It's that time again for ARTEFACT MOTHERHOOD - a project shared with other international female artists who are documenting our journeys as mothers and creating memories for our children through our photographs and words. Have a read through mine and then go check out the next amazing artist in our blog circle!

After a couple of nights of very broken sleep and 3:30 wake ups I had such an amazing sleep. I woke up to you, Forrest, giving me a kiss on my forehead and then telling me in a whispered but happy voice, “I had the best dream, mamma! I dreamed that I had lots of candy and was going somewhere!...can I have numnum?” We had such a lovely snuggle and eventually I got up. Nixie, you were still in a deep sleep with your legs wrapped around me and I had to carefully move them. I had thought it was much later but it was only 5:30. Not long after you, Forrest,  called for me and asked me to carry you downstairs so you can have your morning chocolate surprise. 

I turned on your favourite show: Spidey and his amazing friends and then went back upstairs into the office to try to get some work done. But it wasn’t that long before you called me downstairs again and asked if I could make you porridge. This time you pretty much made the porridge all by yourself, I was really impressed by how slowly you were able to pour the ingredients in! As I was cutting up the bananas, before I was allowed to add in another you needed to do a quality control check with your magnifying glass to make sure they didn’t have any mold on them. When it was time to turn the stove on and start mixing you grabbed my phone and started filming me because you said “I want to remember this day”. You thought the red light that comes on looked really cool when it was being filmed. Nixie, you, woke up just in time when the porridge finished but before making your way downstairs you had to show me how you do snail pose.  I had gone back to the office for a little bit to see if I could manage a little bit more work but shortly after I sat down I needed to get you both dressed and then you, Forrest, wanted more porridge. Nixie, at the moment you are really loving the song anti hero by Taylor Swift and kept asking Alexa to play it over and over and whenever a new song comes on that you like you love writing it down in your journal.

We managed to be in the car and on our way to the forest by 9am. It wasn't as frosty as yesterday but still frosty enough to cover the forest in a layer of white. The first thing you did Nixie, was run to a spot that you saw fitting for making a  very dim snow angel. Forrest, you also loved running along the heath and eventually our focus turned to spider webs and we were on a hunt for spiderwebs for me to photograph. Finally we found some ice! It was the tiniest patch but it made the two of you so incredibly happy and you both took turns gliding across it. You both loved when daddy pulled you both along and hearing the giggles that went along with it really made my morning. It seems like it's been a bit of a while since we've all just gone to the forest together and had fun.  As we continued our walk we kept finding more and more ice and it was the absolute best. I always love seeing the excitement on both your faces whenever you would run up to me with some pieces of ice asking me to take photos of it. 

Nixie you really made me and daddy laugh when daddy had told you to be aware that some of the ice might not be strong enough to hold you and it may be deep water underneath and you immediately dropped to your belly and said to us "I'm spreading myself wide so the ice doesn't break, just like I learned from Bear Grylls, he had to cross a lake once and had to do the same." We were super impressed that you remembered that! We spent ages at this little spot of ice. I was beginning to get really cold but the two of you seemed to be nowhere near ready to move on even though at this point both of you had soaking wet feet. At one point, you, Nixie, wanted to head over to the bridge so we were finally able to move on and I became so excited when I saw in front of me a man walking 4 Great Danes! I asked him if they were friendly and he said they were and for the next 10min we hung out with them giving them lots of love. One day we will be getting one although I think daddy may have a different opinion on that one. When we continued on our way we came across the most beautiful pony who came up to us but only because I realised we were in her way as she was also trying to cross the bridge. We walked along the stream for a little bit before turning back as now I was getting uncomfortably cold and just wanted to head back home. But along the way back, you, Forrest, kept having to stop because you wanted me to get pictures of you in various places, I love how you love me taking photos at the moment! By the time we made it back to the car it started raining with sleet quite heavily! We made it back just in time!!

By the time we got home the cold finally kicked in for the two of you and the first thing you guys did was run upstairs to jump in the bath. While you two did this I got all of the supplies and ingredients ready for our annual salve making. This year our salves will be made with Yarrow, Plantain, Calendula & Dandelion. I do so love this tradition of ours and they always make such wonderful little gifts for our friends. This year, you, Nixie, had no desire to help with the actual making of them as you were too busy with (in your own words) “work” and I had found you upstairs with the binoculars sitting in the window looking for birds. You were also busy dancing away to music and reading your national geographic kids magazine and there was one article that you had to show me straight away and came running into the kitchen super excitedly telling me that this was such a “fascinating and interesting thing I learned!” and it was an article answering the question why don’t birds wee? In regards to helping with the salves this year though I’ll let you off the hook since you did help with the foraging and infusing them into their oils.  This was the first year where you, Forrest, wanted to help and you especially loved helping me with pouring them into their little tins. There was a lot of waiting in between each batch so there was plenty of time for you, Forrest to dance (and I love how you absolutely need to have a dress on to do so and how you love showing us your moves) and continue to make your videos with my phone. While we waited for the last batch to set and for daddy to make this years labels which are now called “Nixie & Forrest’s Healing Salve” the three of us went into the lounge to finish reading our book, Fantastic Mr. Fox (we are still on our Roald Dahl binge and since last weekend we have also finished reading The BFG) and you, Nixie, were determined to try to look at the pictures with your binoculars.  

After you, Nixie, had finished putting the labels on the salves we made dinner and tonight we had pizza. You both loved getting to choose your toppings and Nixie, you kept wanting to take flat lays of our spread. You told me today that you just love taking photos and how you want to take photos of everything and I told you how I completely understood that! You are definitely my daughter! I love that we get to share a love for photography together. 

Once we had finished eating we all snuggled up on the sofa to watch Fantastic Mr.Fox. I had set up my tripod to try to capture a moment of us all snuggling but it turned into a huge distraction and we needed to pause the film and spend about 15 minutes playing with the remote as you, Forrest, especially were loving it. Tonight was also the first night you had ever tried an eclair and I don’t think you were very impressed because Nixie, you ended up finishing it for him. Afterwards we all went to bed and started yet another Roald Dahl book, this time Charlie and The Chocolate Factory. I had planned to get up and do some work on the computer but ended up falling asleep with the two of you. 

Go next to the wonderful artist and amazing person, Diana Hagues in our Artefact Motherhood Project to read her post in our blog circle.