I knew about bloggers doing posts on 8 photos of happiness and it was fun to read the stories behind each of the photos. I waited for someone to tag me. However, at the same time I asked myself if I really want to do this, to post personal photographs on the blog when I am not into this.
When AJ Ishaan did a similar post, I thought “Let’s be brave and shed the fear. Let me do it”. And, I asked him to tag me. Yes, I went the other way round for this.
Thank you AJ Ishaan for adhering to my request and tagging me.
Here are my 8 photos telling stories of homemade happiness.
(1) This is the first photo I clicked at the age of 5. Talk about spontaneity in photography and here it is. But, the 3 subjects in this photo, my parents and my brother, fail to recognise my photography skill till date and always point out that I did not say ready before clicking it so that they could have closed their pop corn filled mouths, grabbed my little brother besides them and popped up their cheesy smiles.
This photo is about finding happiness in imperfection 🙂
(2) This one is from the time we lived in the North-east India and to tell you the least, it is a very beautiful place.
This is me and my brother. My brother has been my sunshine since childhood forever doing mischief, creating dramatic stories and causing laughter all around.
(3) In this photo, me and Amit were in high spirits (not literally), bubbling with happiness after being adventurous. At this time, we used to live in the suburb of Des Plaines near Chicago. There was a cautionary advice from his office – Always travel to downtown Chicago by train and never stay back in the alleys after dark on a weekend. What did we do? Just the opposite. We went by car armed with Google maps and had no fear of the dark alleys.
Today, on looking back, I realise we acted in stupidity because we did get lost on our way back home after missing a turning and struggled our way out of the deserted and dark one-ways in the downtown.
(4) This photo tells the story about the lighthouse in the background.
I wanted to climb the lighthouse and Amit was over-cautious probably because of the hard work it would have been. The whole path uptil the lighthouse he kept on discouraging me giving excuses – ‘it is far, no use of walking so much because as soon as we reach the gate it will be closing time, are you sure, do you really want to do this’. And I kept on walking ahead without saying a word and he kept on following me. When we reached the top of the lighthouse and saw the amazing view from there, he finally said – “It was worth coming up here”.
(5) This was our 5th wedding anniversary’s cake. We never cut cakes for anniversaries but the 5th year was special because 11 days after the anniversary day Dhruv was born.
(6) In this photo, we are celebrating Dhruv’s first birthday. I love the look on Dhruv’s face here. This is an expression of discovering the wonderful taste of a cake for the first time.
(7) This photo is symbolic of our family happiness from the various holiday trips we made while living in UK and exploring a different world together.
(8) This is me and my brother all grown up now but sharing the same bonding as in the childhood. There are 2 sunshines in this photo – Dhruv and my brother.
Caution : These photos are from my personal photo archives and are not permitted to be used in any form.
Linking to the creator of the tag Ariel Ward Ariel’s little corner of the internet and #AnythinggoesonSunday
Beautiful memories..
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Thank you Shilpa 🙂 Will you be interested in taking up the happiness challenge and doing a post about 8 photos of happiness? I promise it will be a joyful exercise.
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Would like to take up the challenge but would take some time to come up with the final post
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Great 🙂 I will be looking forward to your post.
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Hey, Anamika – Am glad that you asked me to tag you for the challenge. Else how would I have seen you in your childhood. The snap which you’d clicked is so lovely. I can sense innocence in that particular snap.
Look at you and Amit in the snap, where, you celebrate Dhruv’s first bday.. the expression is priceless and cute. but tell me , why does, dhruv has a bald look in that pic 🙂 which is cute though.
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Dhruv’s head is bald in that birthday pic because of his mundan ceremony which was held a few days before his birthday. Mundan is done either in the first year or the third year. And he was born bald 🙂 It took a lot of efforts to bring hair on his head. Thankfully he now has head full of hair.
I am glad you enjoyed reading this post 🙂
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I admire you for sharing such personal memories….I also love your new look blog. It does look very chic and grown up. May you continue making happy memories that outlive the photographs. 😉
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Thank you Sunita 🙂 and also thanks for liking this new blog look. I am growing every day and so this space had to too 😀 Will you be interested in doing a post on 8 photos of happiness? I will tag you. I would love to visit your photo journey of life.
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Such a good dose of happiness first thing in the morning. Loved reading your memories
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Thank you Shailaja. I am glad my post served as a sweet pill on a Sunday morning 🙂
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Hi Anamika ma’am,
This is such a beautiful post. Nothing can give us more joy than spending time with the family and being with them. Lovely pics. 🙂
Rohan.
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Thank you Rohan 🙂 Surely nothing is more joyful than being with family.
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Really loved reading these memories and seeing who you hold in your heart, in photos!
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Thanks Lindsay 🙂
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Lovely photos, all laced with warm and happy memories! 🙂
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Thank you Shilpa 🙂 thanks for visiting
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Your photos made me smile. Your photographic talents are evident in that photo taken when you were five – it brought back some of my early efforts (in black and white, like yours). My favorites were the last two.
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I am glad my photos made you smile. To speak of photographic talents I really dont have any 😀 and I really forgot to say ready or cheese before clicking that photo. Thanks for visiting Alana 🙂
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This is such a lovel post! Indeed happiness is in small things
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Thank you Meena. Welcome to my blog.
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Thanks for sharing your memories through this photographic memoir…All the while, there was a smile on my face…it’s always nice to get to know you better
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I think of all the stories I have shared with you in person I missed on telling you about these ones. So now you know about them too 🙂
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Such a lovely collection of pictures, Anamika. It must have been so much fun to decide which ones to share. God bless your family!
Vidya tagged me and I must get my post out too.
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Thank you Corinne. It was fun selecting photos because there were lots of them telling interesting stories.
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Photographs bring back such memories no?
By the way , you lived in Shillong? I have grown up there … 🙂
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Yes, photographs surely bring back memories -some good and some even bad but we choose to keep the good ones 🙂 For the first 9 years of my life, I have lived in Guwahati but Shillong was like a second home to us. We used to visit Shillong very often as weekend gateways ( which wasn’t even a term in the 80s). I loved the way reaching upto Shillong with the hills with pineapple cultivations and clouds so low in the mornings that it looked like the way to heaven 🙂
One more thing I would like to tell you. My best friend’s name from the primary school I attended in Guwahati was Nabanita too.
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Anamika …..this is such an endearing post ! So glad you shared your happy moments ! It inspired me to focus on the beautiful times in my life ! My Maa used to say .. Happiness shared is happiness multiplied and grief shared is grief divided !
Thank you for inviting us into your personal life … feel honoured dear . And hers to happy times ahead . Loads of love 💖
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What lovely moments. That’s the thing about photographs. They capture happiness so perfectly. I liked the bit where your husband followed you up to the lighthouse complaining but following still. That was so cute. And also conceding that the view was worth it! Sweet.
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I smiled all the way, as I went down your memory lane, Anamika. Such a precious post and memories. Thank you for sharing them with us. Your amazing sense of humour made reading the post even more delightful :)))
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