So much of my travel over the last year has been work related, which I absolutely love but I wanted to get away with my daughter for something totally non work related.   My parents travel to ski resort Val d’Isere in France almost every year, and since my little girl is now 3 and old enough to ski I thought it would be something different for us to do together, I’m really lucky to have a close family and so happy that along with my parents my brothers Sam and Chris came along too, proper family outing! (and childminders ;)).  Now I say non work related… well nothing these days is non work related and I was itching to take some shots in the snow.. down on the nursery slopes with my daughter wasn’t a problem but the odd occasion I was let loose on the mountain it was rather challenging! the logistics of carrying a DSLR whilst skiing as well as stopping, taking my skis off, taking my gloves off (brrr) to take the picture was , well let’s face it a lot of faff!! particularly as I was learning to ski again after pretending to snowboard for years!  I had great fun though and my friend Roddy from Pro Snowboarding was kind enough to humour me with some shots on the slopes, thanks for your patience Roddy!

Most importantly we had a brilliant time and I’m so glad I set aside the time to get away.  Nieve did so well with her ski lessons and her instructor Liam was a godsend, so patient and excellent at making snow animals, even with my daughter’s obscure requests! There were more than a few proud tears in my eye as I watched her make her way down the nursery slopes, even her Uncles came down from the mountain to watch her at her lunchtime lesson 🙂

My 365 project really helped me get my camera out on days were I maybe didn’t feel like it, but as a result I have some treasured family photos that otherwise I may not have had the motivation to take.  Taking the camera out when not working has felt far less like a hassle and more of a challenge, so brace yourself for more personal work hitting the blog!

Massive thanks to my wonderful family for such good times and such amazing support, to Liam for his awesome hard work at Nieve’s lessons, to Roddy for always being a gracious Val d’Isere host and excellent model! and to Snowberry for taking such great care in kitting out my girl with her ski gear.