Once upon a time I used to try and photograph and video all the performances that my kids were involved in. It was never a particularly successful endeavour largely due to a combination of inadequate equipment, an unskilled operator, and a rather limiting reluctance to be one of those parents standing up/sneaking down the aisle/laying claim to the center front seats. Not that I resented them doing that. I just couldn’t be bothered.

Besides, I found that if I spent the whole time watching the performance on a tiny screen or through a view-finder I’d get to the end and realise I had no idea what had just happened.

So I decided to stop trying to record everything for posterity and just be there in the present moment and endure enjoy those primary school performances the old school way. By watching all the kids instead of just mine, smiling manically while gritting my teeth and then applauding madly with relief at the end without the awkwardness of a camera held in one hand. (I’m really not cut out to be the parent of small children, am I?)

I broke all my rules today though at a Christmas concert at Blacktown Workers Club. I took photos of Caitlin while she was doing her sound check and I videoed both of her songs.

There’s not much gritting of teeth going on while watching performances any more, and the broad grin is completely involuntary. But it’s still really awkward clapping when you have a camera dangling from one wrist and an iphone in the other hand. Because it’s not enough to record this stuff, one has to instagram it as well. Right then and there.

Sound check. Black and white challenge day 1. I nominate @elainecouragexoxo to post 5 black and white pics over 5 days and nominate someone else to do so each day.

A photo posted by @mimblespix on Dec 12, 2014 at 3:35pm PST

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I was going to share one of the videos with you too but the youtube upload has been stuck on 5 seconds to go for about 10 minutes. So that will have to wait.