Football and pasties

October 1 2017

We are having a very family weekend.  Everyone gathered at the farm yesterday to watch the football finals and cook pasties.  This year I made the pastry the day before and the pasties were ready by half time.  Edd supervised vegetable preparation and assembly of all the parts with lots of help from everyone so that the tradition of pasty making is passing down to the younger generations.

The teens and girl friends disappeared into the environment and Silky kept two- year old Ella happy with the toy box. The serious sports people watched the match right through but luckily let out enough groans and whoops to let the pasty makers know when to rush to the next room and watch key moments.  To crown things off, the Tigers, whom we were barracking for, won the cup. Al and Indi have always been Tigers supporters and so has Stevo who will probably need a few days to recover.

Simon had a worse time. He had set up a screen and projector in the restaurant. All went well until the football started and then the TV system for channel 7 that he was using switched to other programs. This was totally unexpected, luckily our TV at home showed the match fine.

Al and Pip stayed here on Friday night and then Wayne, Dani and Ella stayed last night. I am baby-sitting Ella today whilst her parents go to see the Elton John concert at a local winery.  Lucky them! At the moment everything is peaceful because Ella is asleep.  It is the first time she has been left with us so I am not sure what she will think of the arrangement.

On the farm the goat kids are settling down to a routine.  They all drink from the bucket feeder but the smallest kid runs away and needs to be caught first, which is maddening.  Nola looks as if she might have her kids today and is the last pregnant goat. We have only two female kids so I hope she can reset the male/female balance.

Our neighbour has been over with his digger and levelled the edge of the camping ground where the carport and wood shed used to be. There were some big tree stumps to be dug out that were far too large to do by hand.  Now, once grass grows I can maintain the area with the ride on mower.  This gives us a good cleared space between the ruins and the gully that will form a firebreak as well as extend the camping site.

It is Silky's birthday today so we will all go to Bo’s house later this afternoon for yet another family gathering. We have a complicated plan over cars because only Wayne's car has a baby seat.  Wayne has taken my car to Yarra Glen and then swapped cars with Bo to go to the concert.  We plan to drive Wayne’s car and Ella to Bo’s house for the party. Then Bo will drive Ella in Wayne’s car to join her parents after the concert at the place they are staying and come home in her car. We will have my car at Bo’s house to come home in.  It all seems pretty obvious this morning but trying to work this out yesterday after a few glasses of wine proved impossible.