Sooo, I enlisted the help of my crew to draw our raffle prize.  You may remember I donated a full shoot to be raffled off to anyone who donated to the walk page for me.  Alex was super impressed to be the ‘chosen child’ to draw the raffle.  Okay so in the pic he looks a bit odd but that’s just because he is at that awkward “I can’t remember how to smile on cue” stage.  :-P

It was awesome giving stuff away!  We were so excited we decided – hey!  Let’s give away two!  So we drew another one!  TWO winners!

Congratulations lovelies!  Thanks so much for donating!

But sweet though he may be he is also my biggest nag.  Anyone who has ever said anything about a woman’s capacity to nag has never encountered my four year old son. His ability to nag is completely unparalleled. His talents include – but are not limited to – envoking the extremely high pitched whinge, the over exaggerated pout, used while whining, “Pleeeeease” or “Staaaaarving” or “Thoooomas” or “Choooocolate” or “Teeeeea”, flopping across your lap in the manner of a dying person.  He will put his mouth next to your ear while using the high pitched whinge. He has extreme stamina when it nag mode and does not tire until he has either worn you down, been offered a suitable substitute or been sent to the bottom step for time out. However, be warned that the lull after the time out is merely him regrouping and recharging before launching another bout of nag. Governments should snap him up to be used as an interrogator.

So yesterday he is like this after I picked Alex up from school.

R:  Slushie?  (Slush Puppy)

Me:  No slushies today.  Mummy has no money for slushies.

R:  *higher in pitch*  Sluushie?

Me:  No slushie.

R:  *pouts*  *higher in pitch still*  Sluuuuushie?

Me:  No slushie.

R:  *Puss in Boots eyes*  *pouts*  *highest pitch invoked*  *moves so his face is now 1cm away from mine* Sluuuuuushieeeeee?!

Me:  NO.  SLUSHIE.

R:  Slushie slush slush?

Me:  Omg!  No!  Go to your room.

He races off to his room, collapses on the bed and wails about the woes of no Slush Puppy and the horror of his first world problems.  About 5 minutes later I go in and say, “Would you like to have a photo with Anzac this afternoon?”  And he’s up and bouncing and all, “Yes, Mummy, fank you!  I loves photos wif Anzac!”

He’s lucky he’s cute.

We gave them all ‘Litter Names’ based on Harry Potter characters and although a couple have their ‘Forever Names’ chosen by their new owners I’ll use their litter names here.

First up – Pup in a Cup aka Luna – 6 weeks.  Thanks to a certain little Miss 1 year old the cup she previously was photographed in has gone to cup heaven so here she is next to a different cup.

She wasn’t overly keen on sitting next to a cup. She was kind of like, “Why am I next to a cup? This isn’t fun. Where is that duck/rope thing?”

Next, Hermione – 6 weeks.

Followed by Hagrid – 6 weeks. Totally not fitting in his teapot anymore. Totally interested in the chamomile flowers.

And lastly, Master Dobby – 6 weeks. Our only one without a home so far. Nawww!

The ceremony took place at the Dairy Museum which I had never been to before but was so gorgeous.  Terry and Olivia recently did the painting there in some of the buildings.  The chapel there is small and gorgeous and the ceremony was short and sweet with the bell ringing to announce the newlyweds as they left the building as husband and wife.

Congratulations guys!  I hope you enjoy the honeymoon!

xx

I announced on my Facebook page during the week that I would be closing bookings (excluding existing bookings and newborns) until the new year.   I have a bit of housekeeping to do so I can officially open the studio  and it just has too many bits and pieces to do for me to juggle it with working at the same time.  I look forward to opening in the new year refreshed and ready to shoot.

There are going to be some changes with packaging, packages and pricing which I hope helps make it easier for people to understand and choose their images for their homes.  If you are interested in a booking do shoot me an email – I will still be answering emails and blogging about whatever takes my fancy while I’m on hiatus.

And on that note I’m going to leave with the little man I had in the studio today.  He is the newest addition to the mini mermaid clothing family.  Thanks so much for making the trek out guys – I know it’s a long way!

You get into this weird headspace where you have a ‘husband home’ routine and a ‘husband away’ routine.  For me that generally means that when he is home all routine goes out the window.  The time is just too precious so it’s too easy to put off errands until he leaves so I can maximise time with him.  Even if you’re not actually doing something together, it’s nice to be in the same room.  Right now he is watching a re-run of NCIS and I’m doing this blog post but we’re in the same room and it’s nice to just be close to him.

It’s been 6 weeks since he had a full week off because he had to go to Tafe so his shifts have been all funky.  As a result it took me a couple of days to get use to him being home.  You have this mixture of happiness that he is at home and irritation that you aren’t totally running the show.  For example, the other day I went to the dentist and when I came home he was playing the X-box in our room.  On a tv he had moved into our room.  It’s worth pointing out we already have a television wall mounted in our room so now we had two televisions.  Both the same brand.  And therefore both receptive to the remote.  I tried to watch something and turning on *my* tv turned off his.  Hilarious.  <—- sarcasm.  I shorten my showers because I have to leave enough hot water for him.  Tragic.  <—- no sarcasm.  And he requires bed space.  I co-sleep with my kids until they’re older and ready to move into a bed on their own.  So at this point Evie still sleeps in bed with me.  Last night I get up at 1:30am to feed the puppies (Biscuit requires encouragement to lie down and let them nurse) and when I come back I snuggle in next to baby and I’m totally on the edge.  Baby is tucked under my arm and his elbow is nearly jammed into her ribs from how close he is.  I whisper, “Can you move over a little?” and he says, “I’M ON THE EDGE!”  Now there is NO WAY he was on the edge.  I just cannot fathom it, he isn’t that wide.  I’m sure he must have had one big toe on the edge or something to be able to claim that in good conscious.  Sometimes also he is semi asleep and believes he IS on the edge but actually is in the middle of the bed.  Still, he is all, “I’M ON THE EDGE!”.  He says it that way because he doesn’t have a volume button.  He cannot whisper.  He can’t even talk quietly, it’s a total physical impossibility.  And when he can’t sleep he seems to think it’s only fair that I can’t sleep either. He will ‘whisper’, “I CAN’T SLEEP!” and I’ll be like, “*shhh* just close your eyes and lie there quietly.” and he’ll be like, “BUT IT’S NOT WORKING!  I CAN’T SLEEP!”  by which time Evie’s eyes have flicked open and she’s staring at me and now I’m cross because I have to get her and HIM back to sleep.

This morning I drew him some cartoons to describe how it’s like to sleep with him.  He was very unimpressed.

Despite this I will miss him when he has to go back.  I finally roped him into photos of him and me this afternoon.  It was a big step for him because in general he hates being in front of the camera and this was doubly bad because he was having to have photos in public.

Then I was browsing Pinterest – as you do – and found an image with a  baby on a blackboard ‘flying’ (aka lying on dad’s arm) above a chalkboard city and I had one of those lightbulb moments where I realised I could write little milestones on the chalkboard along with the age and do progression shots.  At this stage I’m looking at Newborn (and the chalkboard would say Name, Age, DOB, Weight at birth, length at both) 2 months, 4 months, 6 months and 12 months.  I think we’ve got buckley’s and  none of getting a 12 month old to lie down for a shot on a blackboard so I figure we will sit them up by then.  If you are interested in the progression shots please shoot me a message at admin@leftofcentrephotography.com.au and we can discuss it.  :)

Anyways, I took this little one’s photos when she was a newborn so we had her come back today for a 2 month catch up.  Her little chin is still recognisably hers but her hair has begun to fall out and she has this amazing little mohawk going on and obviously last time she was in studio she was sleeping where as this time she was wide awake and tracking us around the room with her beautiful big blue eyes.