We've Moved

Please update your Follows/Readers/etc to www.katepaneros.com and come check out the new site.

Moving Again

You might have noticed a little absence lately.

I have been neglecting my French Safari because frankly, I'm no longer in France and things are changing around here. They are un-French, and new Safaris are in the making.

I sat down with the Board (myself) and we had a Strategic Planning Meeting (chai latte and a sketchbook). We decided to take things in a new direction, which I will announce shortly. Something that will be home to all my creative pursuits, inspirations, ramblings and dreams.

If you're interested in following along, please check back after the weekend for the links to The New Safari.

Cairns & The Daintree: Part 2

Cairns & The Daintree: Part 1

More Puppy Love

Here are some more shots of Keidis, and then the newest pup on the block, Ruby. There is so much cuteness here it makes me a bit ill.

I'm for dogs.

Puppy ♥

i heart faces: pets week
A couple of weekends ago (when the sun still existed) I spent a few hours rolling about on the grass with this gorgeous ball of fur. Keidis is a Bernese Mountain Dog, so he'll grow up to be HUGE in no time at all. Reminds me of my Alaskan Malamute as a pup, massive feet and head!

Today & Tomorrow

It's a horrible rainy day in Adelaide today. I watched a tree fall onto moving car as I walked to work, stopped to call 000 and thanked whomever for it not being my car. When I got to work I confirmed my flight to Queensland for tomorrow morning. I don't even care that it's at 6.05am.

Flickr Member: Rui Palha


Flickr Member: Boggy C

A French Safari Tutorial

Today on The Blah, Blah, Blahg, Miss B is featuring a tutorial I prepared on achieving shallow depth of field with ordinary kit lenses on your DSLR. It can be done, and with just a few turns of the dials this blurry bokeh can be yours! Head on over to learn all about it.

Thanks to Miss B for requesting my 'expertise', although I think I learnt a lot just thinking about how to explain it to others.

Mushrooms on Hindley Street

Friday 18 June - Hindley Street

A French Safari - The Book

Thank goodness the Queen was born and we had a public holiday on Monday, or else this would NEVER have been completed.

If you read my blog then you've read this book. If you look at my photos then you've seen a fair hunk of these pages. BUT, in the true spirit of marketing something that is essentially a re-packaging of previous wares, the epic tome that is A French Safari (in print) contains "never before seen photos", and additional witty commentary from yours truly.

It is currently at the printers, but as soon as I check the first copy next week, it's on sale to all! For only $120! I'm sorry about the pricetag. On-demand printing isn't cheap, and I just couldn't cull down the pages for the sake of a few dollars. It's got a nice hardcover complete with 348 full colour pages. Only the true voyers amongst you all would be interested in my innermost thoughts and feelings enough to pay $120, so this should essentially sort the wheat from the chaff. Or something.

So, flip through virtually for a pre-sale sneak peek, and start saving those pennies!

A French Safari by Kate Paneros | Make Your Own Book

♥ someone tiny

Back to little Luke again this week, but instead of toes it's all about the face. There are so many baby pictures, it's going to be hard to pick a winner!



i heart faces: 'babies' week

♥ to play

I'm taking a different angle on Play this week for I ♥ Faces. I saw this group, Clanadonia, playing in the street in Glasgow, Scotland last year and then again in Edinburgh months later. The noise of drumming and bagpipes is so quintessentially Scottish - just wish I'd bought the CD!



i heart faces: 'play' week

♥ little toes

I've been away from I ♥ Faces for a while now but have been keeping my eye on things and am ready to get back into the weekly challenges!



i heart faces: barefoot week
Proudly supporting Soles 4 Souls



Soles4Souls is a Nashville-based charity that collects shoes from the warehouses of footwear companies and the closets of people like you. The charity distributes these shoes free of charge to people in need, regardless of race, religion, class, or any other criteria. Since 2005, Soles4Souls has given away over 7 million pairs of new and gently worn shoes (currently donating one pair every 9 seconds.) The shoes have been distributed to people in over 125 countries, including Kenya, Thailand, Nepal and the United States.

SA Artist: Mark Warren

I think it's the crazy colours that attracts me, like butterflies are attracted to bits of Lego with honey-water in them.

I saw this large canvas in the window in the window of Arts SA (the state government department) on Hindley Street and if I had a piggybank with change for spending I probably would have bought it. It's much brighter in real life, and I would only need 5,500 dollar coins in the piggy, which at the rate of 1 per day would take me just over 15 years to save up.

I don't know anything about art, but I know what I like.

- attributed to Gelett Burgess, who may or may not have said it first.

Annie's World by Mark Warren

Tomoko Suzuki

I wish I could illustrate when I see work such as this, by Tomoko Suzuki (via designworklife).

Where The Heart Is

When you pack it all up and move it, you begin to realise how much of it you own.

Stuff. The pitfall of a consumerist society.

There is the stuff that fits in boxes and stuff that needs a trailer. Stuff in the back of the ute and stuff in little containers. Stuff in drawers and stuff under the bed and stuff on the walls. You can bundle it up and ship it around and then eventually more stuff arrives, just in a different letterbox. Even after filling boxes and bags with stuff to donate, there was still a lot of it left.

If home is were your stuff is, I now have a new home, which I actually love and shall be 'warming' this weekend with my housemate C. My heart, well it's pretty comfy for the time being. I left a bit of it overseas, so I may have to go back one day to find it. I think it's at a gelati stand in Florence.

EDIT: This is the 'pack n move' process, saying goodbye to my old Granny Flat. I will have plenty to show of the new place soon!

This mattress is older than I am. I think it may need replacing.

Boxes. Lots of 'em.

Source: noiruste on flickr

Last time I had to pack up my life, I had to get it in a suitcase and a box or two for posting. This time around I get as many suitcases and boxes as I want, but I have to take EVERYTHING.

Old school books, tea light candles, bobby pins, the elephant with its trunk up, my 21st birthday present yum cha set... you get the idea. And what to transport it all in??

Last night, G and I hopped from one supermarket to the next between Croydon and Sefton Park, on the hunt for cardboard boxes. An easy task you might think? Perhaps, but let us consider these environmentally-responsibe recyclers and their enormous crushing compactors that churn out cubes of ex-boxes like Wall-E does trash.

"Sorry, we crushed them all."
"They're in the crusher."
"Nah love, we pulled 'em apart!"

No thanks - I don't want the waxy ones from IGA that had lettuce in them. Not the foam cooler boxes with a meaty aroma from the butcher. No luck at all at Coles and Woolies. We re-fuelled with Wok in a Box (I tried, too small), and carried on to Foodland Sefton Park.

Oh Holy Grail of Nightfillers! I asked and I received - Sultana Bran, Savoury Shapes, Samboy Chips (we even scored a leftover pack of BBQ chips in that one). Empty boxes by the bootfull! Big, intact, empty boxes.

Take that Budget Packing Supplies. Stick your $6 teachests and free roll of tape.

They Did

A few shots from their big day (and my first 'pro' job).