And So, That's It...

for another year. Goodbye 2010. Goodbye to 18 years of continuous education. I saw some school books in the newsagency yesterday and felt a little pang of surprise (and relief) at the realisation that I won't be doing the school book list thing ever again.

It was a good year. There were ups and downs, laughter and tears, celebrations and commiserations; the same as every other year. It was a year of having my beautiful daughter home (after being away for four) and a year to watch my son mature and grow into a fine young man.

It was a year that went awfully quickly!

Goodbye to another year of blogging.

Happy New Year everyone.

We've Also Been...............

Playing volleyball..............

and arguing the point.

And swimming.
We also did a lot of things that I didn't record on camera. We played cards every night. We played word games and mind games. We did some gardening (6 bodies @ half an hour = 3 hours work). We laughed and ate and drank and enjoyed each others' company.....and we'll do it all again next year.

The Dogs Have Had Fun Too...

We only own two of these dogs.........the rest of them came to board for a few days. Some of them are still here!

Here is Da Wolfman looking for mice.

This is Annie.

This is Sampson.

This is the pup (that ended up leaving us two nights ago to go to a new home at the coast).

This is my baby, Coco.
This is Tess, the mother of the 9 pups born on Christmas Day. Sadly, we lost one.
This is Abraham, Clarabelle's brother. We lost Clarabelle to an angry brown snake two and a half years ago. I didn't get a photo of two of the others - Muchos or Bailey.

The Kids Have Been................

Dressing up the dog with the headbands that Megan gave them. Feeding the goats.
Rolling the swag.
Learning to walk.
Cuddling the chickens.

Kissing the chickens.
Feeding the pig.

Collecting the eggs for Mare.
Nursing the chooks.

Chasing the chooks.
Feeding the pig a bit more.

Playing "find the button in the rice while you wear a mask".

And eating chippies. Phew. It's exhausting being a kid at Aronui. We also had two week old Ethan here but I didn't end up getting a photo of him. He just slept and drank like all good babies should.

We Have Been.............

Well the family has been and gone. We had a lot of fun and ate a lot of food, drank a few beers, played a few games and told a few stories.

Following is a snapshot of the last few days.

We played some games that Karen made up.

We watched proceedings.

We played some more games that Karen made up.

We gave a little bit of extra help.

We tried to choose things from the basket that would help us to follow a pattern. Some of us had no idea what was going on!

Some of us kept an eye on the camera.

We had haircuts. We played tennis.

We cooked on the bbq and ate behind the blinds.

To be continued.........

What Happened Here Today????

Well..........it rained and it rained and then it rained some more.

- and we had to pump water out of G's chook pens. I laid lucerne in my pens over my side and rescued some of Gibbo's..........they are dry and warm now.

- and G spent hours this morning trying to get a man, who had driven all the way from Perth (on his way to Bundaberg) and got stuck in a floodway not far from here, going again - but couldn't......and spent ages on the phone to his boss about what's happening with a couple of his properties up north.........flooded creeks, staff moving to two storey quarters.......helicopters......swimming cattle..........

- the kids played in the mud.............

- there was a cap photo..............

- we moved the pig - she's as happy as a pig in........................

- as always, Meg took every opportunity to look good for the camera..............

- Lochie became acquainted with the goats.........

and rode Pepper.............
- I planted things....................

- and we can see Jimbour Creek from our place. I can't recall ever seeing it before.

On a more sombre note, our local town is in a bit of trouble. The creek is up again and rumour has it that a very large ring tank on our side of town has burst its' banks and flooded the northern side of town. Photos posted on facebook don't look good. Some friends of ours who are away received a phone call to say that the water was an inch under their stump caps with the water expected to rise another foot or two. The creek is expected to peak at 11 o'clock tonight; a very worrying time for everyone made a little worse by it all happening during the night. We had a sunset and some blue sky here this evening so hope there's some reprieve in sight. It is very, very wet here but we are lucky to live on a stony ridge.