I didn’t start out the day planning on having an iPhone only day.  I had planned on going out for my birthday lunch with my DSLR, but that was cancelled because Bradley just wasn’t well enough.  So he slept for the entire day, and I took Connor and his cousin Erin to a party at the fire station, and then we came home for some lunch and then my mom and dad came for tea… armed with my mom’s traditional chocolate cake.  My brother and SIL, and my sister and her boyfriend also joined us for tea.

The party in the morning had such fabulous photo opportunities that I whipped out the old faithful iPhone… and then decided to just carry on using it for the day. I’m really loving this phone, I must tell you… the photography apps are just awesome!  I love that even though the quality of the original photos are brilliant, that I can use apps to make the photos look old and grainy.  Really cool, and so easy to use.

LOL Kimo just wanted some of my dad’s cake…

The iPhone apps I used for the processing are CrossProcess, Camera+ and Phototreats

Erin spent the day with us today, and I took the kids to the Rhino and Lion Nature Reserve in the Cradle of Humankind.  They loved it… although they were very disappointed when I decided that an extra R30 per person per enclosure was an exorbitant amount to pay to let them pet the lion cubs considering the amount we’d already spent to get in the reserve! Anyhoo… I’ll take them to pet the lion cubs another day.

Because we got there quite late, we headed for the creche first where we saw the lion cubs, rhinos, jaguars and tigers.

Apparently Barbie didn’t like the Rhinos…

Then we headed for the lion camps (on the way spotting some warthogs and ostriches and a “wild” rhino and actually a jackal crossed the road in front of us but it was too quick for me to stop the car and grab my camera)… where although we didn’t see the lions in the camp we were most thrilled to spot the wild dogs and the cheetahs… and a family of white lions!

Then before we left, we took a walk to the Hippo pools and saw more lion and tigers along the way.

And now I’m going to have an early night… have to be up sparrows to catch a flight for the first of this weekend’s weddings!! So my blog will be quiet for the next few days

Today’s stay-cation mission was to have fun at the Johannesburg Zoo. Nicole and Erin joined us, and we spent quite a few hours chasing the kids around the zoo.

The weather wasn’t exactly pleasant and alternated between fine drizzle and freezing winds… and then some sun to tease us before the mad weather cycle started all over again.  But the kids didn’t seem to notice, and they ran and ran and ran… and then collapsed at around lunch which meant that Nicole had 4 year old Erin in a stroller with 25kg Connor (also 4 years old) perched on the back of it… and she managed to somehow push them up that HUMUNGOUS slope to see the hippos and rhinos!

LOL I had to laugh, because it reminded me of Exmi’s blog post yesterday about their trip to the Pretoria Zoo.  Well, that, and the umpteen sets of parents that arrived all fresh looking with their kids riding those push along tricycles… only to be seen walking around the zoo half an hour later trying to carry the child in one arm, and the trike in the other!! Zoo trips are not for the faint-hearted!

Hehe Bradley was on tippy-toes trying to reach the opening… and then in the second shot he’s actually pretending to be a lion… although it looks like Connor is kicking him or something

One of my highlights was seeing the baby giraffe.  Aww, it was so sweet!

It was a good day, and it was awesome that the boys shared the experience with Erin

We had tea at my parent’s house yesterday afternoon.  My brother and his wife were there too with Erin, and I took the opportunity (after the Easter Egg hunt) to try get some photos of the 3 of them.  We haven’t done photos of the 3 of them in ages… and I’m thinking that one of them (Mom and Dad, you need to choose) would make a good canvas for my parent’s house.

I actually like the monotone ones rather… think I’ll do a canvas for our home too

and then it was time for Bradley to get tickled by the 2 younger ones

We spent the afternoon at my parent‘s house, and the kids had a ball on Erin’s waterslide that she got from Father Christmas… and then the pool

Jackie was too funny.  She’s never been interested when the kids are in the pool, but today she actually came to ask to get splashed.

See the full set of 2010 photo-a-day photos on my Project 365 Flickr Set.