Point and shoot: Little school

When the unfamiliar number came up on my phone screen I tried to remember if I had missed an appointment or had ordered something I forgotten about. 

It wasn't a call I had expected, we had been on a waiting list since the start of the year.

As I hung up the phone I tried talk through the lump in my throat

"Sadie has a spot in day care". 

Since her best friend started school this year, Sadie has been obsessed with school. 

Randomly informing us " I went to school today" or " I saw my friends from school today".

There's even been a few tears shed about wanting to go to school, so in the name of happiness, I may have told a little white lie and Miss Sadie thinks she is starting little school.

Off we trotted for her first orientation visit, she had her back pack on ready to go

 from the moment she was dressed.

It was supposed to be an hour, we were there for nearly three which included a request to stay for lunch. Easy! We still have another orientation session, then it's the real deal. 

Let's just see how I  cope walking out that gate alone.......

Best I quickly  head over to sunny + scout check out some other point and shoots before I become a blubbering mess.

Red nose day

As a mother I can not think of anything worse than the thought of burying a child, 

especially when they have hardly had a chance to start their life. 

Although I am not a religious person, as I but Sadie to bed when she was a baby, I would 

say a little prayer and hope that she would be safe through the night and like most new 

parents I'm sure I woke her on more than a few occasions as I checked her breathing.

I brought SIDS approved sleeping bags and a fancy monitor that beeped if she stopped breathing, call me paranoid but my mum's cousin had lost an 11 month old to SIDS and 

I was taking no chances. My dear friend has also written about the lose of a child and 

how important red nose day is to her.

So take a moment to be a little silly and red nose yourself for a good cause. 

Party In My Tummy

When I asked if there was anything I could bring to a party we attended on the weekend, 
the hostess quickly asked for that pear cake thing I made last visit.

After posting on twitter that it was in the oven, I ended up sharing the recipe with a handful 
of my twitter buddies, I'd already had it in my head that it would make a good blog post, 
so no time like the present.

Last year for Christmas one of my besties and I decided that instead of buying gifts for each other we would finally book in a day with Tonia Todman. I suppose Tonia,  is the Australia's own version of Martha Stewart.  She offers different classes from interior decorating to flower arranging but it was the cooking classes we were most interested in.

We made a delicious Lemon Tart, but it's one of those recipes that you need to plan ahead for. We also made a pear and almond cake that looks and sounds fancy, but it is honestly the easiest thing to whip up and tastes soooo good.

Pear and almond cake 

• Preheat oven to 170. Grease springform tin and line with baking paper.
• Beat butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
• Add eggs one at a time, beating well between eah addition
• Stir in almond meal,baking powder and flour by hand.  
• Spread mixture into prepared tin, top with pears, cut side downwards, placing them around the edge of the cake, narrow ends facing towards centre. (we also sprinkled the bottoms with plain flour, I think this was to prevent them from sinking too much).
• Bake cake for about 50 minutes or until skewer comes away clean.  

There is a fancy glaze that came with it, but I just make a syrup using the juice from the jar and some sugar and boil it until it turns into a syrup, then pour that over the warm cake.


What I loe the most is that this recipe is a great base and you ould put different fruits into it depending on taste.
I also made the orange and poppy seed version. Any excuse for cream cheese icing........

Orange and poppy seed - add chopped zest from 3 oranges and about 2 tbsp poppy seeds.

cream cheese icing 1 block (250 gms) cream cheese 1 teaspoon butter 1 cup icing sugar

Jeff Bukley

Like James Dean and River Phoenix, Jeff Buckley is one of those beautiful people who I often
wonder what they may be doing right now had they not died so young.

James Dean may have been just another actor that made a few amazing movies but that's it, 

River Phoenix may have left the art-house scripts behind and made action movies (I highly 

doubt that, but Keanu has made  a few dodgy career choices!). Jeff Buckley though..........

His "mainstream" success was most certainly determined by his untimely death. 

So its hard to know what would have been. 

When I was product buyer for a large musical chain I remember that every time "Grace" was at 

a lower price point we would sell hundreds of copies and have always wondered had he not 

decided to take a swim on that fateful night 14 years ago, if he would have been such a success 

and keep delivering amazing music.

Whispers of a Biopic being made of his life hae been rumored over the last few years which Im pretty eager to see. Recently I heard Robert Pattinson was keen to take on the role, then a couple of days ago I read that Penn Badgley had been cast According to the LA TIMES this is false.  Either way I think Id be happy to see either of these guys play Jeff. The only unfortunate thing is we know how this story ends.

Point and Shoot : It's Dancey Dance Time

So if you were wandering around Melbourne town on Saturday and noticed the lack of 

pre school hipsters on the streets, then you would have been either rejoicing the quiet 

or you were unaware that the coolest show to hit daytime Tv was in town.

We've seen and meet the Yo Gabba Gabba characters out and about over the 

past couple of years but DJ Lance Rock has always been missing. 

In the 60's it was The Stones or The Beatles, the 90's it was Brandon or Dylan, in my 

world at this moment in time it's The Wiggles or Yo Gabba Gabba. I personally have no 

place in my heart for grown men in flat fronted pants and skivvies entertaining my child. 

I do however hold a special spot for a black man in an orange jumpsuit and a furry hat.

We were most definitely doing the countdown in this house. I can not lie, I was probably more excited than a certain two year old, but this was her first proper "concert" so I suppose she didn't know what to expect. We got up Saturday morning and announced 

NO MORE SLEEPS . IT"S GABBA DAY!!!!!!!!

Waiting outside for the doors to open amongst a see of toddlers wouldn't be in my top 
ten of fun things to do, but once we got inside all kinds of fun unfolded. As lights dimmed, 
a nervousness hit the crowd as you could hear parents comforting there kids, the 
short stint of darkness quickly disappeared with flashing lights and the next couple of 
hours were filled with squealing, excitement and pure joy.

Here's a few screen caps form the video I made as the show started. 

I'm getting a bit gushy for point and shoot this week, I could look at these expressions all day.

I so hope they come back again soon will look a little weird if my sis and I go sans children.

I have a couple of  dates with Miss Kylie Minogue this week, she has a lot to live up to!

Just Because She Has My Heart

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

30 day photo challenge Part 1

OK so I'm totally behind in sharing this, but I have been playing along with this 30 Day Photography challenge and posting on instagram.

Thought I'd play catch  up over here today.

Day 1 - 6

  

Point and Shoot:

My Sunday was full of excitement  and inspiration.

with this little ducky  the star of the show.

I have always loved, some may say  borderline obsessed, with photography.

I studied it in high school and then went onto a photography college, but the darkrooms 

always made me feel nauseous and most of the people that were at the college were pretentious tossers and I didn't enjoy the course, at all,  so dropped out. 

After that I still always had a camera close by, but didn't really go beyond taking happy snaps.

When Sadie arrived I convinced the babydaddy that we would be better off to spend our money on a really good DSLR rather than getting a baby portrait session done. 
Thankfully he agreed.

For a while I was happy with what I got out of it on auto mode but I knew that I had an 

amazing tool on my hands I just needed the information on how to use it. 

Earlier this year I enrolled in a Beyond Snapshots online course. It was fantastic and having the feedback on my assignments I submitted was a huge help. I also think the forum, where you could chat with other students and also learn from them was super helpful.

 Once the Beyond Snapshots course finished I wanted more (without committing a few years 

to a uni course). I had always wanted to do a Love Your camera workshop so I signed up for 

a one day workshop with Angie Baxter while I still had the momentum.

It was such a wonderful experience. Angie is so passionate about photography and you an tell, I love that for her it's not a job it's a lifestyle. The setting, at Abbotsford convent, was perfect, mother nature was on our side and to top it off lunch was delicious.

Here's some more of my very co-operative subject. 

And here's one of my not so co-operative subject that didn't feel like having a camera shoved
in her face once I got home. (Bloody Diva).

I can not recommend either of the courses I have done highly enough. 
They were both awesome and will no doubt inspire lots of point and shoot sessions, I'm sure.
And who knows what's to come......

An addition to my wish list

Like most little girls, I always wanted a pony of my own. I always have and still do wish for a piano.

Yeah I know technically it's a unicorn but this now tops the Chanel 2.55 on my wish list of all time!!

I just need a home big enough for it