Back to Broadford

This Saturday was the annual family reunion held in Broadford (for my mum's side of the family). Regrettably other events such as going out, sleeping and as I recall even a 'dusk till dawn' at The LAN Mine have resulted in this reunion being the first I have attended (at least as an adult). The man was dragged along to finally meet some of my extended family and despite being up until 2am having "a non-verbal argument" over the intricacies of icing a sponge cake he seemed happy enough to be there.

It had obviously been awhile since I had seen that side of my family because a boy walked past and I thought "gee he looks like Andrew, but Andrew isn't here and he should be a lot older anyway"..and I turns out this "boy" was Benjamin who my sister and cousin and I looked after when he was about three....weird. Some other guy who I just presumed was one of my cousins boyfriends turned out to be a cousin of mine who I hadn't seen since he was about 7 or 8.

Much ribbing about joining a family of tax office employees took place which was to be expected!

After I had eaten some lunch I strolled out to investigate the cricket game going on. After discovering I have literally forgotten how to throw a ball (I hung my head in shame a couple of times)..I got my eye in a tiny weeny bit (I'm pretty sure I still looked...uncoordinated).
Having done my time "fielding" (if you could call it that) I got called into bat. I won't lie...I did ok. My cousin Matt and I had what we "reckoned" to be the "longest partnership in backyard cricket history" strolling up and down the pitch while we smacked the ball around the park (apparently I was "carting" them). Eventually I retired by tipping the ball to my younger cousin, fielded for a little while and then sauntered back over to the rest of the family. Somehow I scored the nickname of "Ricky"...but it was a lot of fun.

The afternoon finished with compliments on the sponge cake and chocolate roll (yay!) and then someone (maybe it was me) threw ONE little piece of ice at someone and then all of a sudden there was ice and water flying everywhere. My uncle busted out the water filled fire extinguisher and then the fun really began. For some reason all the kids ganged up on the man who up until that point had been very quiet but was now wrestling with 3 kids/young adults wielding cups of ice. I think just about everyone bar my nan ended up with a cup of ice down their back (which wasn't altogether unpleasant given the temperature). How my nan managed to escape I don't know but I did turn around at some stage and she had her fists up so I can only assume she threatened some form of violence or more photos...the truth remains to be seen.

It was a lot of fun and the man and I both agreed we would be back next year.

- Jen