Happy Mother's Day...

I've had a lovely day :-))

Lie in, breakfast in bed, lovely card and pressie from my boy (three clip-on lenses for my iPhone; a fish eye, a wide angle and a macro.)  I'm going to have fun with them :-))

Alan declined to come out with D and me this afternoon.  Chose to spend the day with Charlene instead surprise surprise  As part of my Mother's Day spoiling, D had offered to take me to a location of my choice and be my photographer's assistant.  After a little thought I suggested we go to Loch Earn  as I wanted to photograph the Mirror Man.

When we got there I was dismayed to see....well nothing really as he wasn't there!.  A quick google told us that he's been removed after being almost destroyed by bad weather.   Hopefully he'll be back when the threat of howling gales has gone.

It's a scenic spot though so decided to stop anyway and take some photos of the loch.  Sadly I'd forgotten to take food for the ducks (see extra shot) and after mobbing us as we arrived, they soon waddled off when they realised we were empty handed.   Two little robins stayed with us and if it hadn't been so cold I would have stayed long enough to change lenses and take some shots of them.

The weather was supposed to be lovely today but it wasn't!  Freezing with the odd flake of snow and a stiff breeze, but probably better for photography purposes, more atmospheric.

Got out the car and after two minutes my fingers were numb!  Thank heavens for my reliable assistant who, after watching my cold, stiff fingers almost drop my camera as I put it on the tripod, took it from me and clicked it into place.

I then spent five minutes messing around with an ND filter in an attempt to get a soft water effect.  Now I probably don't have to tell you as you can no doubt tell from the photo, absolutely no technical knowledge was used in order to achieve this (well apart from using my tripod and getting the 2 second delay on my camera)  I know there's a chart you can use to ensure you get the perfect exposure but there was no time to faff about trying to use my brain and get technical.  It was just too damn cold!

So, trial and error ruled until we reached the point where we were in danger of losing body parts to the cold and we quickly retreated to the car and headed home for coffee and cake.  Even had my dinner made for me :-)

And just when I thought the day couldn't get any more exciting :-) the Northern lights made an appearance over Crieff!  

Hope all the Blip mums had a lovely day.

Happy Mother's Day Mum, Gran and Mum L.   Love and miss you every day xxx