We did it.
My Dad has been well and truly toasted (but not too badly roasted) at his 'almost 70' soiree at Granite Glen house. It kind of turned into a weekend-long event. The first guests arrived Friday night and I waved the last of my visitors off yesterday afternoon.
But on Saturday it was 'four-wheel-drive central'.
We had about 60 of Dad's mates and rellies to mark this milestone, and the relaxed lunch was perfect for his preferred form of celebration: a good steak and scotch with friends and family. 
D'ya like the groovy (and appropriate) serviettes I picked up in Big Town last week?
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There was laughter, there was eating (oh my, the eating!), there were tears (mostly from the assorted visiting babies although one or two may or may not have been mine during the speeches).
This is Dad with neighbours Bill and Clair.
They are the most wonderful couple who lived across the river from us for many decades. They raised nine children (despite being initially told they couldn't have kids) and seem exactly the same to me as they did when I visited them with the measles when I was 10. They have retired into town and their son (the one I went to school with) now runs the property. Dad made a sweet speech and it included acknowledgement of the importance of great neighbours in the bush - he was looking right at this pair when he said it.
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The atmosphere was wonderful... I found it a little hectic but I could feel and hear the relaxed conversation around me as I brought food to the hordes.
When you are hosting something like this, it is easy to get overwhelmed with preparations and feeding people and stuff. This kind of thing is a group effort. And luckily I just happen to have the best support network in the country - including the bunch below.
Have they not got the most beautiful smiles you have ever laid eyes on?
That's
Pea on the left - she baked up a storm, delivered a table and a heap of chairs and cleared most of the debris for me at night. As Dad would say: Her Blood Is Worth Bottling. Then there is darling Elle - she and her family travelled hours to attend (her hubs Harv worked with Dad when he was a teenager and they share a great respect for each other), she entertained and laughed and helped me unwind at the end of the day (with a Baileys and by recording the Bush Babe
train wreck - see last pic of this post!). Then there is
Bon Bon, the incredibly stylish woman married to Dad's baby brother (
is anyone allowed to look that good over 30?) as well as being a great neighbour and friend and lending me tables at the very last minute when I hit the panic button. And then there is Megs (P's daughter) who shares the long end of the bus run with my Dash - she was the only girl there her age, but who happily mingled with adults
and monitored little kids as required. And she is beautiful.
Nuff said.
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I also had my mother who worked her tiny butt off helping with the garden and getting food ready (as well as hauling the laundry shed back from disaster), providing the gazillion extra wine glasses required by the hordes and cleaning up quietly as her daughter collapsed on the couch. And let's not forget my sister who baked her little socks off - the smorgasbord of bread she provided was amazing. Sorry I didn't get a shot of it all Jeanie! And of course there is my hubby... who cooked a mountain of fillet steaks and moreton bay bugs without complaint, not to mention putting up with being handed a frightening 'Honey Do' list a couple of days prior to the event. Even Dad had to help chip the tennis court, tidy up the shed and nail up a "Please Slow Down" sign on an ironbark tree to prevent guests drowning in dust.
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And of course there was my sister-in-law Curly, who took on the mountain of washing up despite her advancing pregnancy (notice how I didn't mention the step required for my high benches, C?) and the lovely Kay and Shell, who helped her. And my gorgeous cousin Bee who not only took on balloon duties, but also camera duties at speech time (and did an awesome job!). There were others too... in fact, I am trying hard to recall what I actually did for the event! I seem to have blocked it all out...
All this work made us a little thirsty.
Now I don't wish to give the impression that we are a bunch of alcoholics, but I have to say that our crowd does enjoy the odd scotch and dry (
hello Dad) or the odd cold beer (
hello Tex) or the odd
Bundy and coke (
hello there hubby o' mine!). And I have already confessed to a certain leaning towards a glass of chardonnay on special occasions (like dinner). And besides, we were toasting the continued health of my father on the weekend, and let me tell you, the man needs all the assistance he can get in that department (as previously explained
here)!
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The men had a lot of toasts to make apparently, if the low levels recorded in the rum bottles strewn around my patio yesterday morning. I suspect all that pool playing and tall-tale-telling was hard and thirsty work. Elle and I managed to make a couple of private toasts (after everyone else had fallen by the wayside/fallen asleep on the couch) with a dash of Baileys.
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Actually if the Baileys people are ever looking to sponsor a blog, I would be the first with my hand up. I may fall asleep within minutes of the second dash, but those are a couple of FINE minutes. Actually Elle grabbed my camera and recorded the fine-
ness of it all here:
Something tells me I could be waiting quite a while
for that call from the Baileys' people.
Roos and Emus... 
