We said goodbye to a valued family friend yesterday. He had been with us for over 24 years, and every child in the family spent many nights with him. We had held onto him when we were first learning to stand, We had all slept soundly, kept safe in his warmth and comfort, all had screamed and kicked him in our frustrations...

Yes, yesterday we finally got rid of the family cot. After 6 kids, 25 years, countless nights, dirty sheets and ugly teddybears later, the cot is being passed on to another family, expecting their first child.

My mother made a big deal out of it, and wanted to get everyone to have their photo taken next to it, something that was quite impossible for me. Not because I was away, not because I was too big, but because I was cooking bacon and eggs, and was too interested in food to really care.

It was a MASSIVE deal to my little 4yo sister, who was so upset that someone was stealing HER cot. I mean, how dare they! She didnt have a tantrum or anything, she just had that look. You know the one where the eyes fill with tears, and go a little red, and the child walks around slowly with their head down? That look, the one that can kill baby foxes instantly...

Just as Dad was starting to pull it apart, she heard Mum talking about getting a photo... so she went to her special hiding place, and pulled out an old digital polaroid camera she has been using to take pictures, and looked at me with the baby fox slaying eyes, and said "I'd better take a picture before it goes".

Her pictures, all blurry, of white rails and pink mattress, were safely stored in her little camera. And she goes back every now and again to look at them, and to remember her 'beautiful littl cot'. Her camera, her little photobox of memories of a quickly passing childhood.