Weekly Winners: 13 July - 19 July

Pink flowers in the rockery

In pieces

Dove and her chick nesting in an aloe tree

And then yesterday a group of us had lunch to celebate Fiona's birthday, and here are my favourites...

Doing lunch

Sue

Josh

Looking lonely

Hanging out

In the playhouse

Strike a pose

Little shop

Shopfront

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Photohunt: Bright

We went to Lemon Rose Farm again today, and I managed to get some shots of the guinea fowl that wander around the place. I love the BRIGHT blue on their faces, because it contrasts so nicely against their body feathers.





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Spoil sports at Monte Casino

I went to Monte Casino today for the Microsoft Mix Essential conference that was being held there( more about that on my other blog in a few minutes time... parts of it were fabulous). Of course, I took my camera along because the place is quite spectacular, but I'm afraid these are the only photos I could take.

I didn't try take photos inside the complex, because I've done it before, and because I think it looks a bit tacky now, but I thought I'd go to the newish piazza area and take some shots there... which was a great idea until a security guard stopped me!! Apparently I had to ask for permission from Management to take photos. LOL!
Apparently it would have been fine if I'd take a friend along and pretended to take a photo of them, but it wasn't ok for me to just take a photo. Bizarre! So in other words, a tourist travelling on their own is not allowed to take photos of a tourist attraction, that's basically what they're saying!

The thing is, I reckon that if I'd gone with a small P&S, no-one would have even batted an eyelid! He only came up to me when I changed my lens for the kit lens!
I'm finding it quite amazing that I'm getting such a reaction to me taking pics now!! I never had this problem with my old camera! This is the second time I've been questioned in the last few weeks, it's quite maddening actually.
All of a sudden people are worried about what I'm doing with the photos! LOL!

Anyway, for what it's worth, here are the only shots I managed to take. I ended up fiddling too much with the settings to get brilliant shots.

And talking about spoil sports, here's another example for you! These kids were dying to get closer to the fountain. I find it terrible that they've got a chain around it! At Nelson Mandela Square in Sandton, there's a similar fountain, which has been left open, and it's the most brilliant sight to watch the kids playing in the water on a hot day... clearly Monte Casino don't like that idea... which is a bif pity!

Weekly Winners: 15 June - 21 June

It's been easier this week for me to find some weekly winners, because I kept some shots specially for this post :).
I've had a better photo week this week (apart from getting quite good results at Camera /Photo club on Wednesday), and I've graduated to using the manual/creative modes on the camera - I still have a lot to learn about exposure, aperture etc as I had to adjust most of them in Photoshop! Talking of which, I think I should get proper PS instead of Elements, I'm dying to use actions.

We went to Parys last Sunday, and I again took some photos from the moving car :)

Burnt


Abandoned


Connor discovered the windmill in MIL's garden


Hairy cactus


Purple flowering succulent
(I have no idea what the name of the plant is)

Pineapple Lily

I had to take a few days off work this week because I had no-one to look after the kids, and I took them to a tea garden to play on the one afternoon (There are more photos here).

Horny goat


Risky play


Pampas at sunset

And I can't resist showing you these too. Connor picked a flower for me yesterday, but by the time I got it, it was all mangled... and this is why...

Daydreaming


Study of a blue flower


Hmmm, smells nice

OK, I think I've shown you enough now ;)

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Lunch at Lemon Rose Farm

I took the day off today because I had no-one to look after the kids. I used the opportunity to take them to Lemon Rose Farm for lunch... for them to play... and for me to play too :)
We were the only people there, surprisingly. And I must say, I've been loathe to go there until now because of the dangerous fish pond, but they've finally put a net over it... so now we'll go there more often.

Oooh, and... I was finally using my manual function on the camera... so here are the best of the lot... there were loads of duds.

Connor had a ball on this old spring-loaded rocking horse.

And the rest of the pics are all about the birds...
This one has to be my favourite shot of the day.

Connor had a ball trying to chase the geese. And as you can see they weren't happy. I wasn't happy either actually, geese are vicious, so I ended up trying to stand between the geese and him.

The balding ostrich. She wasn't too keen on looking at me today. I've posted photos of her before. Very strange actually, because they actually have 3 birds... 2 female and 1 male... and this bald lady is the only one I've managed to capture nicely.

Project Blue: Take Six

Ok, this one is a stretch :) I've tried to find photos with at least some blue in them for the Project Blue post today.

We went to a party this afternoon at the Firestation in Northriding, and in addition to the fire truck excitement and the fire hose display, and the face painting, and the cupcake decorating... yes, all that at one party... there was drumming!
Even Connor gave it a try, but I think the parents enjoyed it more than the kids did!

Dirty face with blue eyes listening to the instructor


Hey, I can do this!


The drumming instructor


Drum in motion

Check out Anna's blog for more Project Blue.
I'll post more photos from today, in my Weekly Winners post tomorrow ;)

Weekly Winners 11 May - 17 May

I've decided to put the Weekly Winners on this site now, instead of my ramblings blog. That'll make sure I don't repeat photos ;) so it'll be a bit more challenging for me every week.

I went away on a Management offsite to Mongena Lodge, north of Pretoria, and all the photos are from there. It's a pity we didn't get to go on a game drive, else there'd be more to show you.

There was a family of Nyala that were wandering around the conference facilities on Friday.

If someone else hadn't have come up behind Werner, I reckon this Nyala would have eaten the lettuce being offered. The building behind them is a chapel... what a gorgeous place to get married at!

Statue in the bush


Sun setting over the bushveld

The lodge is close to a military air base (we know this because my manager flew there in his plane), so it was quite cool to see this...

Jet stream and pink clouds


Reflections at the watering hole


We all sat around a massive blazing campfire after dinner


Through the reeds

Spiderweb

The lion and the kitty cats

Malcolm flying home

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