photography lesson

Today I bundled the kids and the Nikon in the car and headed for the country. 

We headed out to see the talented (writer, musician and photographer...Words with Friends extraordinaire) Stephen Garton. We share a mutual distaste for all things #hashtags.  He was visiting from the South but managed to squeeze in an Idiots guide to photography lesson...me being the idiot.  

After reading the instruction guide I could at least understand a few of the words he was talking about...but I hadn't quite figured out which buttons to push etc. 

{Playing around with the Shutter speed}

So as far as I understand from the lesson was..."to get the perfect picture you need the perfect balance between the aperture and shutter speed,  and to take a shot in a way that no one else has ever done before".

We pushed a lot of random buttons like white balance, ISO and I even had a go on Manual focus mode. 

So I got snapping. 

What are the chances that I would be taking a close up shot of this flower and a bee would plant itself right on it!

My models weren't compliant enough to stand still for long enough,  but I got a couple of lovely portraits of my darlings.

We left their place and instead of driving home we headed further in to the country...I still wanted some more shots...as I still had some battery power left!
We came to a small town with a little cafe. I did need a coffee break first. And what a find! This cute old time town with all original buildings from many  years ago turned out to be a little gem of a place.

I am always looking for cafes that have a point of difference and quite frankly stuff for my kids to do while drink my coffee. I was quite surprised to find this little cafe bustling with people. I saw a great spot outside...I needed to find somewhere for my noisy non-shush-able two year old to hang out without disturbing too many other paying patrons.

Out side in the garden area were picnic tables,  a little tree hut, a hammock, rocks to climb and pretty landscaping.  

Cute place.

Maungatapere....

Who would have thought.