It was my daughter Gaia's second birthday last week. We couldn't do much, since we're in lockdown, but we had a small party for her, and there were lots of presents to open, so she was a happy enough bunny despite the constrained circumstances.

Gaia's a great-humoured, mischievous little minx of a girl, who loves tormenting her Daddy and her big brother Dante. She's been an excellent addition to the Shan clan, and it's hard to remember life without her.

She's been an independent young woman since very early on, wanting to do everything by herself as swiftly as possible -- walk, climb, eat. I've attached montages of some of the many photos that we've taken of her over the last couple of years, plus one taken very recently, of her after she'd fed herself a load of blackberries -- they're her favourite fruit, and I love that she's so determined to eat them by herself, but the mess... "The horror! The horror!!!" :-)