

This week's portrait was taken on the sandblow behind our house. Before he took charge of Daddy's 'cwam-ewa'. He is really into the whole camera thing. Little child of ours. I am really starting to see us both in him. In his looks, interests and personality.

And yes, his fringe is growing long! Little windswept beach boy. The weeks and days to two are becoming few!

15/52

Climbing! A new thing...

After an impromptu wander along a bush track, we played in a shady patch of grass around around an old munitions store. The island was a military vantage point during World War II, so there are quite a few relics from this time. We had a lovely morning. But I was lost when he asked about the interpretive sign which had a picture of soldiers mustered behind an artillery weapon.

And... it was only a matter of time before I caved on the one image rule. This talented lady sold me on the diptych concept, and well, I just couldn't choose one over the other. I like them as a series. To me, they are stronger together. I began this project wanting to be quite 'flow' about it. So I'm going with my gut on this. Instinct over rules, I say!

14/52

Post-swim, post-pelican-chasing, dreamy sea-gazing

 
We arrived home this morning after three days in the city for our monthly provisioning / appointment-ing / working-from-office / car servicing / playing with Nana / playground-ing, this time with a small friend. It is always lots of must-dos packed into the tightest possible timeframe, albeit cushioned with coffee from the real world. It exhausts us. And takes most of our weekend.

So after the big unpacking, this afternoon we headed to the beach. The only time I had my camera out all week. The weather is definitely cooling now, but the boys still swam. We had a particularly blissful afternoon. The sea was gentle and dreamy. A pelican waddled over to us, quite close. Ellery ran at it, exclaiming "pat, pat, cuddle, cuddle"! And we discovered a small shelter, made from driftwood and seagrass, the perfect beach cubby. 

The boy still grows in leaps and bounds. New: his first four molars (with a fever to boot), and now the canines. Counting to ten in French. Running. Like a gangly giraffe, but running. And singing! 

Joining in with Jodi.

You can see the whole series of portraits here.  

As soon as I find the time, I will post some out-takes. As much as I love that this project is helping me to capture a few better-than-my-usual shots each week, I am finding it increasingly difficult to choose just one, and leave behind other moments which tell an equally important story of this sweet boy's life!