The Gramps

Last week Joel, his family and I trekked over to Halls Gap in the beautiful Grampians. I was concerned beforehand that I would feel a bit overwhelmed and under-spaced but the weather was so incredibly cold and rainy that even though I had to work up the courage to leave the warmth of the fire for the ice of the almost outside toilet I did ok.

All the girls (Rachel, Rachel and Rosemary!) had bought some craft to do and some books to read. I used the scarf I'm knitting to teach Rach how to knit and Rosemary whipped up a jumper on her sewing machine in an afternoon. I read one whole book and started another which I finished yesterday. We watched a few movies and used lines from them in all our conversations until we can't get them out of heads. (Anyone know which movie this comes from? "I'm in the garden... with Colin..." or this one? "your mouth is writing cheques that your body can't cash.")

The boys managed to find enough rain free time to make fire sized logs out of a fallen tree with an axe (and later a chainsaw that Steven bought back). Joel found a little house for sale and drew plans to renovate the outside of it. Daniel gave his car a service in the rain and Andrew almost went for a bike ride.

On the one morning that there was sun we played a challenging game of mini golf on the hardest mini golf course ever. I did... well, I took lots of pictures! I think Steven won overall.

On the last morning, after we'd packed up, we headed to Mt William for the 2k hike straight up to see the snow at the top. Joel and I were incredibly grateful for our purchase of gloves a few days before in Stawell. Quite honestly though the snow was not really worth the walk but I did feel like I deserved the huge lunch I ate at the pub aftwerwards!

And now, tomorrow, I'm off up to Brisbane for two weeks to spend time with my family and Belinda and her baby Thea.

First - I have to re pack everything I just unpacked and washed!