Jikana Damaru

Yvestown's pretty kitchen

This week on Flickr Faves Sunday, I bring you Yvestown's gorgeous kitchen with lots of pretty pops of colour, from the pink spot oven glove to the pale blue Smeg fridge and flower filled jug.

Some beautiful shots from my Flickr favourites:

The gorgeous pastel kitchen accessories in My Kitchen
The pretty pale blue in The Kitchen The Cupboard and The Smeg
The cute floral print and delightful Kitchen Flowers
The green enamel pendant light in in-zinc

Have a sweet day!

Summer sweetness

The Rain

Rain rain go away, come again another day!

It has been non stop rain for almost 2 weeks now! How are you all dealing with this rain my local readers? Thankfully it has not been very cold but the humidity has been off the charts! Every thing feels damp around our house! The floors feel damp, the couches feel damp! Its an ikky feeling! Last year when we had this weather mould started to show its disgusting, unhealthy face around our home and eucalyptus oil became my best friend. I'm not looking forward to that stage! For now I'm going to enjoy the rain as it peacefully sweeps through the trees at night. I'm going to enjoy the cool breeze the rain creates when the humidity just gets a little to much to handle. I'm going to enjoy the beautiful singing of my gorgeous Ruby, as the raindrops falling on the tin roof create a song for her to sing to. I'm going to enjoy watching Bindi as she runs around the backyard jumping and catching the raindrops like they are dog treats falling from the sky. I am goign to enjoy cuddling with my husband on the couch on the weekends because it is too wet for him to go outside and work. I am and I mean I AM going to enjoy running in the rain. A little (or a lot) of rain isn't going to stop me!

The shoes...

I realised this week that my jelly shoes were the best investment EVER! They are gorgeous and casual and are perfect for stomping through the puddles and rain at work! No matter how wet or muddy they get a quick wash and towel dry and they are as good as new! I HIGHLY recommend them! I have 3 pairs and wear them every day. Rain or sunshine! The clear jellies on the left are Holster and the red are Country Road

This week I also braved the rain and RAN. Well well well wasn't that a hilarious experience. Fun, hard but hilarious. It was just sprinkling so I thought yes here is my chance. I put on my rain jacket (just in case) and went for it. Well as I got further and further the rain got harder and harder. Mid run it was absolutely pouring and FYI my jacket was NOT water proof but water "resistant". I should of warn none! There wasn't any point in stopping as I was wet anyway so I completed my run! 30 minutes and I was soaked head to toe. It was hilarious. Its a funny experience being hot and sweaty from running yet having the cold rain pelting down on your face. My bad if I get sick this week! Come on immune system! I had fun and I completed the run so now I know there are definitely NO excuses! The rain can not stop me! It felt good and exhilarating and motivated me even more to keep it up!

x S.K.K x

some new props!

I've been picking up some props here and there lately. And, well, I had to test them out :)

of course she decided it was smiley mood time...

so this is what happens when I try to shoot without looking through the camera in order to get a little one :) normally I would not cut off that much head!

oh and she despises the bumbo. So it was extra hard to get a smile throughout these! Can't wait until she can sit up on her own!

little chunk ;)

I.LOVE.this picture. Could be one of my all time favorites. It's (technically) no where near perfect but there's something about it that makes my heart skip a beat. Entering in the Paper Mama challenge.

little piggies.

Featured in Magie des Zuckers magazine

Still catching up...

On Christmas Eve last year I got a lovely gift through my post box. The November edition of Magie des Zuckers, a German cake decorating magazine. To my delight, my Winter Woodland Christmas dessert table was on pages 4,5,6 & 7 and another double spread at the back of the magazine included some of my recipes from the aforementioned dessert table. My proud Mum kindly got one of her German friends to translate it for me and I blushed at the beautiful write up of my "magical", "doesn't leave anything to be desired", "dreamy" Winter Wonderland table. What an honour! Thank you Magie des Zuckers magazine for the fabulous feature!

Have a sweet day!

these two

are getting married in seven sleeps & on friday night it was rehearsal time. a gorgeous hot night & a chance for me to meet the rest of the bridal party. i am looking forward to capturing their day as they become husband & wife. forever. you can see the love in these photos & the happy times ahead.

photography answers

Thank you for your questions. I still have a lot to learn but I'm happy to share to those just starting out what I have learned so far, and what works for me. Hope you find this helpful.

Do you edit/color adjust eyes? Do you know how to do it in LR?
I often do edit eyes. Just a touch though. I really can not stand googly alien eyes! If you overdo the eyes it looks so unnatural. I do not know how to do it in LR yet. I do them in PSE, if needed.
In this photo I used PW's "bring out the eyes" action at a very low opacity.

I would say it depends if they need to be sharpened/brightened! Just please do NOT overdo them!!

How do you get such tack sharp focus?
1. One of the biggest ways I have improved my photography was learning how to properly focus. For awhile I depended solely on auto-area AF. Which isn't bad. But I wanted to nail the eyes (or whatever else I wanted sharpest in the photo). So I switched to single-point AF and haven't looked back. I toggle my way around for the focus to land exactly where I want. You can read about that here!

Take this photo. If I would have let auto focus choose I could have missed this moment. But I locked focus on the little boy and therefore kept him in focus.

2. High Pass Filter for sharpening. In PSE-- Hit Ctrl + J.---then go up to Filter->Other-> High Pass (I usually pick 3-4 you want to see a light outline of your image), then pick soft light (where your layers are) and adjust the opacity down to 30% (or whatever looks best without sharpening too much)

3. Get the right exposure by watching your meter in your slr. As said in my previous post underexposing can really ruin a photo. And of course a low shutter speed. I use at least 1/200 second for moving subjects. Though if possible I like to go higher.

4. For my Facebook and blog I use Paint the Moon's PSE action FB resize. It sizes the photo down to the right upload size and sharpens it. You can get that for free HERE -just become a fan!

What picture size is the best? On my Nikon d3000 there are options to take pictures in small, medium, and large.
In shoot in large. I figure it will come in handy if I wanted to crop way in on a shot.

What posts were most helpful for you when learning?
Honestly, I learned a lot by just reading a ton of photography blogs. Somewhere along the lines I would find a helpful tip here and there. So I can't point out exact posts, sorry.
But I did read a lot of Pioneer Woman's photography posts. And pretty much any Ashley Sisk post for post processing! Ashley is seriously awesome. Thanks Ashley!

During a session like this, how often are you evaluating the photos you just took and tweaking your settings? Do you pick your settings at the beginning of a session and stick with them? Aren't you afraid of missing that perfect moment because you're fussing with your camera? Maybe it's just because I'm slow in manual mode right now, but my daughter is long gone by the time I get all my settings the way I want them, and that's just at the beginning - I don't even try to evaluate things midway through. But then I run the risk of having a whole batch turn out off. Surely you've run into this with older children, right? Thoughts? Advice?
Yes, I try to check for just about every shot. You never know if the light has slightly changed. Which could definitely ruin many precious moments.

'Usually I will have my ISO and aperture set to where I want, and as long as nothing major changes, I toggle my shutter speed to right the right exposure each time. You can do that without pulling the camera back, but I'd still suggest checking your image and histogram every few shots. You will get faster in manual with practice.
This little boy did not want to smile or even look at the camera. So I had followed him around while his mommy tried everything to get him to crack a smile. You never know when that will happen. Thankfully, my settings were right on and I was able to get this photo.

Can you tell children are my favorite to photograph? Toughest clients, but most rewarding!