Everything was ticking along swimmingly...

 As should be expected, the unexpected happened

Hosting a horticulture team, a home coming, baking success and failure, upgrades underway and some unhelpful appliances! We've had a bit of everything over the past few weeks...

We hosted a group of seventeen horticulture researchers for four days and they were a delight. They enjoyed their stay and were comfortable in the building needing little from us aside from the usual breakfast, cookie jar and housekeeping of communal areas. All chores done by early afternoon. Nice.

I have spent my afternoons baking at a leisurely and curious pace. Three new recipes were developed.

Cherry slice
Apple pie - the best ever
Milk bread - a fortunate accident!

Gareth, had a plan for his weekend to paint feature walls and install shelves in the cabin block rooms that will be home to 6 wine makers in just a few weeks time. 

Fiona came home! Fiona is a Toadie from Scotland. Her son stayed with us years ago as a backpacker while sorting his immigration to become a new New Zealander.  Thankfully he has his own flat now. As truly lovely as it was to have Marc in the house, his remarkably good, renditions of Frank Sinatra at 3am are not forgotten or missed.  Fiona has visited Marc a few times over the years and we always look forward to her stays. 

We hosted a welcome home dinner for Fiona. A wonderful feast with lots of catching up chatter. We were joined by an Australian couple who have been short-term foster parents to about 15 kids over the past 10 years. Such a rewarding life choice! I take my hat off to them. Not a job I could do.

Saturday night L.A.B played. The whole hostel had tickets, except us. We realized in the early evening that everyone was out. Our work is done. Let's go out! A few drinks and catch-up with The Gov' next door at The Cabana.   Then without a single thought for the amount of work we had scheduled for Sunday, we hired Beam Scooters and headed over the hill...and danced the night away.

 And then...

Remember the resilience and  flexibility skills from my last post? ...especially needed if one is a little dusty from the night before....within 4 hours we discovered

- the dishwasher resigned. No warning. Just quit and stomped it's skills out of service.

- one of the hot water cylinders is leaking. At this stage it's a  non life threatening bleed. Which could turn into a severed artery at any given moment.

- the paint for the new upgraded colour was fine until we got a bulk lot tinted - now needing two coats not one. Cost estimates shot through.

So the plan has been tweaked. A new dishwasher purchased - making a good month financially, back to an OK one. Research into a new hot water cylinder is underway and a cross-fingers approach to fitting this cost into next month before things really go south.

The paint...re-calculated and resigned to having to purchase the more expensive paint to reduce having to paint twice - thus saving time and product. Time being the more important factor.

Thus the expected, unexpected happened. We laughed our way through tweaking the plan. 

Humor really is essential. 

My new plan includes finding funds for appliances that resign without notice! Rude!

In the kitchen 

The star dish this week was without a doubt the cherry tart. A light base topped with berry's and nuts. The fresh cherries were a gift from the Australian couple so I made them the hero of a tasty and delicate tart.   Another winner was the apple pie made with baked apples and a new pastry recipe.

From the ashes of error a new bread was discovered. Being a bit dusty on Sunday I loaded the bread maker intending to make a dough for scrolls but hit the wrong button. The beadmaker baked the mix and thus a lovely soft white loaf was born.

Coming up

Our favorite festival, Art Deco, is only weeks away. We're starting to plan for our in-house event. For winter deco we did a Peaky Blinders dinner.  

Summer event suggestions are:

A bigger and better Peaky Blinders - Let's open the Garrison and find a Grace to sing!

A Great Depression Dinner - we ditch the glam and get simple and coal smeared.

A Pajama Party - nightwear fashion,  candle sticks and a late night super.

Put your vote in the comments....and book a room.

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A story from days gone by...

This is what a 4 year old looks like after spending the afternoon with backpackers.

It actually started with a fun-run. A bunch of us decided to enter. 10k I think.

One guest declared that running was 'not my thing' but she agreed to come along anyway. We, of course were not at all in the running for any place prizes But, our non-runner got a spot prize! We all felt victorious.

The prize was a set of glass fish plates. Six of them. Shaped like a fish the size of a standard dinner plate. 

Backpackers are often creative people. Adventurous and curious, certainly inventive in all sorts of ways - particularly when it comes to saving money. or at least, making a budget streeeetch for as long as possible.

So the creative crew came up with An Art Installation. Let's paint the dishes and create a wee school of fish swimming across an otherwise un-interesting wall of the office. Perfect! I had a bunch of paints from test pots. I gathered all I had and dumped it on the picnic table. There you go! Music on,,,a fun afternoon in the sun for six guests.

I went off to do hostel chores.

Jacob didn't have a fish to paint, so he improvised...and no-one thought to stop him. Everything from water color to fence paint. He was covered from head to toe!

After admiring his skin-of-many-colours I put him in the shower.

What a great place to grow up!