As Christmas approached, we took short trips to see how my arm (and pelvis) would cope. All good albeit a little uncomfortable. Christmas gave us the opportunity to visit our caravan for a couple of days and enjoy most of the family; our family Christmas get together was at Nathan and Vanessa’s place and it was a happy time. We met our newest great granddaughter, Trinity, and also said hello to Nathan’s new baby llama, Oris. It was a lovely weekend of quiet celebration.
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| View from the distillery |
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| Viewed across the vinyard the house blends beautifully |
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| Oris born September |
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| Great grandpa with our newest great greanddaughterm, Trinity |
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| Two pretty poppets - great grandaighters Taylor and Lily |
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| Flying to Perth with arm well supported (but still uncomfortable) |
The year that had started out badly with our twin crash-landing at the beginning of January ended on a sombre and sad note – the year was cursed from the beginning. A week after our family Christmas party, we were flying to Perth. Lindsay’s brother-in-law Murray died after being hospitalised for a few weeks. We arrived in time for the funeral and like most funerals it was a time of family closing ranks and supporting each other. But in line with this dark year, a couple of days later Kerry, Lindsay’s sister and wife of Murray (who had just died), went into hospital to have stents put in some of her coronary vessels. She was beside herself as you can imagine and just wanted to be home to grieve. We spent most of the rest of that week in the hospital with Kerry. They released her the day before we were due to fly home.
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| Our trustee fig tree which had been pruned to within an inch of its life gifted us luscious fruit |
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| Banks of beautiful colour |
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| Our garden, our greeb barrier to the world, sustains us |
We spent Christmas day with Anne-Marie and family and then hid away for the rest of this disastrous year. There were however a few highlights in what had been a year of death, horrible accidents and cancelled travel plans (India and Antarctica). We were blessed with a new great granddaughter, and we did enjoy our explorations through thirteen countries from Singapore to London (it should have been 16 but our journey was cruelly cut short by a few days!). The year felt as if in some way time had been combed the wrong way – we simply couldn’t get on top of it. BUT next year is bound to be considerably better.
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| Merry Christmas. This year our lights didn't involve climbing! |
