My Amazement

I came here today to tell you about the lovely lady who asked me to photograph a painting she wants to sell. What was a 5 min job lasted over an hour as I listened to her stories, she worked in Canberra during the Hawk and Keating years of Parliament. She work in the trade department with 39 men, I was in fits of laughter at some of the stories. I don't think they will translate the same if I was to retell them. 
Mary spent her money on fine art and paintings when she was young and full of fun ***her words*** she didn't smoke and when she went out there was plenty of men to buy her dinner and drinks. As she has gotten older she wants to pack her belongings into a suitcase and travel where the wind blows....it is a foolish woman's dream she told me, she is looking after her elderly mother. However she will be ready to leave when the time is right.

Painting by Geoffrey Proud 1982 

My amazement however is not about the lady or the painting but this very blog. This morning when checking my emails I noticed that there was a conversation on my Kit Kat Lasagna post from last November. There was a lot of overnight activity from America, so I checked the stats on this post.

http://rozzy35.blogspot.com.au/2012/11/kit-kat-lasagna.html

I was gobsmacked to find there was over 20,000 views holly doolly that's more than the rest of my posts put together. I use facebook all the time and blog, I have a twitter account I rarely use, I have posted on video on Youtube so I checked the views on that too....over 1000 Oh Myyy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5Gt0bUY2Oc

Today I am very happy to be  out in the world wide web, to make new friends that I may never meet.

I needed some good in my day. Thank you

Life is Funny...

A funny nice thing has happened to me in the last few weeks. You may remember that I put it out in the world that I was not going to try and make a business out of my photography....it is all about me blah blah blah. 

I have since been contacted to do family photos on the beach - a friend of a friend of a friend saw my photos of the dancers at the beach and wanted photos of her family at the same location. I had to quickly come up with a price for my services because she insisted on paying.

Then I got a random call from a lady asking if I can take photos of a painting she want to sell. I will doing this work this week. She also wants a printed copy of the photo.

Finally one of my boys (casual labor hire) has asked me to shoot his wedding in February. I said I would do it for petrol money....but no they want to pay me a fair price.....

I am saving all the money I get from my photography....it is going towards my UK trip (or another lens)

These images are a few from the family at the beach. 

I am meeting some wonderful people along the way. I love what I do

Dancers on the beach

A few weeks ago I was asked if I could help out a newbie photographer take some photos for his daughters dance school. Andrew from Nature's Images Photography http://www.naturesimage.com.au/ (also known as the dude who taught me) asked me to help the newbie because photograph people more often than he does. Andrew's daughter goes to the dance school, which is why he offered his and my help. It was a great morning, although I was supposed to be a back up photographer, support for  Newbie. I did take over a bit....

Pretty butterfly - Pretty girl

Baby Dancer

The Crown of Thorns - the evil dancer

The mermaid and her prince  - the good 

My favorite photo of the day

The cast

The owner, teacher and choreographer 

Silly Daddy

I am looking forward to photographing the dress rehearsal in a few more weeks, I will take daughter #3 to see the show.

Adelaide

I had an unexpected trip to Adelaide a few weeks ago, it was the first time I have been to South Australia I would have like more time to have a look around, unfortunately I was there for a funeral. My Uncle Tim (on my Mother's side) another victim to the horrible lung cancer.

This is a picture taken at a my cousins wedding October 2011
Left to right Uncle Mike, Uncle Tim and My Mum

Living in Queensland you tend to forget how cold the southern states are, we left home at 4:30 am wearing tshirts, lucky at the last minute I thought to add the jacket daughter #1 brought me for mothers day. It had only been cold enough for me to wear this jacket a few times over winter. I can now say it has been worth every cent she paid for it. Adelaide was cold and wet and very very quiet. A 10am you could almost count the people in the city centre, there was a lot of construction and few for lease shops but no people. 

Mum and I made good use of the public transport, we were staying overnight at North Adelaide a 10 min bus trip to the city. We took the 'tram' (it is a train but there is only one route so they call it a tram)  to Glenelg (the seaside) this would be a very pretty spot for photos on a good day. 

Friday morning was not a wet, thank goodness funerals are depressing enough without shitty weather. I wont say anything about the funeral other than I found it very hard....

It was funny watching my mother introduce me to my cousins, she has seen them often over the years. I have not seen them since I was 10. Mum would say "Ant you remember your cousin Roslyn?" ***I swear she calls me that just to piss me off*** Ant looked at me blankly and said no when did we last see each other?" He was 3 the last time I saw him...Of course he is not going to remember me! This happened with all 4 of my cousins. OMG Mum give it up

It was nice to re acquaint myself with my cousins, I have invited one of them come stay with us when he brings his family to the Sunshine Coast next year.

I managed to get a few photos on the day, the kids played football in the front yard and I made the girls get the rabbit for me to hold (and photograph) While they are common pets in Australia....but not in Qld so I was excited to be able to hold and photograph 'Marshmallow"

We had a few hours before our plane so I got some photos of the sights of Adelaide, the Adelaide Oval currently under renovation. The swan thought I was going to feed it and the church so often seen in the commentary of the cricket test matches when the commentators are looking to fill air time during boring parts of play

Birthday

It was my birthday on Tuesday, I love my birthday every year, I don't worry about getting older, I worry about staying the same. The only thing I don't like about birthdays is  the enviable question "what do you want", I feel pressured into having a list...I am happy with a nice dinner, smelly candles, flowers and my family. Simple things, the girls think I need more...So this year I was prepared, I told my family what I wanted....and I got everything I wanted and more.

I especially love birthdays that go on for days/weeks. I stated celebrating early when my sister and I spent a day at the Eumundi markets, a sisters day for my birthday, she brought me a hot chocolate calla lilly, it had one beautiful flower the day she brought it and it flowered again on my actual birthday.

Hot Chocolate Calla Lilly

I am also very lucky to have a beautiful flowering orchid that flowers every year for my birthday. (I know it is because it is the start of spring....but I like to believe it is for me)

Birthday Orchids

The Saturday before my birthday this year for the federal election. I was so pleased that I had already planned a weekend away with HWMBO, we postal voted and went into a media blackout on Friday, it was very good to escape from the hype surrounding an election. (I considered this a gift in itself)
We had a wonderful weekend at the Bunya Mountains, I got some awesome photos - they will be in a post of their own.

I treated myself to a new lens for my birthday (actually it was a reward for a good tax refund, that happened to coincide with my birthday) It is a wide angle lens which adds so much more to my landscape photos. So far I am very very happy.

Point cartwright sunset

New cushions for my couch, a bread knife, a lens, a weekend away, a flowering pot plant, beautiful flowers in the garden, a gift coming any day from daughter #2 in the UK. What more can I possibly need. A visit from the neighborhood snake, this snake has been around for years all our neighbors have reported visits from him. Tuesday was the first sighting since it began to get cold. We were calling him Harry as in Harry huge...now he is BS which stands for Birthday Snake (or just Big Snake). I love him he is so beautiful. I do have a healthy respect for him and don't get too close. 

Birthday Snake

Curled up in the warm sun

Not such good news for my birthday week, parting with a huge amount of money for Daughter #3 to get braces. I know it will be worth it when her teeth are straight.

Blue bands on the braces

Happy Birthday to me and my other friends who celebrate at this time of year also.

Do what you love.....Love what you do 

New Stuff

I am happy to say the reason I am behind on my blog this time is because I have been so busy with stuff other than work, I am finding it hard to catch up with all my editing and writing. (I also have to fit a bit of work into my fun stuff)

I mentioned in the last post that we were doing a bit of renovating...The two most important things have happened. I got a new oven, it is so good, gas cook top (with a lid), an electric grill that doubles as a small oven and an electric fan forced oven. The very first thing I cooked was lemon meringue cup cakes - because I could. It was so nice to have them cook at an even temperature not having to rotate them every few minutes to stop burning, then I make a beautiful roast chicken with vegies and gravy. SOOOO yum.

***Inset photo of old oven here***

New Oven - I love the extra bench space the lid creates 

Lemon Meringue Cupcakes 

We also got our lounge suite recovered, this was a very hard decision to make as we could have spent just a little more and gotten a brand spanking new one. The reasons we chose to recover not  buy new are,

• A lounge suite with 2 recliners and a sofa bed was $1500 more than recovering (no sofa bed on $550 more)
• The mechanism on our recliners is no longer made and is less likely to fault like the new model
• The quality of our furniture is very good, nice thick timber, new products made out of thinner ***inset cheaper*** timber - not as long lasting.
• New (reasonably priced) furniture is imported and a lot of the foam is treated with formaldehyde - the use of formaldehyde is banned in Australia but not in our imported products go figure...
• I am supporting a local business

The two most important reasons I chose to recover not buy new

• The environment, anyone looking for a second hand lounge suite would not likely spend the money on revamping our old one if the same amount of money buy new.
• We bought this lounge suite because we liked it and it was comfortable - it still is and I still like it.

Before, 

***waves frantically at UK Student , Hi miss you***

The finished product...I love it

My Epiphany

I can't believe it has been almost a month since I have written a blog post, I have no real excuse except life gets in the way. I have been busy with work, home and photos. Work is all kinds of crazy with every weekend booked, lucky I am able to share the work load with my colleagues (a few years ago it fell to me to do all the weekends - until I had a tanty and said 'NO MORE I CAN'T DO IT ALL {shouty capitals intended}. Circumstances have changed a bit at home and we have finally been able to get some much needed work done...this will be another post in a few days ***I hope***

In my last post I was talking about finding my 'style' as a photographer, while I still have not found 'the style' I have come to a huge realisation. ***Insert dramatic music*** I do not want to make a business out of photography, not that I don't think I am good enough, I am. I just don't want the stress or the pressure that goes with making money. 
I love photography everything about it (except maybe getting up for sunrise), I loved some aspects of the weddings I have photographed....but I hated trying to get the families organised for the group shots. I will still do wedding photos for friends and families if asked (any excuse to use may camera) I will take baby photos of any babies that are related to me, I just won't do it for money. 
I feel really good about this decision. It means everything I photograph now, I do for me and me alone.

This past few weeks I have been working on ideas, I come up with a image (or I see something on the net I would like to reproduce) then I work on how to do it. I have played with a few ideas that have turned out just how I imagined them too. I have gotten into the habit of sharing my idea with HWMBO or my daughters, so that I have some accountability. To show I am not just making it up as I go and hoping for the best result, not that it matters. 

The monthly challenges on the flicker group help a lot with my ideas, they give me a 'theme' to focus on.

This was my entry for the Up Close Portrait challenge, #2's friends are so much fun to dress up and play with, we had a huge laugh over the makeup session, I didn't know what I was doing and neither did she so lots of makeup wipes later we got the look I wanted. (this image didn't place I was a bit heavy handed with the background, I should really re edit....one day)

This months challenge is another portrait one - surprisingly only it is Portrait showing extreme emotion. This was good because I had the whole hospital garb idea running though my head. my models couldn't quite pull of the expressions I wanted for the escape through the ferns- probably because we were laughing too much. The hollow log provided the perfect hiding spot.

This was is #3 and our beautiful Lilly, I wanted this image to be a bit dark and mysterious,even a bit magical. I know I pulled it off when The Guy Who Taught ME Everything messaged me saying "This image brought to mind Silence of the Lambs"  

Feel free to let me know what you think, I will try not to be so slack and post more often.

Be Happy and smile often