End of year one, time for an update I guess: Nothing in my original profile has changed: - I still live in a small village on the edge of the Cotswolds in the centre of England with my husband and 12 and 15 year old sons. We have lots of animals (dog, cat, donkeys, goats, chickens and pigs), most of which are rescue animals, and most of my life seems to be spent driving children around and looking after the animals.

I was brought up not far from here in the countryside, but have also lived in Manchester,, London and Asia, all of which were great fun at the time. These days 'tho, nothing could drag me away from the rural life that I love, and I think that my photography reflects that. I am lucky to have our animals as (mostly) willing subjects - the dog now walks off as soon as she sees the camera, but I try to avoid relying on them too much because I want to try to have some variety in my albums.

I started the project on 1/1/12 in the hopes of continuing to improve my skills after taking an Open University digital photography course at the end of 2011. I succeeded in taking a picture every day and feel that my photography improved no-end as a result of that. Towards the end of 2012 I upgraded from my Panasonic FZ100 bridge camera to a Canon 7D. I have no regrets about using the bridge camera for so long because I feel that in some way its limitations forced me to think more about the technical side of my photography. But saying that, I LOVE my 7D!

This year I intend to take a slightly more relaxed approach and will probably use some fillers. As I will be 50 in December this year I also want to use the project as more of journal so I can look back on my 50th year so I am sure that some of you will find my commentary a little wordy and mundane.

I would really like to spend time improving my editing skills - particularly the use of layers. I want to start shooting RAW, and to get to grips with using my flash and other light sources with more control. I would also like to take more shots of people - if only my kids would indulge me!

I have three albums - My main '365' album; an overflow album; and, one called 'same tree, different sky' where throughout the seasons I post photographs of a tree that I am particularly attached to. (Yes, I did just admit that I am attached to a tree - maybe I need to get out more)