I have an iPhone and and iPad both with a camera and video recording facility, I also have a fairly fancy point and shoot camera which I purchased a couple of months ago. I take as many photos and capture as many memories as I can, I always have, even more so now I’m a parent.

What I’m not so great at is doing anything with the photographs or videos once they have been taken. Every so often I download everything onto my laptop and on special occasions or family birthdays I may have something printed and framed, particularly pictures of Mabel for her Grandparents and my husband. I feel I should be doing something more. Or at least have some kind of organisational tool (?) or process which means I’m storing everything in some kind of order and picking out favourites.

Now Mabel is constantly on the move it’s far more difficult to achieve a photograph that isn’t out of focus, on the wonk or just a really odd composition/the back of her head (!) It was so much easier when she was a teeny tiny baby. I make every effort on a Friday when we have the day together to capture her in some way or another – even if it’s in her highchair covered in yoghurt and crushed Biscotti. They change so much so quickly, I don’t want to regret missing anything, even her wearing various desserts.

I’ve always been a big advocate of instagram, not only do I find LOADS of fashion, beauty and interiors inspiration on there (it is really not good for my bank balance) but I use it as an online diary if you will, snippets of my daily life. Of course my feed changes as my lifestyle does – for the foreseeable future it’s mostly about motherhood and Mabel, with some behind-the-scenes work action thrown in amongst my obsession with flowers and make-up. It’s a way for me to have a very small section of my memories organised – I’ve had some lovely prints via the Social Print Studio  last year for gifts and to create a montage of images for the kitchen wall. Talking of the kitchen, those of you that read Rock My Style  will know that we recently completed our gallery wall (I say completed – it’s currently got 10 frames but you know, one step at a time!) so I do feel that we have at least some memories in all of their technicolour glory personalising our home.

Sometimes there just isn’t the opportunity to take photographs and sometimes you just forget, at events and gatherings I am particularly lax, when you are having such a super time and there is so much going on, it just doesn’t necessarily occur to me to whip out my phone. And even though my camera is fairly compact, it’s a real arse to cart it around at a party or out and about in general. And it certainly doesn’t fit in a clutch bag.

Whilst we were on holiday in Cornwall recently I did make a concerted effort to capture as much as I could. To the point where my own steely determination was annoying. Sometimes I want to look at a beautiful scene with my eyes. Not via a lens. There has to be a balance I guess.

You are probably wondering at this stage exactly where this feature is going, and to be honest I’m not entirely sure. Six years plus of blogging and sometimes I just need to discuss something that’s currently on my mind, as selfish as that may sound.

What do you do in terms of organising your memories? Do you take hundreds more photographs now you have littles? Do you have those photographs printed often? Do you sometimes feel you should be all clickety click with your camera of choice when actually you just want to sip a mojito/enjoy the moment for what it is? And what do you do with all of your video clips?…..I feel I should make something with them all somehow.

I also wanted to share with you a new project from some of our long term favourite sponsors Pen and Cam from Mckinley-Rodgers, they have launched “A little window” – a snippet of which you can see at the top of this post. I won’t waffle on about it too much as I always think the founder of any business or idea can explain the concept better than anyone else can so I’ve included some details direct from Pen below. What I will say is this film is so precious, and it just re-confirms that making the effort to record your memories, however seemingly mundane, is completely worth it. I just need to be more organised. And endeavour to strike that aforementioned balance.

Pen of A Little Window: “The idea for A Little Window came about a few years ago when my friend Kate was pregnant with her second child, and I captured an ordinary day of her with her first daughter, Ella, before this little family of 3 became 4.  Although there was nothing planned or posed about the day, looking back, that one ordinary day is particularly special because life looks so different now for them.  We are lucky we live in an age where we have smart phones and the technology to document far more of our every day lives, but still too often, we tend to reserve “photography” for the significant occasions and events.  Yet it’s all the days in between that create the story of our life.
However we appreciate, a One Day shoot isn’t always practical, so we also offer the option of a little window – a couple of hours to capture something real and simple – be it on a family holiday, an afternoon on the beach, or just an ordinary day at home and in the local park.  For us, it’s all about memory keeping, and how to pay attention to the seemingly less important days which are in fact the foundation of our extraordinary lives.”

Film by A Little Window