Resting on Our Laurels 2010
We have had an interesting year with the boys travelling overseas and David and Anne enjoying a semi-retirement and indulging in the joys of living off the land.
David and Anne continue to work 2 days a week at Goulburn TAFE - Anne as a librarian and David as an ABE teacher. David also designs web sites, databases and permaculture gardens and performs as a solo musician.
Highlights of the year include the 2nd Bush Traditions Bundanoon Dance Weekend in June (now known simply as "Bunders") and the 5th Bush Traditions Gathering at Goulburn in October (the "Gathering"), both programmed by David and organised by a team of willing workers. David helped to launch a Goulburn Permaculture Group, ran an Introductory PC Course and hopes to run a Certificate course next year. He has also found time to participate at the National Folk Festival in Canberra, the Numeralla Folk Festival, conduct the Heritage Ensemble for the Heritage Ball in May and to perform at the Kangaroo Valley Folk Festival with the band Folk Lines. He has done guest spots at the Goulburn Conservatorium and been a guest speaker at the Marulan Garden Club. In his spare time he has been working on a collection of Australian traditional songs and dance music that promises to be a worthy successor to the popular Blue Book.
Anne had a complete left knee replacement in August and has been hobbling around ever since, enduring two physio sessions a week plus hydrotherapy and swimming at Solar Springs whenever possible. Anne's gardening activities have been seriously curtailed by the surgery but David can vouch for her eagerness to tell him what to do in the garden and where and when. She continues to entertain wild notions of becoming a writer and hopes to enter into writing competitions, having had some success in being short-listed in previous years. She has also resumed research on a project to document printed sources of nineteenth century Australian dance music.
David and Anne have both enjoyed music sessions at the Goulburn brewery and Bowral Folk Club. David and Anne have played with Paddy's River and other musicians for a variety of functions, including a medieval banquet, a lantern walk, background music at a retirement village, bush dances at Exeter, Canyonleigh, Penrose, Goulburn, Towrang and a 50/50 dance with the Crooked Corner Band at Crookwell. December marked the Anniversary of the band Southern Cross, founded by David 30 years ago, and past members of the band converged on Balmain High School for a celebratory Christmas dance.
On the farming front, our Welsummer hens proved to be terrible mothers and our beautiful rooster died suddenly. Queenie the pig continues to thrive, with an ever-increasing girth. David attended a two-day workshop with Joel Salatin, an inspiring alternative farmer, and is keen to put some of Salatin's ideas into practice in developing the farm and our food forest. We celebrated our 20th Winter at The Laurels this year with a feast prepared from over 20 different FRESH veggies and herbs from the garden (see the Post below for Sunday July 4, 2010).
On the farming front, our Welsummer hens proved to be terrible mothers and our beautiful rooster died suddenly. Queenie the pig continues to thrive, with an ever-increasing girth. David attended a two-day workshop with Joel Salatin, an inspiring alternative farmer, and is keen to put some of Salatin's ideas into practice in developing the farm and our food forest. We celebrated our 20th Winter at The Laurels this year with a feast prepared from over 20 different FRESH veggies and herbs from the garden (see the Post below for Sunday July 4, 2010).
We continue to plant and harvest the usual range of fruit and veggies, now scaled down to the needs of two people, and have had some success with a few less common plants such as Kale, Radicchio, Mangelwurtzel, Tomatillo, Pepino, Gooseberry, Golden Berry and Cape Gooseberry.
Summer sees a flury of activity, picking and processing fruit. The cicadas this year have been deafening but we now have a welcome respite from their fiendish crackling. The frogs are now getting impatient for the weather to warm up enough for them to indulge in their usual orgy of sexual frenzy.
James, inspired by his travels in Europe the previous year, has done two 3-month stints living and working in Japan. Phillip, who now goes by his official birth name of "Tatham", travelled to Canada in September and will stay on as long as games oriented computer-programming work is available. Andrew visited Thailand at the beginning of the year and is keen to do more travelling. The boys all came down to Penrose for a farewell bonfire before Tatham and James flew overseas.
David and Anne have plans to do some travelling of their own during January. James has agreed to house sit for the duration so we don't expect many raspberries will escape his expert foraging skills. David, Anne, James and Andrew will be getting together on Christmas Day. We are all missing Tatham and wish he could be with us for Christmas but know that he is keen to experience a white Christmas for a change.
Wishing everyone all the best for 2011
Pictured in the Seasons Greeting graphic at the top are (clockwise from top left): Cape Gooseberry, Red Currant, Dombrowski Plum, Tomatillo.
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