Circles

I went for a run down to St Clair beach and these circles all jumped into my consciousness. I have been there so many times but never noticed how many there were. I snapped this with the iPhone but will have to go down in the glorious sunrise and grab a shot with the light dancing.

QR codes

This image is from the first day of the Learning@School conference in Rotorua, snapped quickly on my iPhone. Allanah has had a pair of earrings made with QR codes on them. Reading them with the iPhone was almost impossible as she kept giggling and jiggling. People must have wondered what we were all doing with Allanah on the floor right at the entrance of the conference centre with Erin scanning her earlobes.

Things from the vault, organised neatly

This image is influenced by two different things I have enjoyed over the last week. The first was a photographic exhibition at the Wellington City Gallery - The Vault by Neil Pardington. These were amazing photos of objects found in the vaults of museums all around NZ. They were sharp, focused and had an amazing sense of perspective. I wanted to play with an image in photoshop to see if I could figure out what he did to get that sense of perspective. The other influence was the things organised neatly blog.

Wellington, Rotorua, and an earthquake

I have had a very full week, I have taken photos but not had the time to put them up, so I have decided to make this post a week's digest.

To start the week on Sunday I had a lovely day wandering around art galleries in Wellington with Esmay. This orb hangs in the sky outside the Wellington Art Gallery.



The day was beautiful, the sun was shining and as I sat in Mac's restaurant I looked across and saw the day framed. It seemed the perfect image for my girls' weekend away - the perfect day framed.



From Wellington I traveled to Rotorua for our annual Learning@School conference. This is a conference that I always look forward to. 1000 enthusiastic teachers sharing their practice with each other around technology, pedagogy, curriculum, and everything else. We had two days to set up for the conference but tragically in the middle of setting up on the Tuesday the news came through about the earthquake in Christchurch. CORE Education, who I work for, are based in Christchurch and about half of our staff at the conference had family there. Everyone was on their phones to find loved ones and then we found a way for them all to go home. Fortunately all were safe, but very, very shaken.



The conference went on with the remainder of the staff stepping up to fill in for the Christchurch staff who went home. Everything ran smoothly and the delegates would not have noticed how frantically everyone was working. My last image of Evelyn trying out one of the electric bikes at the conference summed up the experience for me. The conference went by in a blur of activity.

Petone Markets

We went for a walk through the Petone street markets and these enterprising young boys were showing off their artistic talents and selling pieces of their artwork.

Lower Hutt Farmers Market

I'm in Wellington staying with a friend for the weekend. She took me to the early morning markets where she buys all her fruit and veg and I only had my iphone to capture images, but I loved the colours.

Blue sky dreaming

Exposure bracketing

I found the exposure bracketing setting on my camera last night so played with it while capturing this sunset.

Gunslinger

The band performed in downtown Dunedin today.

Reaching

Evening from my back deck.

Bell tea

Blue skies in Dunedin. This golden bell is just down the road from my house, high atop a building, in a backstreet, where no one really notices it. What a shame

Phone boxes

Phone boxes used to be on every corner when I was growing up. I spent a good deal in phone boxes as a teenager since we didn't have a phone in our house. And of course, where would good old Clark Kent get changed without these boxes? You don't see too many of these around now but these three stand proudly in the exchange.

Advertising

I noticed these coke signs in a bit of a dodgy part of town. They had chain link fences erected in front of them. I found it interesting to think that they were considered important enough to need that form of protection and yet had been let fade with age. In this particular one I think there is supposed to be a splash of coke behind the model, however with the passage of time, and attention of the sun, it looks like she has met with some gruesome end.

Summer

This is a sight not often seen in Dunedin - St Clair Beach with people swimming. Was a beautiful warm day followed by a torrential rain storm.

Dunedin Prison

Just across from the railway station is a beautiful old building being used for a rather sad purpose.

Otago Farmer's Market

If you are ever visiting Dunedin on a Saturday morning and you want to experience the best French crepes, then pop in to the Otago Farmer's market at the railway station. My favourite is the Butterscotch Crepe and (in my opinion) they are so much nicer than the ones I had in Paris.

1976

I didn't take today's photo, but I fixed it up a bit in photoshop. One of these smiling girls is me from 1976.

Dunedin night sky

There was an amazing sky tonight, so I grabbed this photo from my back deck. The colours were beautiful.

A mother's love

This photo was inspired by Misty. I realise now, that a bit of dusting might not have gone astray before capturing this shot, oops.

Distracting view

As I was working in my office I was distracted by the choppy dark seas and the swirling clouds, so had to go outside and capture an image.

Summer skies?

Dunedin hasn't really been putting on much of a summer since I got back from Perth, but there is still time. Amazing skies though.

Don't eat that Jessica!

Why is it with weeds everywhere, she decides to take a nibble from my new plants?

Friends

Hanging out with a friend at the beach in Perth was my favourite thing to do.

Ruin by the sea

The boys went for a camping trip to climb Bluff Knoll down near Albany. B took my camera and captured this image of the old light house keepers house.

Perth Train Station

We caught the train into town today. This is the Perth Train Station. I can remember when it didn't have a roof when I was a child and now it has this amazing roof keeping out the sun which looks rather stunning. Things are continuing to change though, the train station is going to be sunk underground and the current station will become an open space linking Perth to Northbridge. I wonder what they will do with the current amazing building?

Adventure World

I took the two girls to Adventure World today. This was my view for most of the day before they dragged me on a couple of the rides.

Riding to the city

I borrowed mum's bike and went for a ride into the city today. Was a lovely ride along the Swan River. It is funny visiting a city once a year, you really notice the changes and improvements. Perth is much prettier than I remembered and much more runner/biker/walker friendly.

Early morning sun through clouds

They said there was a chance of rain! I think the amazing clouds were as close as we got to rain, and the clouds made for a glorious morning with the sun blazing through.

Skyscraper

We caught the train into Perth today to go for a look around. It was quite a good day to do it as it is a public holiday which meant that there weren't many people around. We had a nice walk around, visited the art gallery and then had lunch at the King Street Cafe. A nice day.

Happy New Year

Bella and Ashleigh make a love heart with sparklers.

New Years Eve at Hillary's Boat Harbour

A day at the beach with my nieces.