Our school holidays have now been and gone in a flurry of goings on. We began our holidays with Easter long weekend, where we managed to catch up with a couple of our grandmas, do a spot of fishing and eat copious amounts of chocolate.
The following week was spent packing all our large furniture into a shipping container and to be honest, I think I almost prefer it this way. A lot less crap taking up room in the house and collecting dust. We are now sleeping on the floor.. but in style on our king sized mattress. I think the kids would be happier if we had our couch back though, but as I don't seem to spend much time there, I'm not perturbed. Once I start to do the kitchen stuff I might start missing a few things, particularly my bread maker.
The second week was mostly spent getting ready for our local show. We had a couple of days of working bees because we hadn't had a show last year so some of the stuff hadn't really been used for a couple of years and we had numerous water dramas, which fortunately our president Lou Geddes, finally got on top of the morning of the show with a delivery from a water truck.
I also tried to get in a bit of baking where I could manage. I was up till 9pm the night before we left for the show making macaroons and I didn't tell mum because I wanted to beat her melting moments (they are to die for)..... I did by the way; beat her, which I think she was a bit dirty about lol. I got third and she got highly commended. It will be on next year though. She beat me with a few and I beat her with a few so it evened out.
Getting a few last shots of our favourite fishing spot.
Got Granny Sheree back out on a horse. I think Yoda might have a new owner.
Went for a quick drive to the beach to have a look for some quinine seed. You would think they could stop eating their apples long enough for me to take a photo!
My first attempt at hot crossed buns..... well to be fair, they were a premix brioche that I added sultanas too and made the dough in the bread maker, but it still counts right??
Big fella delivered on some crab!
Grannie's glasses!
Pancakes for Easter breakfast.
I'm not too sure how we manage to convince our children that chocolate for breakfast is something that we are only allowed to do once a year.
This little dude KOed himself on our window. Luckily after a little bit he came too. He's a forest kingfisher. So very cute.
Our current sleeping arrangement lol. Like being back when I first moved out of home, except the bed is a bit bigger.
So damn proud of my little man, he has come along in leaps and bounds this year with his first term of school. I am just blown away with how much they actually learn.
Fishing with dad while us girls had a brunch date.
Not very often that we manage to get a morning lie in. But it's pretty special when we do!
My little bait catcher.
These pair are on fire with their fishing now. G man reels them in while kaka grabs the landing net to get them! It's pretty cute!
Got a monster!
Even mum did a spot of fishing.
Hard to stay away from my camera though with these gorgeous reflections.
Missy wanted to run.
Trying to get a shot of us all on the 100 but was a bit difficult!
Marlborough Show campsite.
Good distraction for the kids, they played her for most of the day.
The show is pretty full on job and there's no way that I could do it without Grandma coming to babysit the kids for me over the couple of days.
G man got a highly commended for his handwriting which I was impressed with as he was competing in a Prep- Grade 2 class.
So serious. This reptile dude was really awesome and so good with the kids.
I think she was a bit pleased with herself.
Auctioning off the fruit cakes.
This was our circus performer. Her hula hoops were very cool.
Family photo fail!!
Girls Grammar Girls.
Garrett, Kaka, Ella, Jacob, Libby, Lucy, Harry and Bonni.
We also ventured up the road the week before the show to give a fleeting hand to brand a few calves and to catch up with school friends which was really awesome. Ange and her 3 kids had come up to visit Bonni and Lou and then, much to my delight decided to come and stay at the show with us all for a few nights (Ange's husband joined us there with their camping gear). Was so great to spend some time with them and Ange was an amazing help in our horse ring and I think I would have been lost without her.
I did well with my photos this year. I picked up champion photo with the one below. So between the cooking and photos and my painting, I did pretty well. Not to mention our dogs coming first and second in the dog jump. The big fella picked up second in the flag race, I dropped my cup, he also got third in the doubles barrel with Patchy. Garrett got highly commended for his handwriting and a third for his photo. So the Wall family had a pretty good haul.
With all the chaos over school holidays and our first week back at school being very exhausting trying to unpack, do all the washing, get horse results for the show as well as trying to get a week ahead with school so we can attend beef week, the big fella and I thought it would be nice to have a night out for ourselves. With him being away on our anniversary too, we took the opportunity to have a date night, which we hadn't done since last year. How the time gets away.
So that's a wrap!!! I might add that it's raining again, which seems to be the only chance I have these days to get my blog done. I haven't had a chance to listen to much new music lately as I'm listening to Nelson Mandela's Long walk to freedom. Which I must say is waaaaaay too political for my tastes. But some of it is very interesting and enlightening and it helps me to understand why there is still so much racial hatred in Africa. I guess there is a lot of it all over the world and I feel like the recent BLM movement has actually done more harm than good in dividing people. I don't really think it had brought people together. But that is only my opinion.
It's interesting listening to this book because he talks a bit about how he had a lot of reasons to hate the white people but he said that those feelings by himself and others were often motivated by personal vendettas seeking revenge and that, that was not going to unite the people.
Anyhow, hope to catch up with some of you at Beef in the coming week. I am actually in town for two weeks with beef week and then with our mini school for Garrett, so hopefully I will get some time to have a rest as we have been non-stop here for a while. Once we get back it will be full on again with school, packing the rest of our belongings (destination still unknown) and with cleaning everything top to bottom, so I'm going to have a feather duster up my backside.
Take care everyone and I hope you're getting under some wet stuff.
