December = Summer

28th Nov 11- Hydrangea
These are one of my favourite flowers and are growing in abundence outside my building at work hopefully I can grow some of my own next year - I took some cuttings and shoved them in the ground so we'll see.

29th Nov 11 - Lucid
Today I got to go to one of my lovely friends end of year concerts.  She is studying Design and Stage Techy stuff at TAFE and every year they have an end of year fashion parade.  Gotta say it was brilliant - this is one of the rainbow costumes from the third year students

30th Nov 11 - Sydney
Another cloudy day - had a market research this evening so had some time to kill after work - went for a drive down to Ball's Point Park which is a good viewing point for NYE Fireworks - I love my city even on a cloudy day - how lucky I am to live in this gorgeous city.


1st Dec 11 - Xmas Dec's
Unpacked my Xmas decorations today - so of of curse i had to photograph them.








2nd Dec 11 - Finders Keepers
Finders Keepers Market tonight - this is an awesome craft market held at Carriageworks every few months.  Lots of local artisans/ crafty people selling their wares.  These lights are just divine but way overpriced - I love vintage lamps and am always on the lookout in op shops to try and fix up one myself.  I have lot's of lovely vintage fabric and one day will be able to make something as lovely as these.

The weekend of Joel

Day 117 – Fri 25^th Nov - Party Prep

Let the weekend of Joel begin.  Yep it’s my nephew’s 1^st birthday next week and my sister is planning a huge party on Sunday to celebrate.  I took today off to help her cook/ play Aunty.  We spent the day at mum’s and it was great, I just sat on the floor and pretty much played with Joel all day – we went for a walk in the rain, we clapped and danced and sang (badly).  I also got to hang with my sis and did a bit of shopping which was nice as we don’t see each other much these days.  I have heaps of photo’s of my gorgeous nephew, but they are just for the fam, so today’s photo is of the lolly bag preparation!    

Day 118 – Sat 26^th Nov - We miss you Bro

Again I spent the morning around the house cleaning – it was pouring with rain today and all our fingers are crossed that it fines up for the party in the park tomorrow.  I spent the afternoon/evening down at my Sister's house helping her get ready for the Party.  Today’s photo is dedicated to our Brother.  He is living in Scotland at the moment and hopefully will return to Aus sometime next year.  Coca Cola are running a huge promotion at the moment where they have people’s names on coke cans, they also have things like Nan, Champ, Mate etc so of course I thought the Bro one was most appropriate - come home soon!!!

 

Day 119 – Sun 27^th Nov - Happy 1st Birthday

So I took about 150 or so photo’s today – the sun came out, the park was decorated and a great day celebrating Joel’s birthday was had by all.  Really hard to decide which was my favourite photo today.  All the cousins and kids were in posing moods and I got some brilliant photo’s.  I have decided to dedicate today to the birthday boy though – this is the cake that my sister made for him – pretty cool hey – bit stressful getting the end product but I think it worked out pretty well.  Check Facebook for the rest of the party photos

Last Week of November

Day 113 – Mon 21^st Nov – Sunrise 

I only took two photo’s today and once again that was of sunrise on my way to work – whoops took two sunrise photo’s within the last week - at least they are different aspects & locations.  The first was taken in Gosford, this one in St Leonards.

Day 114 – Tues 22^nd Nov – Disco Decorations

It's nearly Xmas and noticed these shop decorations on my way home.  Everyone who knows me knows I love a disco ball so I couldn’t resist – they were taken with my phone hence the not so great quality – I love the daggy old fashioned ribbon and token gum nuts that they have paired with this!

Day 115 – Wed 23^rd Nov - Buttons & Sequins

Once again it got til quite late in the day before I remembered to take a photo.  I had seen on a blog post today people using buttons to spell out words so I gave this a go, but wasn’t really happy with the result – I did however like all my colourful button and sequin jars lined up so I decided to shoot them instead

Day 116 – Thurs 24^th Nov - Reflection 

We were sitting in our education/ lunch room at work today and I noticed that you could see the new hospital being built in the reflection of the building opposite – I thought it looked pretty cool so that is why I chose it for today’s subject.  I like that you can see the crane and the colours of the new building. 

Birthday Celebrations - Sasha & Tepaea

Day 111 – Sat 19^th Nov – Alfie Dog

Wow hard choice today – it seems I either take one or two photos or I take hundreds!!!  Today was a bit epic – I spent the morning in the garden (which I’m slowly getting on top of!!!) then went to a mini festival thing with the BFF and her kids before heading up to antoher good friends house for a BBQ.  The afternoon was spent in the pool drinking beers and chilling out.  It was such a lovely evening and I took heaps of photos – many of which are blurred (possibly due to the number of wines consumed…and the fact I’m trying to shoot manual focus more often than not these days).  Most of the photo’s of the kids I don’t really want to post as they are half naked and I'm so far behind in posting this. I chose alfie dog as my main subject for the day as I just love this photo – he is such a cute puppy and I just like the angle of this photo. 

Day 112 – Sun 20^th Nov – Cousins

Drove down to Sydney today to hang with my cousin’s.  It was the lovely cheeky Miss Tepaea’s 3^rd Birthday during the week so I had promised her a day of playtime – we ate ice cream, swam in the pool and played games all afternoon and it was just lovely.  Miss Tepaea loves pulling faces for the camera and posing for me which is great – this is 3 of my gorgeous cousines posing while they are enjoying ice cream. 

I'm Back!!

So it's been about 3-4 months now since my last blog update, I guess I'm not as efficient at time management as I would like to be, but I do miss writing about my daily adventures so thought I should get back into it.  I actually have 4 written blogs that I haven't posted yet so today is the day!

The whole point of starting this blog was as a record for my Photo a day project and when I took holiday's over Summer I just didn't want to go near a computer every day hence the lack of updates.  I am going to endeavour to go back though and write a mini blurb about the past few month's worth of photo's because despite not writing about it, I am actually still going strong and haven't missed a day yet.

As I've said before it is tough trying to find something interesting to photograph every single day but I am really enjoying the challenge and have to say that it does occupy quite a bit of brain space each day. To help me out this month I have decided to join in a "photo a day" challenge set by another much better blogger "fat mum slim".  From what I can gather she started the photo a day challenge in Jan and assigns a word per day per month to photograph - so it will be interesting to actually keep to a schedule for the month and not just shoot whatever takes my fancy - I'm hoping it will hit a few creative buttons in my brain and make me think a bit more outside the square when taking photo's.

On the camera front, I have finally learnt how to use some more of the settings on Dad's DSLR camera, it's only taken me how long and I've read the manual many times over the past 8 months also.  So I can now set the white balance and RGB colours, can take black and white photos and do some fancy effects.  I still totally suck at apertures (unless I'm using the macro lens) and long/ short exposures so that is my next challenge I guess to get on top of these.  I've been using my macro len's a lot more lately and loving the results and I'm also using my phone camera a lot more - it's just kinda fun to use all the fancy app's.  I mostly use a program called Camera 360 and it gives me some fun colour and retro effect options for my photos. 

So that is the status of my 365 project as of March.  Hopefully I can catch up quickly on the past few months worth of photo's - my biggest issue will be running out of internet access over the next month as I have a very limited amount of access.

Ciao Donna

Nearly Caught Up (not!)

Day 106 - 14th November 11 -  Dinner

I was going to include a photo of dinner tonight as one of the challenges I have set myself is to improve my food photography, however once I looked through my photo's I liked this better - just wish it would rotate properly.  This is my garage - I like the contrast between the wood and sandstone with the flowers in between

 

Day 107 - 15th Nov 11 - Oyster Rocks

I have started a group training session down by the water each Tuesday night which I am loving - I'm back into my boxing and I'm heaps fitter than I thought I was which is a good thing.  Tonight I took the camera down to training to try and get some shot's around the water.  I'll probably try and do this a bit as Brisbane Waters is such a beautiful place at sunset.  I took a few Bokeh photo's but I decided I like these rocks better.














Day 108 - 16th Nov 11 - Stormy Sunrise

Took a few more bokeh photo's today and am starting to get the hang of the concept but still not happy enough to post a photo and I really like the leaves in this photo - it was taken on my way to the station at around 6.15am - a storm was coming over the mountain and I thought the clouds looked cool.






Day 109 - 17th Nov 11 - Trees

I saw these paperbark trees on the way to work and thought they would provide great inspiration so on my way home I stopped and took a few shot's - it was pouring rain and I had heaps of work equipment so I'm pleased that they are not all blurry!!  I actually took more than a few and it was hard to decide which one I liked best - but I love love love this photo - the colour, the peeling shapes.




Day 110 - 18th Nov 11 - Self Portraits

Didn't really know what to take today as I worked in Gosford and it was a full on day, then I went shopping and home to cook yummy food and relax.  I got this mirror from work yesterday and plan to paint it and hang it so I thought I would take a self portrait and play with a few of the app's on my phone. I decided to make a collage of the different photos. 

I'm still here!

Well it's been awhile since I checked in here, life is really hectic at the moment, work is busy and I'm now dancing or training 4 out of 7 nights a week and usually out partying for 2 of the other 3 so my one night off is usually spent in front of the couch doing nothing. 

But I am still taking photo's so that is a good thing.

Day 101 - 9th November 11 - Queens Scout

Congratulations to my gorgeous friend (and blog reader!!!) Miss Bronte on achieving this special award.  It was a privilege to be part of your special night - I'm so proud of you.

Day 102 - 10th November 11 - Patterns

Once again I left my photography til the last minute - luckily I have a house full of pretty things to shoot.  I got given this lovely candle holder for my birthday and I thought it would make some nice patterns - unfortunately hardly any of the photo's worked out - maybe it was the wine, maybe I just wasn't being patient enough as I was taking these in the adds of my favourite show - but this one was the best of an average bunch. 

 

Day 103 - 11/11/11 - Beach

Pretty ominous number pattern hey and the number 1 is my fav/ lucky number.  I went to the beach for a walk after work today and got some lovely shots - I'm going to submit them to a web competition dedicated to 11/11/11.  This bird flying is my fav though - it's just a bit different to my usual beach shots. 

Day 104 - 12th November 11 - I'm a great big Tiger

Dad came up and did work on the house today which was brilliant - once I have finished painting etc then I will share the results of his hard work.  I then had a BBQ at a friends house which was lovely before hitting Terrigal Pub for a night out on the dance floor with my dance friends - so much fun!!  This is Tina and Aidan singing "I'm a great big Tiger" and growling at me, he is at such a fun age at the moment and learning how to talk and sing and dance. 

Day 105 - 13th November 11 -  Pretty 

I just styled this part of my home today after doing a bit of a kitchen clean and picking some flowers from my garden so I thought I would share how pretty it looks.  I am reading more and more about how all the home magazine spreads are styled and cropped so I'm going to try and take a few more "stylised" shots over the next few months of my lovely home.