Somehow I got roped into being a member with our Capricornia branch of the ICPA and managed to land the job as the Project Officer who handles social media and all that entails. A quiet little job, with very little input which was the reason why I volunteered. ANYHOW.... they had their 30th Anniversary Bush Wisdom luncheon didn't they. Which involved a significant amount of social media presence. Not that I minded, but I had a few balls in the air at the same time which felt rather frustrating as I didn't feel like I was doing justice to any of the balls; however, we made it through the event and sold most of the tickets and the luncheon was a beautiful success mostly thanks to the other committee members, I was just the photographer. Head over the the Capricornia Branch ICPA facebook page in a week or so and I will have uploaded all of the images there. Here are a few I took of the decorations as they were so lovely.
Ange made over 100 of these biscuits that would have been hand painted!!!!!! Isnt' she just the most AMAZING!
The team setting up.
Ange also made this MASSIVE white chocolate mud cake.
These were also there on show, these are made by a blacksmith... not leather!!
We has Jess Howard as one of our speakers and wholey cow is she one talented and amazing lady. Her journey through life shows so much strength and courage and determination and I am in awe of all that she's done. She is not a lot older than I and we actual were in boarding school together for a period of time. I have been following her for a while and I was so happy when I thought of her to collaborate with for the luncheon and everyone agreed. She really is an awe-inspiring lady!
Our little crew, some of my most favourite people here! Just real, genuine people that you can have real conversations with and not just about the weather.
I've only read one storey so far and I love Jess's book already.
The following weekend was the Springsure Show and they asked me to come and photograph some of the action. I really enjoyed it actually as, I wasn't really designated to do a job, I could just take photos of what I wanted to.
How funny is this pair.
This guy made me laugh, he seemed so happy and approachable.
I loved these.
This guy and his son below were really lovely to talk to. It was nice to be able to watch the woodchop and actually talk to them. Something I wouldn't have done otherwise.
So annoyed that there was a person in this otherwise lovely photo of my beautiful inlaws.
This was a father and son team.
Pair of ferals.
I loved this little girl.
This guy scared the pants off me... snuck up behind me and I nearly had a conniption.
I walked up the hill a bit from the showgrounds and got a nice shot of all the fireworks.
Bethany spotted me and I scored this beautiful smile.
Fletcher! Gosh this is a cool kid!
Duck
From my phone
Backwards as per bloody usual!!!
Hold your hats. You wouldn't believe it, but this horse is not dead... he is stuck!!! However, as the afternoon unfolded, on first arriving at the scene, I definitely thought he was dead!!!
Called all the horses up, Bobby was missing!! St Bobby is very food motivated so this was not usual. So I'm looking and looking and he has a bright red rug on which isn't hard to spot. Anyhow, I thought, I will just drive over to where the others came from..... oh, what is that, that Justin has put on the pipeline....... wait a minute.... OMFG... heart in my mouth as I drive full speed on my little 100XR across the paddock to come upon Bobby... NOT DEAD... just stuck!!! Wholey talk about heart failure. So now I'm ringing Justin, who has spotted me from up the hill and come running... not dead, not dead just stuck I'm yelling through the phone. Luckily he thought to take a photo as I was too flustered.
Not a scratch on him. Got up and shook himself off and none the worse for wear. THANK goodness, that we decided to go for a ride this afternoon, thank goodness, it was a cool day.... I bought a lotto ticket although I believe this may have used all my luck!!!
Our neighbour has a large number of milkers and she made a red-eye-run round trip to Caboolture to get a trailer load of poddies. So we grabbed one to put on Tilly so that we can wean her two bigger calves and keep her in milk.
My new view from Tank Hill.
Max with his little mate cruise. And yes, it was very cold the next morning!!!
Our Dozer driver "Tex" who has been here for the past couple of weeks; talking to Kaka about her photos! It was a bit cute.
Kids were pretty keen for scones. So we had to light a fire. Not very tasty but it placated them just the same.
FINALLY got some meat in the coldroom! I am sooooo sick of buying meat, so I am very grateful for the couple we have hung up to be eaten!
Saunders loader makes him look quite small.
Some black calves in the neighbours paddock that may or may not have been from some escape bulls we had last year... he he he he he
Horses were very suspicious of a random feed time down the paddock to get some photos for school.
Madame, fell backwards off our little verandah on the school house (about 1 meter) and landed flat on her back. As I was kinda helping her up, she must have been a bit disorientated and kinda fell forward and come down hard, head first, on the concrete that was holding the stumps for the house. So slightly concussed, we iced and calmed and after chatting to the neighbour who is an RN, decided that due to the blood she had in the corner of her eye, unrelated to the laceration on her forehead, I had better take her to town. So 1 hour drive and a 3 hour wait to be told that she was fine. FML. Anyhow, nothing a bit of maccas couldn't sort out. Took me 3 tries at the speaker box for them to understand that I just wanted a cup of tea!!!
Looks so pretty all cleared! We are finally getting some progress on our long-awaited pipeline project!! Never again will be do another! I will be so glad to have this over and done with!
Kids bought themselves new stretchers and swag with their own pocket money and I helped a little as I thought it was a good investment..... sooo this is where they have slept all week! Even last night in the frost!!
I got a touch of the flu and decided to try this trick and I dunno if it worked or not, but I definitely didn't get as sick as I feel as though I would have otherwise.
I love heaps! So nostalgic! I can't wait to burn them!
Where our tanks will go.
We managed to squeeze retreat creek campdraft into our schedule. The kids did well. Kaka got third and g man won with his group being split into a big and small arena, so there was only 4 in his group.
Madame split her lip open on the playground.... I see a trend here.
The week before retreat was mini school! Kaka picked up student of the week and they both got an award for being apart of the school choir at the eisteddfod.
Love when they do the school song!
Kaka has two teachers this year and we are blessed that she likes both of them.
We even got to have Ben for a sleep over which was very exciting! Bit sad not having Grandma though as Grandma was off touring the countryside in WA.
So handsome.
Check out the flames in this photo. Can you see the unicorn.
Choir
Molly got to have her morning walks while we were there.
G man packing his own lunch.
Kakas garden is starting to look a bit happier.
The week after mini school we were back to town for Dr apt. So good excuse for an ice-cream.
Mum and Aunty Wendy off on their WA adventure! So excited for them and so proud of them.
Mothers' Day weekend we mustered the last of our calves that needed branding.
We were both a bit over it all here.
So aside from the fact that I was already a bit upset that we didn't get to go to Paradise Campdraft this year, we had possibly the worst brand I've ever experienced. Day one when we mustered, a two separate weaners broke out. With it being just me and the kids on horses, Max and I were sent clambering through the thick wattle suckers to chase after it. Jumping break away gullies and galloping of massive rocks meanwhile being directly below the helicopter which was just above tree height. Clearly ol brumy has no PTSD from being mustered in off the long plain of Kosciusko. Having spent an exhausting hour of elevated adrenaline levels to get these two scoundrels back into the mob, I was thoroughly exhausted, clearly very unfit, and we hadn't even started the branding yet.
The next day, we started at daylight and after a few hiccups because the calves had busted a rail and Justin had to go home and get a portable panel we eventually started branding at 7am. I tell you, it was slow as smell! Because the catching sword didn't seem to be holding these late-to-be-branded (massive) calves, we had to tied a rope around the cradle for every, single, one, and it was incredibly tedious! Plus because they were so big, I had to man handle a great deal of them into the cradle and then Justin had to hold the leg of all the steers because they were too big for me to do myself. ANYHOW...... 7hrs later and we finished the 110 calves we had to brand. It was now 2pm and we'd not had lunch because we were supposed to be well and truely finished by smoko. Luckily we packed smoko. Plus... no one had wished me happy mothers day all day and I was thinking everyone had forgotten, until we finished branding and packed up at 3pm when Justin and the kids wished me a happy mothers day.
So yeh, I sat on the bed that night and had a good cry to feel sorry for myself and Justin's goes, "you just exhausted babe?"
"Yes, and I feel very small, I never let my size bother me, I just suck it up, but today I felt very small!"
He goes, "when you were pushing them up into the cradle, all I could see was your head sticking out... so yeh, you were small!"
Silver Lining: it is very nice to finally have all the calves branded. We did the final handful of poddies before the kids and I headed off to minischool. So it is nice to be done for another year. I think perhaps we might purchase a new sword before next year though!
Poor Max was a bit sore footed after our galloping but I was very proud of how well he went. I just need to get him stopping a bit better!
One of the runaways that we apprehended and carted back to it's mother at the yards.
A highlight was uncle H giving me and the kids a lift back to the house in the helicopter.
Hickory Wattle.
Some more upcycling.
And there you have it. It been a rather long a busy month. I always find myself going back and thinking, "wow, no wonder I haven't had time to scratch myself".
Going to be a bit frosty in the morning. I have my heated blanket preparing my bed for me now. The kids are still camping outside, I think they are crazy, but they love it. I hope it's a good memory and it's something they tell their children and say, "mum forced us to sleep outside in the freezing cold!" Aaah the trauma!
Hope you are all nice and toasty.
With Love xx
