I am blessed……

…..the greatest love in my life is my son.

My beautiful boy

I can’t believe where the time has gone and here he is now almost taller than me at the age of 11, going to the park on his own to meet up with his mates.  Preparing the way ahead for when he starts Teddington secondary school in September and then? I hear it changes!!!  Teenage hormones are not something that I am looking forward to as I have far too many of my own thank you very much!!

So… seeing Peter in shots that I have taken recently you would never know that he was born with a cleft lip and palate.   This is something that wasn’t picked up on the scan so it was quite a shock when he was born and I remember my first words to him were “I am sorry…” At four days old they repaired the lip (they wait until 3 months now) and then that was the start of the operations that he has had to have.  The more recent one was 2.5 years ago when he had a bone graft from his hip into his gum and a revision of his lip and nose.  That was one of the worst.  Why am I talking about this? Because I never want to forget how brave and matter of fact my son has been and how far we have come as a family….and also to give encouragement to those who may have recently given birth to a child with a cleft lip and palate that it is going to be all ok….

Peter is a kind boy, great sense of humour, cheeky and has his father’s wit, but most of all he has empathy, an understanding and intuition of people around him which you can’t teach.  Even when he was a baby he used to cry when others around him cried.

I had to finish a 35mm film that I had started for a recent shoot and I just took a few shots in our conservatory while Peter was still in his pyjamas with a 50mm 1.4 (longing for a 1.2 but that will have to wait).  I got the film back a couple of days ago and I am just shocked on how my son is growing up before my eyes and I am not documenting it like I should – so this is my mission to use my gift as a photographer and not miss these precious years.

I love film btw……nothing has been done in post production…..  that is the way it should be really – get everything right in camera!

All images – Copyright – Annie Armitage 2011 – Do not copy