Oh July, you beauty! It finally feels like we’ve had something resembling a summer - we’ve had so many lovely chilled out days just hanging out in the garden, having water fights with the hose, eating ice lollies, having dinner outside. It’s been the stuff that summer is made of!

I was much more organised this month about getting our monthly portrait done - we took the tripod out with us on our trip to Mottisfont (which you can read about here) and set about trying to get some shots in their beautiful walled garden. As expected, Max wasn’t keen at first and just kept trying to run off, but we managed to turn it into a bit of a game where he and my husband would set the timer and then both run back to me, waving arms about madly! I love how well this worked and we have our first ever nice shot of the three of us!

My husband also took the camera for some lovely shots of Max and I walking over the bridge, trip trapping looking for trolls. I loved doing this as a child and Max seems to love it too! Bizarrely, my husband had never heard of this tradition and was somewhat baffled at first and worried that we would be traumatising our child with talk of trolls. But clearly no need to worry - check out that big grin!

 

 

It’s been this month that it’s suddenly struck me that my little boy is now very much that - a little boy! I don’t know if it’s been the fact he loves a cuddle so much, the lack of hair, or the fact that his speech has been slow, but he’s always seemed to be younger than other children his age. To the point where other children younger than him would often pat him on the head (which he hates!) and say ‘baby’! But so many times this month, I’ve caught glimpses of the little boy that he is rapidly becoming and it makes my heart both swell with pride and also break a little bit at how fast he’s growing up.

 

In July we’ve loved:

• Eating ice lollies in the garden
• Playing in the paddling pool and playing with the hose
• Trips to the lavender fields, Legoland, and the strawberry farm
• My new shorter haircut - such a relief to get rid of such a lot of hair!
• Playing with other children for the first time! Max has become such a friendly guy these days and is all about making friends
• Getting to grips with my new camera (family shot still taken with the old one as I’ve not yet worked out the timer on the new one!)