highly commended photo in a local contest...yay!

i entered a few photos from the boab festival in a photo contest recently. i was surprised when someone came up to me and congratulated me on one of my photos getting "highly commended" and being printed in the broome paper.  that was news to me.  though i didn't win, and it wasn't one of my favorite photos, it is still really exciting.  gives me hope for my new found hobby!  and what better place to learn than up here with so many wonderful things to capture.

mom in oz...more marsh walks, visits to work...

after our time cramming in derby sights...i had to go to work for a few days.  how inconvenient.  on the wednesday, mom joined me for the morning to see what i do all day.  she got to see the derby hospital and my office and tx room. she met all my co-workers and experienced our weekly morning tea!  at lunch several of us went out to a new cafe in town and had a great time chatting and soaking up the ambiance.  mom walked home from there and i continued working. later that evening we went walking with lisa, hannah and lisa's two dogs on the marsh by the cemetery. we had an amazing sunset care of a bush fire. looking forward to my four day weekend with mom!

silly miski

as always, miski relishes her marsh walks, oval runs and golf course jaunts.  the next day, after marsharts, we took her for an early morning run.  she practiced catching tennis balls with jose. of course, as soon as i got out the camera she stopped catching them. but they made for some pretty cool photos.  see more of them here

holy sh-t i'm 30!

so it finally happened. this thing i've been dreading. i've closed out my 3rd decade...and had an awesome time of it! started with a picnic at dinner tree the sunday before with some good friends.  had great food, great company, champagne and other spirits.  when the tourists came and clogged the site up we moved to the marsh by my house and watched the sunset with another bottle of wine. on my oz birthday i got some nice surprises in the morning, watched an incredible sunrise with claire and miski and then claire made this incredible lunch and brought it to work.  i pigged out!  after work a bunch of us went to the jetty to watch the sunset and eat some more.  we also had more champagne.  went home after and played with sparklers and ate cake.  talk about overindulgence.  today was really my us birthday and i watched the sunrise again with miski and claire.  it was breathtaking.  what a lovely way to welcome myself to my 30's.  all the photos are posted here

Derby sunset taken with the new camera

as soon as the camera arrived i made good use of it.  still figuring out what to do with it for each situation but even without knowing what to do the pictures are clearly incredibly superior.  we've had bush fires recently, now firmly in the dry season, and the sun was blood red.  just stunning.

jetty walk

 

took another walk to the jetty with the pup this weekend.  we had to go the road way though because of the recent rains. she did great and it was beautiful as always outside.

water water everywhere

after high tide we had some heavy rains as well.  which was nice because it lowered the oppressive heat and humidity we'd had.  it was so beautiful out with the clouds and the water came right up to our street! i've never seen the marsh so wet!

4 Wheel Drive Course!

i got to take a four wheel drive course for work. was one day of theory and then a practical day! super awesome!  it was a beautiful, hot day and we got to go through mud and sand and over hills and into boggy areas.  the tides were up so we were treated to "beach" like views along the way.  absolutely stunning vistas and i love off roading, always have.  i even got to do it in a manual car and did great so that's exciting!  i also found a beautiful beetle when other people got themselves bogged and we were waiting to snatch them out, etc.  sad thing is on the second leg of the course (another area) the car died so we had to tow it back to town and miss out on black soil avoidance and more mud running. oh well another time.  can't wait to get out there and try it again!  many more photos here Derby 2011

marsh walk with the dogs

went for a walk on the marsh with friends and their dogs.  it was a muddy, soggy mess out there and a blast! miski kept pulling my arm out of the socket which is annoying the crap out of me but i have no idea how to fix it. anyway turns out instead of an amazing sunset we got treated to a cloud show the likes of which i've never seen before. shadows were being cast all over. i have no idea how it made the patterns it did but it was unbelievable. we then were treated to an amazing dinner at our friends place!  check out more photos here Derby 2011

my two cuties

how cute! jose has really taken to miski and now says he loves her at 98%...this might sound mean but it started off below 80 and has risen steadily the past three months. she has really grown on him and though she does irritate him at times when she is naughty (that's what babies do), i can see how much he loves her.  thrills me to no end, especially knowing where he comes from and how animals are viewed, treated, and eaten there.  yay! also a lot of shows about animals and their power to heal and reduce stress have lent themselves well towards assimilation into my world of animal worship. here's hoping the other 2% come along swiftly.

chasing a storm

i know i keep saying this but each storm keeps getting even stronger than the last and is more incredible than the ones before.  i went for a walk with miski today around 5pm. the usually salty, dry, dirty marsh had become an ocean. it was spectacular. the bridge that usually houses a wee bit of water trickling under it had become a full fledged river where the dogs can swim. you could see storm clouds brewing on the horizon. i ran home to get the camera and jose. jose didn't want to go as far as i did so i ran back again to the bridge, taking photos. well i got caught on the way back in the beginning of the downpour and the winds were so strong it was actually kind of scary. i love the storms and the sky here but i was sad to discover that our backyard has become flooded with this particular rain (never happened before) and now miski cannot sleep outside tonight...should be an interesting evening. we have about 1/2 a meter of space for her to pee outside. poor thing. anyway check out the rest of these amazing photos.

dinner, halloween, hikes about town and roo's

we've had quite a first week in derby!  place is still great, so are the people - super friendly. we went to a co-workers place for a great dinner (8 of us), then the next night played beach volleyball (which i suck at), then we had a big dinner at jila's cafe with work friends (great pizza and we tried kangaroo! yummy). Then last night we got dressed up as vampires and went to the local halloween party which turned out to be super fun. All the hospital staff and friends were there in great costumes with good drinks and finger food. we have a lovely neighbor who took me out this morning very early in search of kangaroos in the wild!  We saw tons of them on our walk but they are too fast to photograph.  i will try another time.  then i decided to stay home and make cake instead of doing anything social.  so far so good here...our derby album has been updated with more photos - see album link in sidebar for those.