The Gallary - My Current Favorite Photo

I love lots of photo's and favorite choice changes with my mood, the time of day and well the month, year and all that jazz too.

At the moment my favorite photo is not one I took, but one that Mrs W from Clinically fed Up took when we were at The Mad Awards.  I love it because it captures the whirlwinds that are my boys.

Then I have my second favorite one, why well this is because it captures all of us Mads, happy laughing and generally having fun.

And you see that is the beauty of an image, it is a snap shot, a trigger of a memory, a certain moment in time, which is precious for a certain reason and even more precious at certain times.  

For me at the moment, it is my boys, my family that is getting me through each day and night, so they are my favorite and my best (as Lola would say)!

See more favorites over at this weeks Gallery

The Gallery - A photo I am Proud Off

Oh my I can not get that "What have you done today to make you feel proud" out of my head.  This week I am supposed to show you an image I have taken that makes me feel proud. 

I am not a professional photographer or even an amateur really.  I am a snapper.  I capture moments of our everyday lives to trigger wonderful memories.

This image was snapped with my now defunct original Olympus digital camera, the first digital I owned, which was the size of a house brick and I love it.

It captures a wonderful day, the first time we went out of the house as a family of four in July 2006.  Granted it was only 200 yards up the hill from our then rented house to the in laws garden, but we did it.

So this is me one week post c-section, first day out of bed, with two babies, one aged 15 months and one 2 weeks and really signifies the start of the parenting adventure for me and my two boys.  Proud - you betcha, I couldn't think straight, but I managed to capture a wonderful time.

The Photo Lottery

I have been tagged by The Musings of a geriatric Mummy and I am sure someone else too, to do the Photo Lottery Meme, the rules are:

1. Open the first (oldest) photo folder in your computer library
2. Scroll to the 10th photo
3. Post the photo and the story behind it
4. Tag 5 or more people to continue the thread

OK the oldest digital photographs I have on the laptop are from 2003 and our trip to South Africa. This is the tenth one and not all that stunning in its imagery, but as a part of modern history it is just beyond my comprehension.

For this is the cell that Nelson Mandela occupied for approx 18 years during his imprisonment on Robben Island. He was finally released only 13 years before this picture was taken on 11 February 1990 (he didn't spent the last part of his sentence on Robben Island).

The whole tour of Robben Island was very emotional, as we were shown round by an ex-prisoner and oh my it was certainly an eye opener. The hardships that these people endured. The hard labour where they were forced to work in a Lime Quarry and were refused a lot of basic medication.

We were amazed by South Africa when we visited and had the best holiday ever. You have to remember that this is a third world country, with such a mixture of first and third word, that it is mind boggling.

The people we friendly, the hospitality excellent, the food was outstanding and the scenery well out of this world. One day we hope to be lucky enough to take our boys and show them.

Plus I am very envious of anyone who is going to the world cup. They will have a fantastic time, in a beautiful country that has come such a long, long way since the days of apartheid, but still has a long way to travel.

I need to Tag 5 other people to do it too and I am going to tag some of the new people I have been introduced to via The Gallery

Mums gone to....

What's happening at my house

Barefoot in the Kitchen

Freckles family

Kelloggsville


Now if you have tagged me recently, please can you drop me a line, as the flu has fried my brain and I can not find my notebook where I write all these things down - doh, I am having a homer moment as we call them.

The Past in Pictures

Once I started scanning in pictures, well I couldn't stop and I have asked my mum of I can have the family tin, which is a box full of wonderful pictures and things from our family history.

 

Look at those side burns, this is me and my wonderful dad.  I still have the rabbit, well mini has claimed it and my mum still lives in the same house, although she doesn't have the bar or the wonderful mural on the wall in the sitting room.

This is me and my wonderful paternal Grandad who lived with us.  I was his reason for living.  He suffered from cancer before I was born and he always said he was waiting for me, he died when I was 17.

 

Me and Lassie, Lassie was my Dad's dog given to him by his mum before she died way before I was born.  Lassie was my guard dog.  They used to pop me outside in my pram to sleep during the day and Lassie would guard me.

 

Me and Mum, Mum was an older mother and she always seemed so glamorous to me growing up.  She made most of her and my clothes and I never really appreciated how much effort she put in.  we couldn't afford cloth kits (which were all the rage when I was little), but she would make our clothes from scratch often working late in to the night.  Oh and look I have red shoes on again.

The Gallery - Beauty

Tara at Sticky fingers has introduced The Gallery designed to showcase all the amazing photographs she sees dotted around the bloggisphere.

And the first 'theme' she chose was beauty.

I have chosen to showcase two photographs and explain why they sit the bill for me.  Firstly a photograph I took during the recent snow we have had.  I love snow, it makes the whole world seem clean and sparkly and it also can make the most mundane things dance.  This is a photo of some mint in the garden, which I cut down over the autumn. Isn't it amazing how the snow turns it in to a thing of beauty.

 

My second image represents my quest to find beauty in the everyday and try to recycle as much as possible.  Me and Minimad make this garland for valentines out of an old Boden catalogue, but we loved it so much it is still hanging in our dining room.