Despite being convinced that parenthood would be a barfy-smelling, cheerio-crunching, sweatpant-wearing purgatory, I had a baby.

January 2005 bewitched us with a wriggling, scruffy, golden retriever of a kid named Evan. Alongside this first pregnancy this space was born. Recently, sweet | salty has prompted me to capture a part of the human experience I would have thought inhospitable to light.

Happily recruited into the baby gulag, we became pregnant with identical twin boys. In May 2007 they were born catastrophically, three months early. One survived and one did not. Liam, who lived for six weeks, is a hole in our hearts, murmuring to us every day. His mirror-brother Ben lives and thrives for two.

We carry on, struck by lightening, simultaneously torn to shreds and inspired to live in technicolour.

Why sweetsalty? Because that’s what it is.

Kate