Pat

I first met Pat when we moved to Beaufort in the 1980s and she was teaching at the Beaufort Primary School.  Then we moved to Ballarat and kept in intermittent touch with her.  Later, in one of those random acts that life throws at you from time to time, she took a flat in Melbourne for weekday use, next door to the flat that my mother in law owned and which we used as a pied a terre when we were in town!  We've been friends for decades.  She's known Tabitha, Austin and Freyja since they were tiny.

So when she said that she was coming to the UK and could she come to stay for a few days we dusted off the spare room, made up the bed and Tabitha, Gareth and Cally arranged to come and pitch a tent on the lawn so that they could play too.  Freyja isn't back from California yet so couldn't come to play, and Austin, of course, is in Japan.  Skype, however, is a wonderful thing :-D

We've had lunch at The Nettle (who accommodated all of our various requirements with grace and good humour).  We had a Proper Sunday Breakfast, and a Proper Sunday Lunch.  It was showery yesterday but nothing that inconvenienced us!  Tabitha, Gareth and Cally have gone home now, but I've got this week off work so we are planning to head to Chatsworth to inspect the farm shop and to have a spot of lunch.  Tomorrow she moseys on down to Cambridge and goes home to Ballarat at the weekend.

It's been lovely to see her.  I think she should come again!

She claims that it's her 80th birthday this coming December, but I really don't think that that can be right!!

Click on Pat and Marlo to get to the Sunday photo album