Yesterday was the best beach day we’ve had since we’ve been here in Ballito.  The sun was awesome and the waves weren’t quite as rough as the day before… the only problem again was the cold wind.  But that didn’t deter us from having fun.  We met up with the boys’ school friends on the beach, and the kids had a ball playing with kites, and bats and balls… and playing tag, and hide and seek.

Connor counting to 20 while the others started hiding

Oh the joys of a long lens, and the kids that weren’t watching me I love taking photos like this… natural play

I had such fun tonight.  I went to the Jozi Blogger Meetup at Wolves in Illovo.  It was organised by Nicki and Tash and Angie and it was filled with bloggers and they gave away awesome prizes.  Too awesome! I love the resurgence of blogging that’s happened recently, and after tonight, I now have so many more that I’m going to want to add to my reader!  It was awesome to see my friends who’ve I’ve known for ages, and meet a few bloggers who I’ve been following for years and never actually met IRL.

I don’t actually have many images from the evening, and I was lazy so didn’t take out my flash, so all my images are grainy but I like them like that

I don’t know all the people I took photos of, but I’ve linked to those that I do know

Firstly, it was awesome to see Tanya Kovarsky again

And I FINALLY got to meet Hayley and I spent more time with Timor

And Gina, you must recognise from old posts on my blog

Hehe MeeA and Nicci toasting with their free wine from Laborie

Nicki and Angie doing the draws for all sorts of prizes.

Oh and so excited to have FINALLY met Emma, I’ve been following her blog for ages!





I really hope there’ll be more meetups like this it was good fun!

I joined Marcia and Dion at their home to celebrate twins, Kendra and Connor’s, second birthday party.   Marcia and I have done a talent swap over the last while, and in exchange for a few photoshoots (this party being one of them), I’ve been getting some business coaching from her.  I met Marcia online through blogging and I did a family photoshoot with them last year, and it was so cool seeing other people at her party that she’s met online.  Most of them being moms of multiples.  In fact, there were 4 sets of twins there… all 2 years old!

I just loved her theme and decor.  She got all the decor items through a store on Etsy, and downloaded the designs… I think that’s uber clever!

These 2 girls were so sweet, and asked the baby’s mom if they could touch his feet   (this is their mom holding the baby)

Nicole and I had a plan for today… to explore the city.  I wanted to find new photoshoot locations and she wanted me to help her with her camera.  Our limitations at the time of making the plans were that our kids would be with us.  We didn’t think that the weather would turn as cold as it has.  Seriously, we could NOT have picked a colder day for this adventure.

We had planned to go to at least 3 lookout points over Johannesburg city, we made it to one.  We had planned to get to Newtown and possibly the old bank district, we only managed 10 minutes in Newtown.  We had planned to find the Westcliff steps and Hope Road and the forest in Bryanston on the way home… none of that happened at all.  LOL, so it may not have been as successful as we’d hoped, but it was worth it… Nicole got to see parts of Johannesburg she’d never seen before, and I found a new spot for photos, and we had the most awesome coffee and chocolate croissants at 44 Stanley.

It was just far too cold.  When we stopped at Melville Koppies at 10am my car’s thermometer was reading 3.5 deg C.  But I cannot describe how cold the wind was at the top of that hill.  It was just too freezing for words.  Then in Newtown my car told me it was 2 deg!! But it actually didn’t feel as cold as the hill.  But that was the end of the road for Nicole’s little Damian, he’d just cried and cried… we think because his hands were so cold… mine were like ice blocks and were actually hurting me!!  So we aborted our mission, and headed for a heater and some coffee instead

But here are some of the photos that I did manage to get…

I really need to do more things like this.  It’s good for my soul.

Claire and Dom returned recently from the Jivamukti yoga teacher training program in New York, and I met up with them today at the Living Yoga studios in Craighall, for a photoshoot.

They didn’t want a “clean” look for their photos, they wanted mood, especially for the naked part of the shoot; so when I got to the studio, and set up my strobist kit, I saw very quickly that it wasn’t what I was wanting, the look was too cold.  So, off went the flashes, and up went the ISO and down went the shutter speed (right down to 1/30 actually, which was fine because they weren’t moving subjects)… and then I instead made full advantage of the pale coloured spotlights in the ceiling.  That was the only light used in the shoot, because the studio doesn’t have any windows so there’s no natural light at all. And I think it works… I got the atmosphere I was wanting.  I really really liked the pink strips on the wall created by the spots

It was fun!! So cool to step out of my comfort zone too, it was a completely different kind of shoot, and I really really enjoyed it!