ON a small screen on a family camcorder, the image of a little boy flashes up. It's Joshua Massey-Hodgkinson, holding a broom -- the handle alone twice his size -- as he pushes it along a small backyard.

He turns to the camera, drops the brush, puts his hands up in the air and shouts 'yay!' Then the screen goes black.

For parents everywhere it is the sort of snapshot of childhood that is consigned to the cupboard, only to be rescued at a suitably embarrassing moment -- the 18th birthday party, for example.

But for Joshua's parents, Emma Massey and Simon Hodgkinson, the video is played regularly, a visual reminder of the little boy they lost in the most tragic of circumstances less than a year ago.

Emma said: "The video just sums him up so well. Happy and smiling. And he loved cleaning. If he wasn't pushing the brush around, he was playing with the vacuum cleaner or opening the washing machine. People used to joke we were lucky to have a lad who liked cleaning. We knew we were lucky to have a little boy like Josh. But now he's gone."

Over the last two years, Emma and her Clitheroe-based family have experienced a rollercoaster ride of emotions that few other families will ever go through -- which began on January 2, 2002.

Emma said: "I was taken into hospital with really bad stomach pains. At first the doctors said they thought I might have had an ectopic pregnancy or have appendicitis but then they told me I was pregnant. We were so happy."

Joshua arrived on September 5, 2002. The photos on display at the home of his grandma, Catherine Massey, show a smiling little boy with a sense of adventure, surrounded by a loving family.

They include pictures of holidays in Majorca and Tenerife, with family pets, standing next to the washing machine and sitting inside a Little Tikes red car.

Each picture tells a story. Emma said: "The one with the car is one of my favourites. We had been to Tenerife and he had absolutely loved the one at the creche there.

"I spoke to mum and when we got back home, just before his birthday, mum had left an identical play car waiting for him, with a ribbon on. He fell in love with it straight away and there was just no getting him off.

"His birthday party was another happy occasion. All our family and friends were there, it was such a great day."

But next to those happy memories is the grim recollection of what happened on April 17, 2004.

Emma said: "We dropped him off at the childminder's house so we could go out for the night and I left him tucked up in bed. He'd gone straight to sleep. The next morning, we got a knock at the door and it was the police. They told us Josh was dead.

"I couldn't believe it. When we saw Josh, it wasn't the Joshua we knew. It was just his body. The Josh we knew wasn't there, he is still with us."

In the weeks and months that followed, family and friends rallied around Joshua's mum and dad as first they tried to come to terms with what had happened, then go through the funeral. There was then a second funeral afetr pathologists returned organs they retained for examinations.

But the couple could no longer live at their home in St Paul's Terrace, Clitheroe. "There were just too many memories," said Emma. "It took me weeks to get up the courage to go back in there after Joshua died.

All his clothes were there. I'd put them out ready for when I picked him up. That was really hard."

Different members of Joshua's family have taken to remembering him in different ways. His great-grandmother hasn't washed a window in her Clitheroe home after she discovered a handprint Josh had put on it shortly before his death.

Grandmum Catherine, also of Clitheroe, has a monkey puzzle tree in her backgarden.

She said: "Whenever we drove past a monkey puzzle tree, we'd look to see if monkeys were there.

"I still talk to Joshua. Somedays it is still like he is here."

Emma added: "I still don't think we've actually managed to grieve yet. I'm still numb. I still don't know what happened. If it had been an accident, maybe I could forgive her, but I can't.

Referring to Wendy Barlow, she said: "She's had months and months of extra time with her family while she was on bail, got to spend Christmas with them as well.

"Christmas has been horrendous for us.

"All my friends have children and they have been out shopping for presents and I kept thinking I should be doing the same for Joshua."