he made it,

but only just!  Riley has been pushing the boundaries a lot lately, testing us in every way, but after many threats to cancel his birthday we finally got there

He was spoilt with many presents including a DS (YAY one each now, no arguments) and some “Rollerskaters” , one of which he has mastered and the other is a work in progress.

We celebrated the day with a family BBQ and skateboard cake, which was a disaster from start to finish (the cake not the BBQ).  Even though the cake was falling apart and the icing was melting in the heat, he loved it. 

We will continue with a few mini celebrations during the week , and then start preparing for the next big thing…….Christmas.

Helen xxxxx

 

Flash, Boom, Crack!

Like most of Melbourne, we were hit by a MONSTER storm on Friday night.  Steve and I headed outside with my camera and tripod to try and get a few shots of the incoming light show and this is the result,

Steve’s amazing shot taken from our front lawn as the storm approached,

and some I took from our back garden (at 1am! ) as the storm moved away,

This last shot scared the **** out if me and my trusty sidekick Butch, who was the only one still awake by this stage.  I love storms and head outside to watch from the first “flash” but this was a little close to home,

 

Judging from the “crack” that accompanied this one, it hit just down the road. 

I am glad I got to use my expensive tripod again I am glad I did all of this on Manual and I am glad that I actually got a photo of lightning !.

It took nearly 300 shots of mostly black sky just to get a few “OK” pictures .  I have a new respect for any photographer who tried to do this back in the day of film cameras, must have been a very expensive process.

The other bonus to this storm was that we now have 3 full water tanks to take us into summer.

Helen xxxxx