~ 4 weeks to go ~

yes, 4 weeks Friday until we depart for our long awaited trip.  We are all sorted for it, so just need the weeks to pass (quickly we hope!).  Working out what we need to take is proving interesting, as the weather will be all kinds of variety - mild in the north, and possibly snowing in the deep south!  We will shop for clothing over there if need be... after all, we are familiar with Kathmandu and The North Face brands!

I will attempt a blog post after each day, so I can document our trip, and record memorable moments (I bet I'll be needing to be on here a LOT!).  Internet access will depend on wifi locations (free hopefully) and I will be uploading when I can.

Until next time... Hooroo!

~ over the ditch ~

So, yes, over a year since my last entry... oh well, move on... !

This year, our long time (10 years in the making) planned extended trip to New Zealand is happening.  Yes, we are going over the ditch, to a beautiful country, for 10 weeks!  2 adults, 3 kids all jam packed into a 6 berth Spacious Automatic Mercedes to travel New Zealand (Aotearoa).  Can't wait!  

People think they've mis-heard when I say ten weeks...  No, nothing wrong with your eyes and ears folks!

We are starting off in Sydney for a couple of days (kids are all very excited about a big city stay!), and then flying into Auckland, where we will collect our SAM and head north before the school holidays begin.  A fishing charter and some reef snorkeling beckons in the beautiful Bay of Islands!  We will endeavour to hit Cape Reinga and the northern most point of NZ.

SAM- Our home for 10 weeks

Cape Reinga, Northern tip of NZ

Paihia Bridge, Bay of Islands

Mt Taranaki

We will meander in a southerly direction exploring the North Island, and toward the end of the year we plan on catching the inter islander ferry over the Cook Strait from the nation's capital, Windy Wellington into Picton, where we will begin our journey in the South Island, enjoying the Malborough Region (wine region), Canterbury Region, and visiting a couple of fancy glaciers and mountains!  

Vineyard in the Malborough area

Lake Matheson, with Fox Glacier in the background

Mt Cook

So, after our adventures in the South Island end, we will fly back to Auckland, then head on to Melbourne for a few days for some sporting action!  Australian Open 2015, and some T20 cricket...

The girls and I may just have to hit Bridge Road for a spot of therapy ourselves.... 

We'll be back home for a week of rest before school starts in 2015.  

I intend to blog our trip, so we have a record, and so I can do a lovely glossy coffee table book of our trip!  

Stay tuned.... 

*it has been 5mths since my last....... post.*

So I've been busy... for 5 mths?!!! Yes, OK, I'll upload some of what I've been up to... soon...
Christmas came and went, New Year came and went, Stella's birthday, Yes, she turned 2 on the 5th January, I can't believe it either!! Lovely day, lucky little thing had 2 mini parties, a family one on the Monday, and a friends one on the actual day.

MC and I went to Perth for a dear friend's 40th, and that was a fleeting trip, OH, but the night before we went to Perth, I caught up with an OLD mate!!! Yes, went to see Kenny Rogers in concert at the Festival Theatre, and yes, it's the second time I've seen him perform! He hasn't lost it that's for sure!! Red eye flight to Perth the next morning, after a rather large night out... see when I went to the concert, I expected (silly I know) that my husband might go back to our hotel, and catch some shuteye, as he'd been pretty busy, well, wasn't I wrong!! He found a couple of mates that he knows, and stayed on at the Strath for a few ales... when we (Gemma, Erin and myself) finished at the concert, we headed back there for a couple ourselves, and to my surprise, there was MC, boozing away! So, we joined them... until about 2am... then caught the 6am flight to Perth... I think we should've done a Leo (Haarsma) and put our tickets in our pockets at the airport boarding gate... whilst we slept there the night!! We made it to Perth, in time for Cyclone Bianca to stir things up over there!! Fortunately she went back out to sea and fizzled into a puff of wind, but it looked hairy for a while...

Levi's birthday was the day after we got home, and happened to be a student free day, so that was good, it was a relaxed day, with him enjoying his presents at home for the day!

Fast forward to now.. when I remembered that I hadn't updated the blog for a while... oops. I shall entertain you with some images... tomorrow... when I am not so tired... :)

Tooroo for now!! (promise it will be less than 5mths til the next post)...

{Twinkle Twinkle Lincoln Lights!}

OK, so I've always wanted to take a photo of Port Lincoln at night from Winters Hill. Last night, on the way home from Camera Club, Tiff, Laura and I 'happened' to have our camera's in the car and did a slight detour!! I think these are OK, I'm happy with them, I think I've got a couple of ideas for next time I am up Winters Hill at night to try though!


I took about 6 photos, but the best were these two. I think there's another one with a twinkly star in the top right corner, but it was just too much DARK!!


I do love the longer exposure shots - I think the bottom one here was about a 30 second exposure, and the top one was 15 seconds.

Next time I'm up there I'll be sure to have the tripod, instead of resting the camera on the stone wall that goes around the carpark!

{Lake at Sunset}

Laura, Tiff and I ventured out to the lakes towards Kapinnie a few weeks ago to experiment on some 'long exposures'... wow, I learnt a whole lot of new information that night!!! Here's a few of my shots from the night.







Hoping to do this again sometime!!!

RAW!!

Has it really been this long since I've posted here?? Oops, clearly I'm not a true 'blogger'. I'll improve, surely. Can't get worse can I!?

Ventured into RAW today- after communicating with a pro, Philipa Smoke from Sweet Chilli Philly Photography and asking if she shoots in RAW at all (probably a silly question to ask a pro, but hey, I had nothing to lose!), she informed me that she always shoots in RAW, it's the only way to go - so I grabbed the camera, worked out how to put it into RAW mode, and went outside where I had some small people playing! Here's what came out of that!!

{a little bit of flare}

Lens flare that is. I stumbled across this action on PS... threw it on this photo that I'd done a bit of editing on... and voila. I think it really tops it off.