365/58 - The Crew

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

This great bunch of people are the ones who organise the Kapiti Women's Triathlon - most of us have been doing it for years. Competitors come in for the day - complete the tri and then head off home. We start at the end of the previous year and finish our work a month or so after the tri. Tomorrow's weather looks fantastic and hopefully we will have had another successful day by this time tomorrow.

365/57 - B.E.V.

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

This is a bird's eye view of my lunchtime raspberry and coke today.

365/56 - Vic Uni

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

I spent the day at NZEI House in Wellington today and this was my view from the window. Took me about 1/2 the day before I realised it was Victoria University!

365/55 - Cicada

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

This fellow isn't quite as gorgeous as the one @Allanahk shot - he was quite high up in the tree and it was a bit of hit and miss - I cropped the original to get clearer view.

365/54 - lunch

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

I like making my lunch for school and have developed these very yummy and colourful sandwiches.

365/53 - chickies

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

One of the teachers at school has these three visitors in her classroom at the moment. I was on duty at lunch time and popped inside to grab a quick photo when I walked past her classroom.

365/52 - Tri-vision

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger


What I was aiming for here was a glimpse of objects at different focal points - the sticker on the window, the pole just outside, the building across the courtyard and the trees in the distance. I have no idea why I was trying to do this - it just seemed right at the time!

365/51 - all packed up

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

I picked the girls up from Otaki Forks where they have been camping for the last 3 days.

365/50 - sunrise

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

Another sunrise - lots of gold in this mornings sunrise.

365/49 - Fun Fruit

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

My students had a blast yesterday with my release teacher - she ran a full day program around the theme of fruit. Today my students finished off their Fun Fruit title pages and I photographed them for our class blog. I loved the colours that "Max Melon" used.

365/48 - Sign

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger


The sign beside our front gate at school. The bottom phrase reads: "Hei ako, hei toa, hei ora."

365/47 - spectacular

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

Just a glimpse of the spectacular sun rise this morning. The real thing was much better!

365/46 - motu

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

We've been learning a mihi in class that relates to our school learning journey - mine goes like this:

Tena koutou katoa
Nau mai, haere mai, piki mai
Ko Kapiti te motu
Ko Rau o te Rangi te moana
Ko Wharemauku te awa
Ko Raumati Beach te kura
Ko Jo taku ingoa
No reira, tena koutou, tena koutou, tena koutou katoa

The island is Kapiti; the sea between Kapiti and the mainland is called Rau o te Rangi named after an heroic swim by a Kahe Rau-o-te-Rangi from the island to the mainland with her baby strapped to her back. She was later one of three women to sign the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840.

365/45 - Day of Rest

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

Sunday is traditionally supposed to be a day of rest. Unfortunately for many teachers it's a day of work. I try not to take work home (except the electronic kind of course!) and if I need to do work on the weekend I just wander over (5 mins slow walk away) and work at school. I actually did no work at all yesterday (Saturday NZ time) and went in today instead.

However it should be noted that in my house there is always someone who is partaking in a day of rest - and that someone will usually be a furry someone.

This is our oldest cat Twitch (17 years old) resting in the middle of my bed!

365/44 - shoot

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

I had fun trying to shoot the knight at the medieval market today.

365/43 - Our Alphabet

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

Today in class the students created this art project. I'm really appreciating working with older students - it takes them less time to complete tasks and they produce work with more detail.

For this project I printed out B&W A4 size versions of their photos and cut them in half (facial half not picture half for some). The students then pasted one half on another piece of paper and sketched the missing half.

This could be a good project to repeat later in the year - hopefully students will have made progress in what they see as being important features to sketch.

(Note - my unpainted wall won't be finished until next term so I'm just working around it!)

365/42 - Reward

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

The most diligent thing I do for my health is fortnightly massages during the school year. This is a shot of the massage table waiting for me for my first massage of the year.

365/41 - Grizz

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

This is the logo on my well worn UofM Grizzly cap.

365/40 - The Classroom

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

Here's an exterior shot of my classroom taken while I was on lunch duty today. I took a tip from @allanahk's photo blog and uploaded the picture to Photoshop Express and used the sketch tool to create this effect. The sign reads "Naomi Pool Library" in honor of a former teacher who died some years ago (way to early) and who had a passion for reading.

365/39 - Out of Focus

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

When I checked through my photos from school today I found this delightfully out-of-focus shot of two boys totally on focused on their task and couldn't resist posting it for today's photo.

365/38 - Pretty in Red

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

I was around at a friends place having drinks this evening and spotted some flowers - no idea what it is but the still evening meant I could get close up to get this shot.

365/37 - Rugby Sevens

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

Hope nobody faints but I've actually been watching sport - the Rugby Sevens - I like it because it's all over in 14 minutes - no dragging anything out.

365/36 - The Lone Gunmen

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

We started out just looking after these fish over the summer holidays for one of the teachers at school but have ended up keeping them. @spacegirlnz named them The Lone Gunmen.

I've been wanting to get a photo of them since I started the 365 challenge and finally decided that the light was good today.

365/35 - Black & White

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

A black and white shot - quiet one for today.

365/34 - Ready to rock-n-roll

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

All ready for the day to start - my backpack sitting on my chair in my corner of the office.

365/33 - South from North

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

Just barely visible behind the cloud bank - the South Island viewed from a prime spot in the North Island.

365/32 - Kapiti

cc licensed flickr photo shared by dragonsinger

A shot of Kapiti Island taken through the flax bushes while I was on a break during out eTime PD day today.