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favoured by Australians, was a winner.

It’s hard to describe the joy that this little daddy-daughter ritual brings me. Just the fact that we have this moment together every day is important. The archive in the cloud serves as a record of so much: my daughter’s physical development, the beauty of her changing face. The ratcheting-up of her levels of crazy as evidenced by her increasingly bizarre facial expressions. Ace photobomber Gringo the Basset Hound puts in a regular guest appearance.

Going back through the feed has frequently brought me to quiet tears. There is so much pathos in watching a child grow. As she’s gotten older there have been losses and gains. I miss the toddler in nappies, but am proud of the wilfulness that has crept in of late. While she is still a willing subject, it’s now often with a precocious “Oh dad, this is sooo embarrassing” pose, no doubt foreshadowing what is to come.

The project also keeps me in touch with my changing self. It amuses me that on any given day I can flip from proud, responsible father to total teenager mode, checking to see how many likes our latest post got.

I know that at some point my baby girl is probably going ask me to stop posting pictures of her wacky dress sense on social media, and that in her awkward teens she may demand that I delete every last one of them. We’ll have that conversation then.

What I know now is that our hashtag project is one of the many ways I tell her I love her every day. I think she gets that.

It is also a constant reminder to ask myself: Are you being a good father? Are you giving this special little creature your time and attention? Does she know that you’d give everything to keep her happy?

That, by a long shot, is the most important part of the picture.

— Brendan Cooper is head of content at New Media Publishing

Two dads, two daughters, and the power of social media to amplify love, pain, hope, pride and joy