20/52

a portrait of my children, once a week. every week in 2014 inspired by Jodi

He : always easy to spot in that favourite colour. He tells me he is completely off bright colours and wants me to only buy blue and green but still the old yellow gets chosen.

She : marching in the conga line at the school fete

19/52

a portrait of my children, once a week, every week in 2014 inspired by Jodi

He : we had a cold snap. "Mama, can you please wrap me up like a sausage roll?"

She : modelling my fruity headpiece for the school fete.

18/52



a portrait of my children, once a week, every week in 2014 (inspired by Jodi )

 

She : admiring her handiwork with our easter tree and dressing up for the day in her tutu togs ( as you do)

 

 

He : white chocolate bunny love.



17/52

a portrait of my children, once a week, every week inspired by Jodi

He : we paint and he reads. Poaching my scaffolding and setting up it with all his treasures.

She : she still likes to help me with the washing, not sure how much longer this will be appealing.

16/52

a portrait of my children, once a week, every week in 2014 inspired by Jodi

He : it was only a matter of time before that loom band was reconfigured into a sling shot.

She : practising her acrobatics on the plushest grass I have seen in years. I love her little wise, confident face. 

15/52

a portrait of my children, once a week, every week in 2014 inspired by Jodi

He : has fallen straight into this rainbow looming craze headfirst. Oh the joy of whipping up one or three rainbow fishtail bands.

She : that first milestone has passed and the tooth is gone, caught me by surprise as she was 9  months earlier than her brother. 

14/52

a portrait of my children, once a week, every week in 2014 inspired by Jodi

He : intent and focused, designing his latest "Dream Home". This one is deep underground but has a void (inspired by the sisters on The Block) to allow in sunlight for his underground vege garden.

She : testing out her new winter pyjamas with a furry cuddle.

13/52

a portrait of my chidden, once a week, every week in 2014 inspired by Jodi

He : getting his rock shop ready, I think he has been "trading" with his sister which probably means fleecing all his favourites out of her pile.

She : is  choosing a design for me from her face painting book. We drew lots of different designs - butterflies, mermaids, cats, dragons then she coloured them in. Into a plastic sleeve folder they go for her face painting shop. Then all she needs is a cup of water and a paintbrush and she carefully paints your face with the chosen design. This particular day she decided to treat me to a free face paint- at six am while I was still asleep!

12/52

a portrait of my children, once a week, every week in 2014 via Jodi

He : kicking back with his new best mate. That little paw poking out just cracks me up.

She: say Cheese Mama. We have progressed beyond plaits to actual real hair accessories. It has only taken five years to become tolerable.

11/52

a portrait of my children, once a week, every week in 2014 inspired by Jodi

He : give this child a rope, a plank of wood and a tree and he is good for a few hours

She : is devoted/mad enough to test out her brother's crazy stunts - just stand on that platform while I winch you up to the top of the tree............

10/52

a portrait of my children, once a week, every week in 2013 inspired by Jodi

He : is sampling the hideous concoction he whipped up in Potions class at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Let me just say that combining gruesome food items is a big hit for eight year old boys at a  birthday party.

She : was Dobbie the house elf, with various outfits and her own foul contribution of flobberworm mucus and ash winder eggs. Note my feeble attempts to contain everything to a black tarp on the lounge room floor.

9/52

a portrait of my children once a week every week inspired by Jodi

He : has finally received the pet of his dreams as an early birthday present. Meet Jet, the guinea pig, and one VERY happy almost eight year old.

She : helping me hang out the hand washing on her little line that we found a few weeks back in our local curb side cleanup.

8/52

a portrait of my children, once a week, every week in 2014 inspired by Jodi

He : is at that special age of almost eight, where there is room in his head for both duplo mobile animal rescue centres, and Voldemort. 

 She : has moved up a class in dancing and has added singing and acrobatics to her tap and ballet.

7/52

a portrait of my children, once a week, every week in 2014 - inspired by Jodi

He : whiling away a Saturday afternoon fossicking for treasures in the backyard with his metal detector. At the going rate of ten cents per nail, we have a flurry of other children lobbing in to earn some pocket money while clearing our yard of nails and other building detritus. The eldest Menace brother has been over twice already and taken home about eight dollars. 

She : was very quiet in the bath one night. When I snuck in to check on her, she had sorted and organised every last bath toy into those unfinished shelves. I shudder to think how she reached that top shelf!

6/52

a portrait of my children, once a week, every week in 2014 inspired by Jodi

He : accessorising with a skink ( as you do) . This one came to visit with the Menace brothers but my boy has been known to spend an afternoon upside down inside our compost bin making pets out of the skinks who live there. I plan to refer back to this photo when thoughts of boarding school resurface. 

She : Showing me her stick on earrings that were a must on a trip for Yum Cha. Due to food issues we eat out infrequently, hence the need to frock up.

5/52

a portrait of my children, once a week, every week in 2014 - inspired by Jodi

He : asked if he could dig out the overgrown garden bed underneath his bedroom window. A short while later with hacked up plants strewn around the yard he announced that he was having MAN- FUN and could I please bring him some refreshments. Yes, those were his EXACT words. (makes me think of Bear Grylls having tea with the Famous Five ) 

She : started prep this week and has settled very well so far. This was the trial run on the weekend before school started as she was so excited to try her full uniform on. For the real day the uniform was ironed and the hair was (miraculously) in plaits. 

4/52

a portrait of my children, once a week, every week in 2014 via Practising Simplicity

They : as the school holidays come to an end and my ideas were running low it was time for an old fallback. The hose in the sandpit is always a winner and has given us HOURS of joy this week. 

3/52

a portrait of my children, once a week, every week in 2014 via Practising Simplicity

He : has not outgrown his love of mud. Tooway creek creek river mud in this case.

She : hops nimbly over those rock pools, deftly treading the same paths she toddled over three years ago. On a search for sea cucumbers, we found seven of them, plus one spectacular nudibranch - my absolute favourite creature name ever (and difficult to just drop into everyday conversation without the giggles).

2/52

a portrait of my children, once a week every week in 2014 via Practising simplicity

He : stumbled onto Legoman's old stash of Yowie figurines, oh the joy of searching and sorting.

She : is adventure-girl about to leap out of trees with a very dodgy rope arrangement. She had only just taken off the pink vinyl handbag which was obviously hampering her style.

1/52

a portrait of my children, once a week, every week in 2014 via practisingsimplicity.com

They : as we go the full circle of a year, we find ourselves back at the same playground as this time last year, longer limbed but with the same love of water and sand.

After stepping away from this space for the last few weeks there has been much pondering. About the year just gone, the year ahead and just surviving the day to day of school holidays (it never bodes well when your child wants to go back to school and there are still five weeks to go). 

I finally decided to go ahead with another  year of this wonderful project, although it is possible that only my girl is happy to be photographed in the months ahead. The photos are likely to remain amateur but the memories and moments captured will always be golden. Regular blogging will resume shortly, once I catch up.