Life is very much back to normal since our big Exchange year in 2009. This year Rosie and Bruce went to the Leeuwin Concert in February to see Brian Ferry and then later in the year we went to Sandleford to see Michael Buble. Both concerts were good, but we are getting a bit old to be sitting on the ground in the cold night air. We are also getting annoyed at the number of people standing so you can’t see or talking all through the show.
Liam had his cricket windup at Amazin, which was a really nice place for a picnic. We think this will be the last time he plays cricket (thank God), it is so slow to watch and he isn’t good enough with the bat to make it interesting for him.
Bruce had his shoulder operation early in the year so that he would recover in time for the annual school ski trip. He also felt left out since every other male in the Maths Dept had had a shoulder operation.
It all recovered quickly so in July he was ready to take another 40 staff and students to Falls Creek.
The snow this year was very good so everyone had a great time skiing, making snowmen and having snow fights.
The group had a long wait down the bottom of the mountain for the snow buses to take us up, eventually most of them walked up and had their luggage taken by the buses. Liam had another really good skiing year, his skill level is quite high now after a year in Canada and he can happily keep up with Dad in the afternoon sessions.
Unfortunately, Rosie’s brother Doug passed away this year, so we all went up to Geraldton for the funeral. It was a good way to catch up with all her family, but it would be nice if we could do this at less traumatic times.
Liam had another good year with his football, Bruce was the team manager and Dylan’s dad Todd was the coach. Liam loves the training and really enjoys tackling people. He is very good at hand balling, but his kicking stills needs to be worked on. We do consider him to be an asset on the field now, which is a vast improvement.
Rosie went off to Country Week golf in September, which she really enjoys. The girls have all these weird traditions and one of them is the revolting jacket Rosie has on here, for coming first in the group. Each of the girls attaches something to it that is meaningful to them. Not sure why condoms were attached!!!.
Betty came to stay for a month, which she thoroughly enjoys. She gets around with her walker or with some other aid. Rosie had her out gardening and doing general clean up work around the house. Must keep her active. Betty loves Vegas and will happily sit with him for hours.
One of our guests bought their staffy puppy down to play with Vegas and it was amazing to watch the puppy jump all over Vegas, bite his ears and generally annoy Vegas. All Vegas did was shake his head occasionally and send the puppy flying.
Daen and Sophie came over for Christmas breakfast and Sophie was able to pick up the motor bike that Daen had bought her as a present. Sophie liked it, but couldn’t really see why he bought it. They had a bit of fun learning to ride it around the property and Sophie quickly became very good with the bike.
Bruce’s project for the Summer holiday was to redo the front garden. He pulled out all the railway posts that were retaining the garden (most were rotted) and then took out all the overgrown or dead plants. He then lay the foundations for a limestone block retaining wall. It was a huge task given how heavy the block were, but in the end it all looked very good.
Towards the very end of the year, there was an out of control fire on the coast that swept through Prevelly. In the photo, our Beach House is somewhere in the middle of the smoke. The police set up a road block on the corner of Wallcliffe and Devon, where we live. It meant that if we left our rural property, we wouldn’t be allowed back in. Daen tried to drive over to visit us and got turned back at the corner. He just went back 50m and then came in the back way.
Dave and Barbara came over to our house since they lived just around the corner. We sat outside drinking wine and waiting to see if we would be evacuated. We did have a problem that Dave, Barbara and Bruce wouldn’t have been able to drive, but we had Rosie to get us out.
As it turned out, we were lucky and the Beach House had no damage. 20 other houses burned down in the area and you could see where the fire burnt up to the fence lines around us.
