not another one...

Oddly enough, this little corner of the world has been a bit hectic again.

Firstly, and most importantly, I have a new baby cousin. And though I've yet to meet her, I'm sure she is the cutest baby girl ever, because her parents are utterly adorable. Hopefully I'll get to meet her this weekend, so I'm pretty happy. Congrats Krissy and Seb!!

And now for the less amazingly awesome updates...

These days I'm working for Integrated Images Australia, though as funding is still being finalised, it's currently unpaid. It's meant to be three days a week, but really, I'm spending my other days frantically organising and typing. We have a huge launch coming up in October, which I'm not allowed to say much about at this point, very top secret, but if it goes the way we want it will be HUGE and amazing and you will literally kick your own butt if you miss it. Honestly, that alone is taking up most of my waking hours. I'm the Office Manager of IIA on top of that, and we're still setting up the office as much as is possible when your table vanishes daily, so that keeps me rather busy, too. At the end of the month, I'll also be helping teach the basic photography course, so sleep may well become a figment of my imagination.

Because I've been so busy with IIA, Kat Browne Photography has taken a slight hiatus while I try and learn time management and effective juggling skills. Though it's good, in so much as I'm learning how to run a business effectively, and seeing how to organise myself better, I still miss having enough time to wander aimlessly taking photos. There'll be some new pics up soon, though, as I've actually got a day to myself today (shock!) and have some to catch up on. Yes, I know I'm slack :)

Peta's still working hard at her high school, and for those who don't live with teachers, we've just hit the frantic marking phase of the calendar. I know the mythos is that they're rushing about because they're lazy, and for some, maybe that's true. But having watched Peta this year I'm staggered that she has a moment spare in her day! There are so many things she does outside of teaching that she can be at school and school related events for anywhere up to 16 hours a day. Given that teachers get paid for five, that's pretty impressive.

What else? I finally have a phone that works here, which is pretty impressive. For those who haven't had the joy of dealing with my old phone, messages would take up to two weeks to get through to people or would just vanish into the ether all together, phone calls were at times indescipherable, and messages sent to me often just vanished. So, yes, people can now contact me again, which is fantastic. And I've kept the old number, too, so no having to replace business cards or anything.

Oh, and the craft room flooded again. So much so the carpet had to be ripped up, and the insurance claims guy had to come around. We're getting the room fixed and tiled, and hopefully the stuff now living in our livingroom and the garage can go back into the ordered chaos we knew and loved. I can't wait.

LOs and craft room dramas

How is this for a wonderful sight to see when you walk into your craft room?

The constant rain has given us plenty of chance to scrapbook over the weekend... mainly because most of the stuff was hurriedly put in the living room when the craft room took on water.

Currently, there's a fan on in the craft room trying to dry the carpet, though because of the continued rain, the whole thing has to stay fairly closed up. Joy. It's not too bad; not great but nothing was too damaged besides the carpet, so it's mainly just the smell and the wet carpet that's the issue. Oddly, there are some areas that are soaking wet that you only find out about if you put weight on them, which I think means there's a gap between the ground and the carpet?

The scary part is that we've been told to expect rain off and on for the rest of the week. Eep. The room just reeks, and there's mould on the ceiling that Peta's dad says was already there, but we never noticed it, so we're still a tad concerned.

Anyway, enough of the melodrama, onto the pages:

This is probably my favourite photo of Lyn. We took her out to Toombul shops in 2005, and took her to see Santa as it was one of her favourite parts of the season. After the invasion of kids wandered off, we took her up to shake his hand and have a natter, and ended up getting her photo taken.

Matthew, my younger cousin in one of the rare moments where he looked angelic and thoughtful, since he's normal moving a million miles an hour.

The beautiful Lu, singing up a storm.

And last but certainly not least, Lu's beautiful daughter, Caeligh at her recent birthday party.

The inevitable catch up

The Ideas fest was shaping up to be an awesome one, but I missed three of the four days because I was sick. Blech. I was so disappointed, I still am somewhat cranky about it all. Didn't overly help that I had a sore ankle on the Thursday, and the limping blistered my feet so bad that they're still sore and difficult to walk with. Without getting too gross, you know how when you get blisters on the back of your heel they just rip open over and over and over? Yeah, I have three of them.

I did, however, get to stop in and see the robowars at Southbank, which were part of the festival. And I loved every second. Casual robotic violence is good for the soul. Watching bits of old vacume cleaners try and hit other bits of old vacume cleaners with an axe is just all manner of fun, and I hope it's something that comes back regularly.

Other than that, not much has been happening. The exhibit closed yesterday, and while Mum and Lisa got the chance to go check it out, I didn't (see, slack!). Richard is apparently talking to some other libraries about hosting exhibits, so it could show up again somewhere. The IIA office space seems to be coming along, and when it's all organised I'll be there regularly doing office-y type stuff and helping plan course overviews. Who would have thought that when I bailed on the teaching degree that it would come in handy? I'm really excited about it all, even if the office stuff means learning new stuff (so I'll be constantly annoying Mum since she's done courses on office work in the past).

Peta and I went to see Tim Minchin (obviously, since the last post had a pic), rather randomly. Peta saw online that there were a few tickets left, and decided we should go. We even managed seats in the middle of the forth row, which was amazing. What we hadn't realised until recently was that Tim was the musical director for Todd McKenny's version Cabaret; we only realised when Peta was flipping through her old programs and we saw the name, some big ol' nerd glasses and a short haircut. It... creeped me out, really, given how used to the long haired, babbling, bug eyed genius character I've gotten. Being as we're quite happy being random, Peta took it along and got it signed.

That's pretty much it for fun stuff. Peta's drowning in marking which has to be done and put into the system by Wednesday, I think. At last count 30 students hadn't submitted one of the assignments, so she's a bit stressed.

Though, oh, yes, she shaved her head. For Shave for a Cure, she ended up with a 4 blade because they didn't raise enough money for her to be completely bald, but it was fun to watch and photograph.

And right before the festival I got well and truly over my hair, had it hacked off and dyed black with a red streak. And I love it. Far more than some people have, but hey, it means I get a seat to myself on public transport, so it's all good. No pics yet, as I need to wait till Peta has time to take the photos, but they will eventuate soon.

Other than that, the only newsworthy stuff is our coming trip to Roma over the Easter break, which should mean a chance to check out some new places and give my camera a workout, again.

Hope you're all doing well, and life's treating you well. Have a great day, whatever you're doing.

LOs

I know, I know, I should just tattoo 'slack' to my forehead and be done with it. Mostly these are older LOs I've been meaning to photograph and put on the blog, sorry, haven't had much time for actual scrapping recently.

I tend to flit between things. Lately it's photography and painting, which doesn't leave much scrapping time. It's been months since we got new photos developed, though hopefully it'll either be this week or next that we do, so they should (hopefully, maybe, fingers crossed...) be something soon.

Anyway, pages:

This is Peta in a balaclava her mother brought back from an overseas trip and gave to her parents. When Peta was going to Canberra last year, it was suggested she try it on. And doesn't she just looked thrilled with it all? Beelzebozo is a Bill Hicks reference.

The beautiful Caeligh, one of my favourite people to photograph. She's just so expressive and her thoughts and ideas tangent in some fantastic ways.

My cousin Matthew as a baby. He has the most amazing blue grey eyes. His mum gave me three photos of Matthew and his brother Jonathan to scrap for them, and this is page one.

And last but not least, one of my favourite photos I've ever taken. There's so much technically wrong with it, but the emotion behind it is just beautiful. Ted died of cancer last year, and the dignity and bravery he showed was just staggering. But more than that, he was a gentleman to the end, always more interested in making sure Rita was alright. I think if Ted taught me one thing towards the end it was that cancer can't ever really beat someone. It can kill you, but it can't kill that which makes you who you are; you're compassion, you're dignity and bravery and all those things that just seem to shine more brightly in the darkness moments of life. It can only beat you if you lose who you are because of it. In the end it may not be much, but it can also be everything.

The Piano Knows Something I Don't Know

Not good enough for KBP, but a pic from today's Tim Minchin matinee. Alas, no taking photos of the comedian.

My new boots

So it's taken two years to find some boots that I like. That aren't either those ones that look like they're melting, ones covered in fringing or are just F me now boots. Work boots, basically.

And all I've found (aside from the melting, fringed F me nows) have been those boring ones. You know the sort, just black, with a chunky heel. This has saddened me greatly. Buuut, last night I *finally* found my new work boots. And I've fallen completely in love with them.

Aren't they pretty? And odd, kinda, but that's most of the reason I like them. I don't know, for some reason they remind me of a messed up blend of Sgt Pepper, The Black Parade and Firefly/Serenity. And they have heels, unlike most of the boots we found that were kinda sorta maybe if you squint what I wanted. And, to complete the perfection, the insides of them are purple.

It was meant to be.

Seriously, I don't care if everyone else on the planet thinks they're ugly. I love them.

(ok, so, yes I still have to find a work appropriate outfit, but hey, boots.)

Ideas Fest 2009

Ok, so Richard has told me that he's the photographer for the Ideas festival, and that I'm welcome to tag along as his photographer in training.

Of course, I found out near enough to midnight that I didn't get a chance to fully check out the program, so I'm doing it now and it sounds utterly fantastic. Lots of stuff aimed at school kids, lots of environmental stuff and art based talks and so many events I'd love to go to and just listen.

Oh, man, it has Robowars. Tell me I'm not the only one gleeful at robot battles? Back in the days we had Foxtel, my sister and I loved watching people make home made robots smack each other around.

Seriously, if you're in Brisbane, check out the program.