Summer of Love

7pm and the sun. It's an energising feeling knowing that the sun sets so late here in Melbourne during daylight savings. We are so lucky. And the sun just feeds light and life into my soul. I'm not a sun worshipper.... I'm whiter than the belly of a fish, so have to be vigilant about loving it too much. I've never been one to sunbake, I always feel like I'm burning even if I have sunscreen on. It's hard to enjoy it when you're a pale shade of white. But I love the feeling of sun in the air. Sitting just on the edge of it and letting its warmth soak into my pores. Feeling the enervating life it gives to my being. 

I love photographing in the sun. Especially at 7pm in summer time. Because it's usually dinner time/witching hour/crazy time, it's so very rare that I can photograph my own kids at this time of the day. And I should more often. I should just hoik them out the back for a 2 minute shoot. But I don't.

But tonight I did. I asked Elliot, because he's usually much more compliant. And he agreed, but only if I could catch him first. And then we negotiated the terms all the way up the back of the yard. No more than 3 photos I promised, as long as he didn't pull a funny face. Buggalugs needed in on the action as usual. And I let her tag along because she'd give me the angry face if I didn't. And when we got out the back and Elliot couldn't face the way I wanted him to so I could get that beautiful sun on his gorgeous face ("my eyes hurt, I don't want to") Ivy filled his boots quicksmart. Yeah she had to blink, yeah she had to squint a bit, and yeah the photos aren't great. But I got what I wanted. The sun. For a brief 2 minutes, I got the sun on my kids pale skin. And it was golden and it was delightful. And squinty apparently.