I adore green. And as it's Thursday I am going to go for a #throwbackthursday amongst my post with the #capturingcolour bloggers too! It's hashtag central today!

I always thought my boys would inherit my dark brown eyes but no, Ollie is almost a carbon copy of Rich and his side of the family.

This is one of my favourite photos of Ollie. My gorgeous green boy. Where did that baby go?!!!

I had baby pink as our wedding theme and a few years later at our best friend's wedding I had serious colour envy! I absolutely loved the mint green throughout the wedding and if ever I get a chance to wear that beautiful dress again (if I can fit into it!) I will jump for joy. 

So I was very at home the week for the Instagram #capturingcolour week of green.

If you haven't joined Instagram you are missing out of a world of endless creativity and inspiration! Come and find us all and see what we are snapping using #capturingcolour.

You can find me here... if you like peonies you will like my feed ;)

There is something so calming about stopping to appreciate a scene or your meal. I have seen a lot of green this week as we are all slimming down for the Summer. We are off to Spain with my sister and her family and my brother and sister in law from America. I am doing ok so far, 7lbs down, 16 to go! But I haven't been able to get anywhere near to zipping my favourite green dress up in a couple of years, so all the plates of green will be worth it! A few more pounds off and it will fit like a treat.

I am staying with my sister tonight ahead of her helping me at the BritMums Live conference tomorrow where I am hosting the blog design session - wish me luck! 

This week you will be flooded with violet, indigo, mauve, lilac, lavender and every other colour way of purple you can imagine! 

Come and join in the fun and see what the other colour loving bloggers have captured this week.

My Two Mums
Real Housewife of Suffolk County
Sorry About The Mess
Maybush Studio and
my fellow BiBs Photo Finalist Shutterflies

It's an amazing thing watching people joining in and getting excited about capturing their colourful adventures.

Good luck to all the BiBs Finalists for the awards tomorrow evening! Sending a virtual 4 leaf clover to everyone! 

I live a colourful life and one of the most handy things I have ever made was a printable colour wheel.

I have a dog eared copy in my purse that I carry around and pull out when I am styling photos and planning blog posts. It's amazing how following the simplest rules of colour can make a huge difference to your photographs.

Of course there will always be exceptions to the rule but once you understand the basic principles you will suddenly realise how much you notice colour and which colours work together to make your photos pop.

It's a pleasure to join the #capturingcolour group of bloggers. #capturingcolour is a weekly Instagram tag, with each week a different colour taking centre stage. Last week was red.

It's strange isn't it, when you are pregnant all you can see is other pregnant people and when you have a colour in mind all I could see was red! In fact, I even created Ollie a red theme packed lunch as I realised I had subconsciously bought lots of red food in the weekly shop!

This week it's all about gorgeous greens. Green is actually my favourite colour. Mint green to be precise. I always feel confident in green and it 's my absolute favourite ice cream. Mint choc chip. Yum. 

Make sure you check in with the other colour loving bloggers:

My Two Mums
Real Housewife of Suffolk 
Maybush Studio
Shutterflies and
Sorry About The Mess.

We want to get everyone excited about colour. So here is a brand new colour wheel for you to download! Click on the image.

The Floral Colour Wheel is full of beautiful petals, buds and stems. They all look so beautiful but the opposites on the wheel are even more striking together.

View fullsize

When planning your blog photos think about using opposite colours on the wheels. So when I photographed Ollie's lunchbox in the pictures above I popped it on a green piece of paper. The touch of green in the ice pop photo makes the red in the ice lolly pop a little more than if it was just on the ice. 

Print off your own copy and have it around next time you are photographing a recipe, or a product you are reviewing on your blog.

I even think about the boys clothes when I am photographing them for a blog post! So if I was going to take a photo of them in a park amongst the green grass and trees I'd put them in red. 

Have a go and see what a huge difference it makes to your photos.

Now get snapping green and tag your photos on Instagram #capturingcolour You can find my Instagram account here! 

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Oh Summer days get here faster. I am dreaming of bbq's in the garden, lunches on street tables and the sun on our faces. May has always been kind to our family of 4, bank holiday fun, house news and celebrating a big boy's birthday.

So this month's Me and Mine portrait to dedicated to Sammy. 

A precious boy who a mere 6 weeks ago was driving me to tears with outrageously bad behaviour, rudeness and being aggressive to his little brother. But something happened quite naturally over the last month, this phase of shouting at us, demanding, defiant behaviour has dissipated. To the point where we have a lovely boy, who is appreciative and grateful and kind to his brother.

Of course there are still flashes of a 5 year old's temper and frustration but 99% of the time we see a new Sammy.

And at a time when our family are reminded of how precious life can be, we felt his birthday was a perfect excuse to spoil him rotten. Reward him for his good behaviour and just generally give him the most awesome birthday ever. "Everything is awesome...!" If you've watched the Lego movie you will know what I mean ;)

We headed to my Mum's late last Friday and after a leisurely sausage sandwich breakfast we set off on our adventures at Staines station. A half hour journey on the "land train" was enough to whip them into an excitable frenzy, with every platform we stopped at enjoying Sammy's announcement "Welcome to London Waterloo." Cue ah no darling not this one.

We negotiated the hoards of people heading for the Underground and made our way across the Jubilee line to Green Park to head for The National History Museum.

We had not anticipated the queues so dived into a Lebanese restaurant for a quick lunch whilst the lunchtime queues died down. What a treat to sit on the street! We let him have his first fizzy drink - he didn't ask for a second and called it spicy, and indulged in lamb burgers, pittas, dips and grilled chicken.

Unfortunately we timed it all wrong and just as we headed to join the back of a still rather long queue, the heavens opened! We crowded under a small umbrella and got soaked. The boys thought it was hilarious and spent the rainy episode with their tongues hanging out catching raindrops like dogs, apparently!

After 40 minutes in the pouring rain we made it inside, headed for the hand dryers in the toilets and dried off as best we could. Soggy trousers didn't bother the boys one bit - there was a new world to discover!

We explored and then explored some more. There is so much to see and do I think you definitely need 3 or 4 trips. Ours enjoyed the hands on stations around the museum and I know they will enjoy it in a whole new way when they can read all the information stands.

We stayed until closing time, fulfilled one of Sammy's wishes of taking a taxi ride (Straight to Anthropologie for me to grab a couple of bits and then to Harrods to have a peek at the incredible toy department!) and ended up in Chinatown where we had promised him dinner with chopsticks!

We enjoyed a feast, made friends with the waiters and as we left Chinatown to walk to the tube station, got caught in a hare krishna demonstration. The boys loved it and ran straight onto the makeshift pavement stage, dancing with delight in front of a smiling crowd who had gathered to watch.

I had fully expected one or both of them to nod off but no they were giddy all the way home and couldn't wait to see Granny to tell her all about our day in London.

Sammy woke up to helium balloon gift wrap, lots of little presents (His main present is his fishing party today.) and a simple day of family fun followed a 6am wake up call.

A birthday roast, a trip to the park and a sleepover at Auntie and Uncle's. What more could a boy want? We ended the birthday weekend with a visit to his poorly cousin.

Happy birthday my darling, we are so lucky to have you. So lucky you are the healthy happy boy we are incredibly proud of.

ps. Can you believe I left my big camera at home? On a birthday weekend? So this month's Me and Mine is mobile all the way! 

Join in with us and share your family photo from May. I've shown you me and mine, now show me you and yours! Capturing family moments is precious. Just snap away!

I'm hoping next month will be a photo of us at our new house - we should exchange in June so fingers and toes crossed. If you fancy a nose at some house photos click here.

Now head over to Becky's ace blog and check out what her, Tom and sweet Holly have been up to!