I take hundreds of photos every month, and most of them don’t get shared with anyone, let alone online. And yet the moments in time that those photos capture are just as important a part of our story as the other images that I do choose to share.
I originally created this blog as a way of documenting our lives, a way of watching the girls grow into who they’re going to be and a way of remembering who they once were. It’s something I want them to be able to look back on as they get older, because memories fade but (digital) photographs don’t. A legacy, of sorts.
It’s easy (and tempting) to only focus on sharing the fun bits, the memorable parts, the highlights and the celebrations. But I’m learning more and more as I continue through this crazy journey of motherhood and life that it’s really important to me that I capture the ordinary, everyday times that we spend together as well.
The pieces of the jigsaw that fill in the gaps to complete the picture.
The tantalising glimpses into who our girls are becoming.
The chaos, the calm and all the moments in between.
This monthly feature – The Moments In Between – is a space for me to share all of those magical and messy parts of our family life that would otherwise just stay in a folder on my laptop, never to see the light of day.
MAY
“How change happens… slowly, then all at once”
I’m not sure who to attribute that quote to, but it definitely resonates. The start of this year has felt chaotic and difficult, clumsy and incongruent… challenging in so many ways, with lots of little (and big) stuff going on behind the scenes. A slow build up to the sudden domino-run of decisions and events that seem to have taken place in recent weeks.
As a result, May feels like it’s been a month of transitions:
- the transition from the end of spring to the start of summer (if you go by calendar months rather than solstices, although the weather doesn’t seem to have got the memo – come on sunshine and warmth!)
- transitioning Lola back to school
- transitioning into the final year of my thirties
- transitioning my current work priorities in order to focus on the bigger picture
- transitioning things that I’ve been imagining and planning for years into more of a reality
There are ideas that have been in my head for a long time that I’m beginning to speak out loud and put into action and – truthfully – it’s a little very scary. I know that there are going to be ripples as a result and I don’t know how far those ripples are going to spread, which edges and corners of my world they might reach, what parts of myself and others they could touch and nudge and jostle and disrupt and disturb.
It’s exciting too, for that exact same reason: the not-knowing. I have a feeling that these transitions are going to lead to a fairly significant transformation, not just for me personally but for the shape of my life as a whole. I just have no idea what it’s going to look like yet.
There aren’t many images documenting this month. I’ve not felt the pull to pick up my camera except on a few occasions. I’m trying to trust the timing, to trust the process, to trust myself and accept that this is enough. That these photographs still tell our story in a significant way.
This was us in May…
