Melbourne Pettys

Ellen goes to Canberra, Marion and Calvin get work, we all head for Canberra for a wedding.

It has a very wet start to the month with a week of solid rain. There were lots of floods up north and in NSW.

Ellen flew off to Canberra on Thursday the first to visit with the Howe gang. Because it was so wet the plane couldn’t land so they flew back to Melbourne. She then had to wait around the airport until later in the day and they flew up again and managed to land. Ellen just stayed for the weekend and when she got back she said that there are so many of them that it was hard to around to them all. There are a lot of them that is for sure.

Calvin has got a job sharpening drill bits, good pay and long hours. Marion also got working selling stuff at the shopping centres. She didn’t like it so she gave it the flick and started working with Mahli in the factory.

Janet was over on the fourth and dropped off some goodies, she is off on holidays for six weeks with Johnny. They are going to Hawaii then Vancouver Canada then Oregon and San Diego.

Our stake hosted a YSA regional activity on Saturday the tenith. We had a movie night with a bunch of YouTube clips that Marion help put together that proceeded the movie. They were a laugh but the movie was really boring.

That night Carmen and Austin were invited over to the Parton’s place for a sleep over. It is not something that I was comfortable with however but since we were all going to the Caulfield Ward Conference the next day we let them go. I must be getting soft in my old age. They had a good time with what I call the A-List youth that were invited.

I went out with the missionaries while Carmen and Austin were in Mutual. We visited the Hicks place since I am trying to track down Maálo and William. They are proving hard to find but I will keep trying.

Ellen had her birthday, it was our Temple night and she wanted to go to the Temple so we did. She also wanted to attend institute so we went early and I waited in the car playing solitaire on her phone (that is set to Spanish). It was nice to spend some time with her.

We got a bunch of stuff from Auntie Em, clothes and the like. There were also some nice curtains so Ellen grabbed them and went and bought some paint to match. She came back with orange and purple, she painted one wall orange and one wall purple and I repainted the door. Vernice tailored the curtains and Carmen help paint when Ellen had to go out from the evening. It looks pretty good.

That day was also our twenty-fourth wedding anniversary. I had forgotten all about it so we went out for dinner up the road. I had better not forget next years.

Carmen was diagnosed with having a Pillonidul Sinus which is a condition where a hair follicle burrows itself under the skin usually in the region of your lower back and gets infected under the skin. It leaves a hole in the area and when the infection is rife it is excruciatingly painful and you get very sick. She has been on antibiotics but the only cure is by having it surgically removed. Carmen got this last year around the time that her play was on and she managed to get through it with antibiotics. Carmen manages to get all the diseases that no-one really hears of. We have been waiting since last year to have the surgery and on Thursday the twenty-second we got a call from the hospital to say that there was a cancellation on Friday morning and would she want to take it. Of course we jumped at it so at 7am she was there with Vern. She had the surgery around 11.30am and left the hospital about 7pm.

I went with Austin to pick up his Laptop from school, they are all being given one this year and will give them back when they finish school.

With President Dudfield away I had the opportunity to set Lauren Pitman apart for her mission on the twenty eight. He was away last week so I released Sam Stuart and set apart Alex Brown.

On Friday the thirtieth we headed up to Canberra for Auntie Ena’s wedding. We took the two cars since Vern, Marion and Ellen are staying the week. It was just Carmen in our car so she could lie down to take the pressure off her wound. If we a beautiful day, we stopped in Gundagai for dinner and had a bit of a look around.

The next day Austin and I when to have a look at the Mugga Mugga historic cottage but it was closed. Although he was disappointed he got over it pretty quickly and we went for a walk up Red Hill and Mt Davidson instead.

The wedding was nice, Carmen played the violin for the prelude and did a good job. The bride was late so she had to play for some time. Because she had just had her hair dyed blond some of her cousins didn’t recognised her and thought we had hired someone to play. The reception was out at Gold Creek. Vern organised the music and had Dave McDonald help out. Austin played his saxophone and also sang a Frank Sinatra song that when down well. Carmen also sang and did a great job and of course Vernice was a star like normal.