Today I learned how to...

How to use the live view function on my camera. I confess I have had this camera for almost a year now and this is the first time I have even attempted to use it, it will certainly not be the last, at least with macro stuff any way. I love that I can focus on an area, then zoom in and see if I really am as focused as I thought, then take the shot, super cool. It pays to do a little research sometimes... I have actually, after finding out about this, ordered a disk with three hours of tutorials on the 50D. I am visual so being able to sit and watch with my camera and note pad on my lap should with any luck be great and a worthwhile investment. Oh and by the way, thank you Donna for the packet of ranuculas bulbs, they are just starting to flower and I love them...

Yellow ranuculas, the centre reminds me of a cats eye. Red ranuculas bud

I missed the centre focus here when the wind blew but I love these little red flowers so much I have put them on anyway, any one know what they are called?

Just a little yellow daisy laying on the grass

All shot using an 85mm 1.8 lens with an extension tube.

Today I also loaded my page for the scraperlicious challenge
here

Boys 'n water

They just go together...

Contemplating making the plungeAnd they're in
Braving the cold



And then it all broke loose

(this is my favourite photo of the day even though it is over exposed, love those happy faces)


And even small dogs love the mud and water.

Just 'cause I thought the weeds growing on the side of the road looked pretty.

Yesterday we decided it was about time we took a trip out to Mullinger's swamp, a few kms out the road. I had never visited it before and even though the boys had been they have never seen it this full of water before. We packed up lunch, towels and some changes of clothes(I have been around boys long enough to know that there is a natural magnetism between them and water and mud) It made my heart happy to see my two youngest and three of their friends having so much fun and being so free. We did take some yabby nets out with us but had no luck with them which didn't seem to bother any of us too much. I think it may be a little early yet for them to be crawling or maybe it was the excessive noise level that frightened them off,lol. Tomorrow we plan to go out to Bool Lagoon, another largish body of water near home that has been empty for several years but is hopefully filling up this season, and do a little bird and nature watching. I love the feeling at the end of the day when you have had an active time out doors, tired but somehow energised at the same time.

Prize...

Wow have you seen Cathy Z's blog? She is offering a cricut expression plus four cartridges as a random prize for donating to charity water . Wouldn't you just love to win one and know that you are doing something worthwhile as well?

I love the rain...

I kind of figured since my creative output lately has been almost zero that I had at least better put a few photos on here just so things aren't totally neglected.

I seem to have a thing for photographing snails lately, or maybe it's that at least I know they aren't going to rush away on me,lol.

Water is so pretty

Saying hooroo to winter

by making the most of the few cold days left and baking. Seamus and I made banana bread, not sure which is better, the smell or the taste. And enjoying the last batches of rustic winter soups (pumpkin, cauliflower and bacon,mmmm)
We are beginning to see more of this


and then you get days like this that are all four seasons in one day.
Joe competing in the long jump event at the SAPSASA athletics carnival (we used to call it inter school sports) one of five events he was selected for.

An update Seamus

I had a message on the answering machine this afternoon from the respiratory specialist we took Seamus to see in Adelaide last week(he has been dubbed the nice Dr because he was exactly that, the first one who really sat and talked to Seamus himself and didn't ridicule the ideas we had as to what it could be, even going so far as to order extra blood tests on some things we were concerned about). He was meant to go back to him next week to be put under an anesthetic and have a look deeper into his bronchial tract, turns out we can cancel that, he has had whooping cough. Makes me kinda mad because he was tested for this a few weeks into the cough here locally and the Dr told us it was negative, ahhhhh, someone must not have been doing there job properly somewhere. All that time off school, all the money, all of it could have been prevented quite early on if it had been picked up. I am waiting to speak to the Dr to find out more but we are quite relieved, cross at the mess up early on but relieved that it is nothing more sinister, my imagination was starting to run a little on all the horrible things it could have been. Once Paddy has his tonsils out in December I Hope our illness run will be over for a while, we have been to the Dr more in the last few months than the entire 7 1/2 years we have lived here. the kids are generally quite hail and hearty.

On other news these two, my niece and her husband(A photo I took at their wedding early last year)are due to give birth to their first baby within the next few weeks, so very exciting, can't wait. I hope I get to take some baby photos...

The action for the rounded corners with a black border is from here

Bits and pieces

I haven't been blogging much lately, i will use the common excuse of being too busy. have started back work a couple of days a week and it has thrown a temporary spanner in my routine, I will have to get back into the working Mum thing real fast. I also think the fact that I have had Seamus home with me for soooo long hasn't helped at all. We counted today, 72 days since he first started coughing, we have dubbed it the thousand dollar cough, because by the time we add up specialists, blood tests, xrays and Dr's visits it will be that and then some. I don't really care about the costs though. I just want him well again and doing the things normal boys do at this age. He is feeling yucky about himself too, poor kid, he feels tired all the time and gets cranky quite easily because of it, not his normal state of being, he has also put on weight because of his inactivity which is getting him down. Keep telling him as soon as he is back to running around again he will be fine. We are off to Adelaide tomorrow to the ENT Dr to put a camera down his throat. It's been a process of elimination. Paddy will come with us too as the same Dr will be the one who will take his tonsils out. Other than that the rest of us are well, thank goodness, touch wood etc...

This little bundle arrived at my door the other day, gotta love etsy. The colours are gorgeous autumnal shades ( see Coco, I used that word,lol)with little owls and apples and trees. I am going to make a chenille quilt(I think that's the name of it anyway, it's not made of chenille, were you join the pieces gets that effect) 'cause it is quick and fairly easy to make and that is just down my alley. I don't have the time or the patients to do a large complicated project. Bren picked me freesias from our garden, a lovely reminder of the warmer days to come, not that I don't love winter, it's my favourite season but early spring is great too, before it gets too hot and there is still lots of moisture around but you get the odd day to feel the sunshine on your face. The weather never worried me back home when we lived by the coast because even in the middle of summer we still had reasonably regular rainfall adn a fresh evening breeze, here is just hot and dry and I hate hot and dry with a passion, no desert dwelling for this girl.

Lots of blown out areas in this, it was really windy and kept blowing the shade of the tree out of the way and blowing the flowers over,lol, don't care I still think they are pretty.

Proof of organic gardening practices,lol


The coughing boy himself

Saturday night was spent at the Marks' for a final farewell dinner. Our family is going to miss them and I am going to cry. It takes me a long time to make a really good friends, that's me I guess. I envy people who can breeze in and have every one a bestie for life in minutes. I'm not one of those people. Not that I don't get along well with most people it's just that those real, lasting friendships take me time to nurture and grow. Kathryn is one of those people who I have known for several years(four and a half to be exact) but have grown to love and trust more over the last few years, and now she is leaving. I am happy for her to be moving to a new town, that part is all very exciting but I will miss her like crazy. We all had a lovely time Saturday night, the men drank red wine and talked (and talked, any woman would have been proud to chat continuously for that long,lol) the kids hung out, watched DVDs and ate, then Mum's and kids played cards then we all went outside for sparklers.

this shot of Dan reminds me of the lines of that song whose name I have temporarily forgotten "I see the light surrounding you"

three sparklers at once

I could say several not so polite things about Joseph having two heads/faces

but I shall keep them to myself :-)



What a sparkler looks like held still.

Well that's it, think I have caught up with most of what has been happening, can't wait to get back into the creative groove again, after this week hopefully I will have a little time back to myself.

Cheers

Sue.

Oh and sorry if the typing is a little off, my finger and a sharp knife had disagreement last night.

My boy loves to draw...

The Port Fairy light house by Joseph (aged 13)Excuse the quality of the scan, some of those vertical smudgy marks to the left of the light house showed up darker than they are IRL.