When I started typing this post up I thought that perhaps I've given them the wrong titles, and that maybe "Behind the Scenes" would be better. Because the hint of sarcasm in the vs could lead you to believe that the photos you see lean more towards the fabricated than the fleeting moments that are captured at any given time. But there is always a story behind the finished story. For me styling photos is such a pleasure, creating a mini scene amongst chaos or not, (sometimes the house can look quite together, but only sometimes!) is my way of relaxing and I cherish the times I have when I can get lost in a little world of props and flowers, using my favourite old baking tray and snap away. 

I look at the people I follow on Instagram and there are some accounts who have made a full time businesses from their snapshot photos, sharing their every days, their travels and adventures all snapped in beautiful light and all with a post edit glow that makes each one stand alone. There's a sense of love and dedication in every single little square, that that photo has been chosen for you to enjoy and that's exactly how I feel. That each one is the next page in my visual storybook, I share what we are doing that day, or where we might have been that week, perhaps it might be some flowers or something I've snapped that sums up how I feel from a while ago, but each one means as much as the last.

I had the pleasure of meeting one of the Instagrammers I follow Julia last month who has grown an eye popping following of loyal and engaged fans who adore her flat lays, her florals and her eye. It felt like I was in the presence of greatness, with someone who was humble but had found her home in this creative space. Confident in her style, but free with her advice. We chatted about using the best camera you have available, that it's not cheating to use a dslr instead of the camera you can whip out of your pocket and I don't know why, but when I read that she has re-cropped and reposted an image deleting the ones that didn't sit right with her a day or so after, it made me realise that taking absolute ownership of your Instagram gallery with the same fierce pride and love as your blog is a good thing. 

So many of us will be styling our photos without even realising. That almost on auto pilot you will move a touch to the left to crop out something less pretty in the background. Hands up if you've ever got out a piece of white card and set up a mini scene on it?! Yep! Me too :)

I end up in contorted stances, on my hands and knees, even on the floor, to take photos at different angles! I know my eye is always drawn to the detail in a situation, and the photos I share where there's just a hint of a scene rather than the whole story are always the ones that get my lovely followers double tapping. 

It's become second nature to lug around my Canon, I sling it over my shoulder without a second thought and no one bats an eyelid when I snap away at family gatherings. I shoved it into my hospital bag as I raced to be with Natalie when she was in labour with Logan and I will always treasure those precious first photos I snapped when he was cocooned in his white blanket in a hazy newborn snooze as the sun came up. It was so special to be my sister's second pair of eyes and whilst she was struggling to stay awake I could take some photos for them which we all have on our window ledges. 

In fact when we took the boys for a run on the beach last week I lost count of the number of other parents who had a bigger camera around their necks. I love that there's this generation of us who have fallen in love with photography, friends of mine have cameras on their birthday and christmas lists, and there are so many moments I have stored on my laptop, that I print out at a later date. 

So here's a few of my behind the scenes from the last month or so, nothing that constitutes rocket science just conscious cropping and some tidying! And of course you don't have to have a DSLR or point and shoot - just don't feel you have to be shy if you do! 

I've shared all of them on Instagram and they've all come from my DSLR. It's not for everyone to upload photos to a Dropbox file and then share them from their phone but it works for me. I do share photos from my phone but mostly I use the camera I love the most. And I am not alone feeling like this which makes me breathe a huge sigh of relief!

I headed to Bristol last Wednesday to spend a couple of hours on the Clifton photo walk organised by Lori and Laura and I looked around at all the different cameras and felt like one of the gang. Phones, point and shoots and DSLRs all capturing different scenes and stories. 

I looked around at this group of passionate writers, photographers, vloggers, parents and friends and thought wow. What company to be in. People who have taken a leap and followed their hearts, turning hobbies into businesses, contributing to making blogging a profession to be admired and valued. Lori who lives and breathes her Mama meets cool tagline, exuding the most genuine and uplifting spirit every time I see her, Fritha who must have barely taken a day's traditional maternity leave, a superwoman whose real life has become blog life and who treasures her family unit. We talked about how you can't blog without the support of those around you, not just our "Instagram husbands" who have to painfully put up with endless requests to take photos but who are there, at midnight when you are still staring at a laptop, who forgive you when your head spins off and you shout at the top of your voice and who are there to celebrate and share all the wonderful things that blogging brings you. And Natasha who I can talk honestly about work opportunities and worries without any sense of competition, like we've known each other since school. Her confidence and determination inspires me to the point that I wish I could just get in the car and drive to her house to sit on her sofa for a long cup of tea and not stop talking for 4 hours.

One of the things Natasha said to me last Wednesday, really struck a chord. About doing less, but doing it better. And I guess that's what I am going to concentrate on. My love is for photography. Visual stories that capture my attention, that I want to share with you. My heart is in my photos, the colours, the compositions, the people and places that fill the frames. 

It's easy to feel left behind with blogging. It's easy to say to yourself you can't do everything and be everything to all people but it's harder to believe it. Consciously not let yourself get weighed down with the pressure to keep up. It feels like the world has just discovered Snapchat right at the time when I feel that I have really found my home on Instagram! I signed up to a video course in January as I am determined to go out of my comfort zone this year and understand how to edit all the video clips I take that get left unloved in an album. Not necessarily to share them right now, but to find my way of creating mini movies for the boys for the future. 

Being an all or nothing type of person has it's downsides. I am either full force or stilted like a rabbit in the head lights. And that can make you just not try. But at the same time the upside is that you practise at what you love the most, and hopefully you see yourself improving. A couple of weeks ago I felt like I had a huge opportunity, shooting images for a new Summer catalogue on a beach in Devon with a team from Moshulu. I got to the beach about an hour before we were due to meet and wandered along the sand covered in a blanket of pebbles and took a deep breath. There was no where to hide on the beach. No shelter, just a vast expanse of space, with the sea air whipping against my face. It felt like a big moment, my first fashion catalogue shoot with no one else to be other than myself. Just me and my camera.

I feel like I am on a never ending journey with my photography, I look back at photos I took last year and can see my style evolving and feel so proud of how far I have come. There's so much blood sweat and literal tears that have gone into the images that get uploaded to my blog. 

So I was over the moon to see the Finalist's announced for the MAD Blog Awards 2016, celebrating parent bloggers from the UK. My heart leapt when I saw my name under the Photography category! Recognition from your peers is a huge deal. These are the awards that without a doubt made a difference to my whole working life. Thank you so much to anyone who nominated me. The other 4 finalists are more than worthy winners and I can't wait to see them all at the awards ceremony in September. 

If you haven't voted yet you can head over here and cast your vote! 

On Friday I had the pleasure of being invited to the beautiful Nib and Ink book launch (which deserves it's own post!) at the Platform Gallery above Habitat on King's Road in London. I felt like I was amongst Instagram royalty with almost everyone introducing themselves as an Instagrammer when I said hello. 

It was a wonderful but slightly surreal experience to be surrounded by the London elite, firm friends who exchanged big hugs as we cooed over the decor and pretty inks on the table, as well as those who had travelled from a little further afield. People whose galleries I adore.

I was in awe and got a little over excited, barely pausing for breath on several occasions! But the reality is everyone is just the same. Despite followers in 6 figures, no one was elitist. Refreshingly ordinary, normal people with extraordinary followings. Once upon a time suggested users, members of a real community, building and shaping the influence and power of visual social media.

I feel like you can learn something everyday, that you can evolve your gallery, curate your feed any which way you want. That perhaps it's not about being a master of the platform, it's more about being the master of your account. So what works for them might not work for you. You can read the thousands of posts of tips, share your own - be open with what's helped you and help someone else. But the most important thing is that it's yours. 

That still life, as beautiful as it is, quite possibly doesn't interest you. Maybe your gallery is all about you, your face, your family, your clothes, your home as opposed to a feed full of stunning florals, with no hint of the person behind it. 

Whatever it is I just think you need to love it. And your passion will shine out and inspire, engage and resonate with people. 

Whenever I get together with friends I have met through blogging and social media the conversation always turns to Instagram. Why we all love it, what hashtags we all join in with, what new communities people are starting (if you love a good coffee join in with the brand new hashtag from Wild and Grizzly #stylemycoffee) and the mystery of why people follow and unfollow and milestone moments we are all so proud of.

And I couldn't be more proud of #capturingcolour. A 33,300 and growing strong gallery bursting with bright florals, patterned mural walls, delicate pastel houses, magnolia trees starting to blossom and injections of colour into family lives.

No one photo linked up feels the same. For some a love of colour means pops of pastel, neon brights, for others a more muted palette is how they embrace gentle hues in their home. The gallery is bursting with inspiration for interesting compositions, portraits, capturing your children, flat lays and eye catching photographs to give you ideas on your next weekend away or holiday.

I seemed to fill my February feed with lots of feminine colours, blush roses, pink petals and a mix of softer tones amongst my more stronger shades. I realise how much my photos jump around, when I look back at the #capturingcolour gallery. One minute I share something from the house, the next a floral flat lay, boys to westies and there was even a few of me last month! I was discussing with a friend how there isn't a real theme, bar colour. And I guess that's fine by me. I don't want my grids to blur into each other. Our lives are an organised mess of 4 different jobs, boys, school life, friends and family. And I think my feed is exactly the same. An organised mess but hopefully a pretty mess!

Every month when I scroll through the gallery to pick out a grid of favourites I open the gallery on my laptop and randomly bookmark those that ping out at me, and they always seem to flow into each other. I spotted the photo of the tule skirt and it went on from there.

I love the coolness of the violet tones against the warmth of the pinks. February was biting cold in the UK and I love that despite the serenity of these images there's a hint of whimsy, a lightness, almost a hint of spring.

Hop over to Instagram to find these accounts and follow them! So much inspiration for your daily feed.

And this month I want to highlight Britt's account that I discovered a while ago. Her use of texture blows me away. The way she incorporates muted colours is so captivating and her engagement is just incredible. Stunning still life, delicate pinks and a real sense of depth with metallic.

I could get so lost in her gallery. 

I want to dive in and eat everything she bakes! I can't wait to follow her through spring, to see how she shares the brighter colours of the season. Every picture she shares could be a piece of artwork. 

Thank you so much to every single one of you who make this gallery so beautiful. And a huge thank you for following me on Instagram. For me, it's become almost a blog of it's own, a daily journal and it was so interesting to hear that Julia and Hannah only recently started their blogs in the last year or so and that Jess only uses Instagram.

That Instagram had been their sole creative writing and visual sharing platform. That the power of the community online has given them this audience around the globe. And more importantly that there is so much room for everyone. To not get caught up in how many followers someone else might have, not to rush. As tempting as it is to want to post every few hours or even every day, by being more conscious and discerning, you only share your very best. 

I find it hard to only share a few times a day - what about you?! I guess it's all a balance about posting for you, posting for your followers and posting with purpose. Just like a blog. 

Come and join in with #capturingcolour. I share my grid of favourites each month and I hope you find some new wonderful accounts to follow. 

I love the idea of traditions, we have a few in our family, Christmas Day rituals and toasts at the dinner table when we are all together, but I've really wanted to start something at home.

In the last month I've seen such a change in Sammy. As he approaches 7 we feel like we are leaving the little boy phase behind and he's turning into a young boy, complete with goofy adult teeth pointing in all directions. It feels like a big jump 6-7, he speaks with confidence and eloquence unlike Ollie who still mixes up his words every now and again, "cockcorn" being one of our favourites on movie night. This week we will be choosing his first pair of glasses for when he is working in the classroom and I look at this great man child before me when he hops out of the shower, wiggling around waiting for me to dry him and I see him torn between being this carefree innocent boy and someone ready for more independence.

The nights spent creeping into our bed to sleep with me are few and far between now, but the cuddles in the morning are just as huge as they were in the middle of the night. He lies on us in turn like this baby elephant squashing our chests and I just breathe these moments in. 

It's not like we are on borrowed time, more like we can see the road ahead, despite us still being firmly Mama and Dada. Rich has offered to be Dad of Daddy if they'd prefer but they don't want to. Thank goodness because I can't imagine being anything other than Mama! This year will be the start of Year 3, a move up to a separate part of the school and new routines. I want to let them be little for as long as possible before the natural course of growing up kicks in. Yesterday they rediscovered all the old Early Learning Centre Happyland plastic toys I have been saving for Yasmin when we emptied our hideously untidy garage onto the drive for a major sort out. I watched as they collected grass and logs and built a "tree lodge" for the figures and hid in a tent with no pole to hold it up, two pairs of legs and feet poking out of the door whilst pretending to be robbers in one of their wildly imaginative games. 

There's secret languages, chants and songs including "Stupidy one and Stupidy two" where a sense of irony is totally lost on my Dumb and Dumber haircut boys! Sammy is a good boy, someone who I imagine in later life will be described as a "good egg", an old fashioned phrase that suits him perfectly. He sleeps with a copy of The Famous Five by his bed, has sussed out that if you join Ballet club after school you get to be with all the girls get a biscuit at tea time and has made firm friends with 3 other boys at school who are out of the same mould. You hear them playing Knights and Dragons in the playground as we try and corral them to the car park. Maybe not the cool kids on the block but the nice boys and that's fine by me. There's plenty of time to be trendy and grown up, I don't want to rush it.

At home I watch them swing on this tree in the front garden like monkeys giggling to each other and long for the summer holidays when we pottered around past a normal school night bedtime, with two barefoot boys, sunshine blasting through the branches at 7pm and their heads upside down, with hair like a wavy mop. 

I love how I will be able to look back at photos of them on this tree and see how they have grown.

And that sparked an idea.

In the late spring I adore the wooden arch over the gate to the front door. It becomes covered in small pink roses which last until late October. In the winter when it's bare I wonder whether it would be nicer to have the front more open and take it down but now it has to stay.

This is going to be our February tradition, charting the boy's heights against the arbor. Scratching their initials and ages into the wood - if we ever move we will have to take the pole with us!

Ollie feels like he has such a long time to wait until his 5th birthday in July, with most of his class already having had their birthdays and parties he's one of the littlest in every way. I can see his face changing, the roundness paving way for more refined cheeks and he's so slim you'd think we never feed him! In so many ways he's desperate to be like his bigger brother and in others he's so contended being the baby of the family. He sleeps with his other family of soft toys, in a defined order, leaving almost no room for him and you are in trouble if you don't carry out to the letter the "kiss and a cuddle" bedtime goodbye ritual. One day he might forget this beloved tradition but that's the joy of writing a blog. A digital diary of our family life and one of the reasons I love the Me and Mine Project.

Without this monthly prompt to take a family photo I know we would only have a handful rather than an album full.

So this is my little family, on my little corner of the internet. Last week I and a lovely day out with some other parent bloggers and whilst putting the blogging world to rights one said something that really struck a chord. That there are so many of us now it's hard to stand out, but I disagree. When you write about your family you have a never ending stream of unique content. 

Some people will follow you on your pregnancy journeys, some will follow you through until your Facebook posts become tearful goodbyes at University doors and some will find you along the way, dip in and out when you are going through the same stage in life. 

We are only limited by our imagination. I look at my two as inspiration to how I approach my working life like how they approach a Sunday afternoon in the garden. It's not the garden, it's the ocean and the balls littered around the grass are sharks. So you have to jump onto the swings to be picked up by the helicopter who has come to save you.

To them the world is an endless stream of possibilities you just have to make them up sometimes. It's not about waiting for things to happen it's about making things happen. So be brave, make new connections, collaborations just like this one. It's a pleasure to cohost this monthly family portrait project with this group of talented and inspiring parent bloggers, pop over and read the other posts linked up below. There are so many lovely families joining in, all with their unique stories to tell. 

Cheerio February, bring on the sunshiny days of Spring!