Happy 7th Birthday Tickles.

Happy 7th Birthday Tickles.
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You are a patient, kind hearted example of the human species and there is a lot we can learn from you πŸ™‚
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Thankyou also for introducing me to ‘Pusheen’ (thats a fat animated cat thing for all you peeps under a rock:) ) I suspect our house and bank balance will never be the same – they are however so soft and cuddly πŸ˜‰

Middle Sis

Middle Sis
Every one needs a big sis, some are lucky enough to have a big sis and a middle sisΒ πŸ™‚
The best place in Sydney park ? with the crazy swans and their cygnets… since no dogs are allowed there πŸ™‚ I’m glad they have fenced off the bottom pond here, it means you can get some relief from all the dogs in the park – don’t get me wrong, i like dogs, but it seems the inner west has gone dog mad.

Pretty sure some dog owners would prolly like to see a area fenced off for no kids on scooters too πŸ™‚

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Happy Place.

Pretty well a ritual every day, plonk oneself infront of bookcase and pull down a bunch of books. Little E will happily spend 15 minutes here just thumbing thru the books, lifting flaps and feeling textures.

Happy Place.
(C) 2019 Gerard Blacklock,

Busted.again.

– Oh shit.. he’s busted me again.
– screw it, i’m going in anyway.. it’ll be worth it..
– ohh.. blissful choc powder!
– don’t be cranky dad, i put it back and did not spill any:)

I think its a rite of passage for all my kids to eat my coffee sugar, choc powder and coffee beans (they only try those once ) i can’t remember how many times i have had to clean my choc powder shaker to remove hardened slobber and chocolate powder…

 

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Chaos vs empathy.

Its a tough gig growing up and being the oldest, sure there are plenty of positives (probably mostly seen from hindsight and adults) however when you step back and view it from the shoes of a kid it really must be tough, as the oldest your expected to do the right thing all the time, to know better and behave better than your younger siblings, continually help out more than the others, the list goes on. This is then compounded by the fact that it appears you are no longer cute or as lovable as the younger siblings who appear to get more ohhs and ahhs – you can then also pretty well rinse and repeat that for the middle child, i’ll let you know about the third in a few years

Parenting for me is like continual battle of unwavering patience (mine does waver tho, often), discipline, cleaning, making school lunches (don’t wind me up about school lunches) and washing punctuated by moments of sheer joy from the acts of empathy and selflessness that they exhibit. Its those moments that keep you going thru the epic pile of unfolded washing and inside out shirts and tights…or the tantrums when your meant to be at a 9am meeting or the snot on your shirt applied when hanging up and its too hard to reach the tissues

Those moments of joy are hard to capture in images, possibly because your still operating on anxiety level 14.5 million and 2.5 hours of sleep, but i’ll share two here, one captured in images and the other simply in words.

Its 9pm, time for bed and its been a long day when Chaos says
to me “how about you put tickles to bed while i fold the washing” I’m sure you can imagine my skepticism here, especially when it seems at any available moment when not supervised she is doing something she probably should not be doing, fingers in the icecream, biscuits in bed, stashed lollies, eating dads chocolate, putting makeup on, using all of the hair conditioner in one go etc

“really dad…i promise you can trust me this time”

so, in another moment of unwavering patience i take mayhem (aka tickles) off to bed to sleep, fully expecting to come back out and to see two socks folded and chaos laid back on the couch with a bowl of icecream watching married at first sight or something equally inappropriate
20 minutes later i return and yup, its one of those sheer joy moments, she has folded all the washing, pretty darn well too and started to put it away – now this is no small feat in our household where a mountain of washing large enough to cover a small island nation is regular occurrence every couple of days. Well done chaos, you have restored my faith in humanity.

The second, and this is actually somewhat more common, often in a more malformed way tho:) – the act of pure kindness to mum or dad in the way of breakfast in bed, or a variant thereof. here chaos had dutifully made several cups of tea and a few pots as a tea sampling morning for mum they were pretty good too…

 

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Studio

Tickle Studio - (c) 2014 Gerard Blacklock

Tickle Studio – (c) 2014 Gerard Blacklock

Welcome to the tickle studio
I just found the best studio for doing portraits in, well kids portraits anyway πŸ˜‰ now coined “The Tickle Studio”

Its a background, diffuser, child barrier and child entertainer all in one and for less that 20 bucks πŸ™‚ My little tickles dutifully adorned with head band, testing it out for me, this is her corporate look – nicely done and I reckon your pretty darn cute πŸ™‚

Family

and there were 4 in the dunes and the little one said.. where to now?

This scene with the grass clumps reminds me of my own family, my beautiful partner (wifey) front row centre, mayhem off to the left (and as always.. heading off to explore with no fear), me , i am the big clump off to the right with chaos close by keeping a eye on me πŸ™‚

Its a big world out there πŸ™‚

Whilst our dune-age here in NSW Australia does not compare to the stuff in the middle of the county or even some the awesome ones over in other countries, I still love getting out there and trying to capture that expansive, bleak and textured scenes – i hope I have acheived it here and gotten you lost in the scale of the vanishing horizon and classic big blue aussie sky.

Single frame
Exif/setup data:
D7000 coupled with Tokina 11-16mm f2.8 @11mm Aperture: f/16 and Shutter Speed: 1/20s
ISO 100
out front – Screw in Hoya Filter – circular polariser

As always, I welcome any suggestions, comments and improvements to my photography, they are always warmly welcomed