BLESSED SPEEDY

Restumping is done and dusted - well not really dusted as the whole house is truly filthy and full of dust which I think will take me quite some time to get rid of but not complaining.  At the worst part the house had to be raised 4 inches which is a lot so shows how bad things had got.  We can even shut doors now and even the kitchen cupboards shut - such luxury!  As can be seen in the photo of the front of the house its all nice and straight now - at the back door (which is the one we use all the time) two huge pieces had to be cut out of the concrete so that access could be gained to two stumps - wonder how long before Gary gets around to replacing the concrete?  Im actually wondering about putting some outdoor tiles there as well - what do you think? Thank goodness that Red Cross was such a blessing to us and provided most of the $12,500 needed to do the job due to being flooded 12 months ago - now to just talk Gary into renovating - stay tuned!

Last night Gary, Megan and I were very honored to attend a dinner in Kerang for people that had been affected by the floods - and the guest of honour was none less than the Governor General Quentin Bryce and her husband Michael.  I was blessed and honoured to be asked to be Mr Bryces dinner companion, so we had nearly half an hour of "quality" time with him.  What a lovely and intelligent man - someone you could sit down and talk with for hours and hours and hours.  The Governor General was quite lovely as well and in her short "speech" (loose word as it was definately NOT prepared) she spoke of how touched and moved she was visiting our area and even had a tear in her eye as she spoken.  Truly a remarkable evening and one we will remember for a long time to come!

Well after what has seemed a very long time (well at least five weeks) it looks like the flood waters are receding.  We had actually got to the point of thinking that we would not be able to access our land that is under water this year for sowing crops etc but we have finally had some good news! Goulburn Murray Water has approved us to pull out our re-use plug so water from the flooded farm can run off and into the drains - hopefully a large amount of it will so that we can get onto the land and start cleaning up the mess, otherwise we will have nowhere to put our calving cows and young stock over winter. To pull out the plug was difficult and Gary had to swim in and with water well over his head - I watched and prayed that it went well and it did!

This morning at 7.30 am I was lucky enough to go up in a light plane and fly over the local flood affected areas. SO much water, destruction and heart ache to be seen, and its still going on. We now have water coming towards us from another direction, its swirling back on us, so we are by no means out of the woods yet. This photo is of our farm that is under water, and that is only a small portion of the huge amounts of water that are flooding our land at the moment.

Floods, floods, floods - we are sick and tired of them They are tiring, they are draining, they are extremely annoying and in our case they take a long, long time to come and go - not that I am asking for flash flooding, but I think you know what I mean. At this stage, our second farm (which is down the end of the road where our main farm is, around 2.5 kms) is completley under water.  Completely underwater means nearly 2 metres under water. The channel bank that is stopping that water from flowing down the hill to not just our farm and home but many others is still holding.  Some patching up has been done and the authorities have now changed their thoughts from evacuate! to cautiously optimistic. SO we are trying to be "normal" - well as normal as one can be a these times. Ive had my parents living here with me for the last week as they live in Kerang, which was evacuated and surrounded by water.  Today they are able to go home, which is fantastic for them. We w...

At the moment Australia is experiencing horrendous floods - and here in Victoria unfortunately we are not untouched.  We are on high alert for flooding here and its not looking good.  Today we spent the morning moving cattle for Gary's brother thru this water - chest height and scary stuff.  I am exhausted and just want to be "normal"