40th Birthday Party Help needed

It is DH and my 40th bday in july and aug and we wish to combine a house warming with that...can anybody help with ideas please????

Im prob thinking a BBQ here at home with friends from here and away. My dilemma is the ones that come from away need to find accomodation and then buy a gift (if they wish, we arent too fussed about gifts but if any one wanted to then vouchers would be most welcome) would this be tacky to write on the invite.

I dont want people to go to too much expense esp ones travelling. Unfortunately there isnt enough room here for all of them....although some room can be swung for 4 couples to sleep here and we can pop the kids in big tents under the big shed...would that be ok do you think.....

For the local guys i was thinking of asking them to bring a plate......maybe some to bring savoury and some to bring sweets?? Can anyone else shed some more light or give me some more ideas,,,,and would these options be okay????

Thanks in advance.

PLEASE dont be shy sharing ideas and tips,,,,,,ive never done this before and any help is appreciated
Char

Challenge at ScrapBoutique

We were set a non scrapping challenge at scrap boutique this morning so i donned my trusty thongs (or flipflops for the non Aussies)and wandered about the property looking for some Red, Blue, Brown and Yellow things to photograph.

I didnt want to do the usual stuff hence the thong donning and wandering. It is amazing what grabs your eye as you wander about. Im hoping that you enjoy seeing what i have photgraphed for you all.

Okay on with the Red Choices

1 the International tractor

2 a close up of the tractor

3 a closeup of a seeder machine here on the property, also used the wheel as part of my yellow challenge.

So browse on down thru my blog and check out the other pics ive added.

Thanks for stopping by

charxx

Yellow Post

Here are my yellow items of choice.

1 Pears still hanging on the tree

2 a wheel to a seeding machine that is here on the block

3 afron, cherry picker or hydraplat depending on where you live. We usethis to reach fruit in the larger trees.

4 dried pears ready to go to the processing shed to be packed for the supermarkets. Look for Angas Park Brand and you will find our produce:)

Brown Post

Here are my brown choices for the challenge.

1 & 2 are photos of our sultana vines....we had to turn the water off on them this year to save it for crops that would give us a higher return.

3 is one of our brand new chickens we got yesterday...

Blue Post!

Here are my blue choices.

1 The kids made blue pancakes for brekky this morning,,,how could i ignore that photo op!

2 & 4 Abstract shots of our disc blades used to disc up weeds.

3 DH wanted me to take a pic of his irrigation valve

5 Blue gum leaves on our property line

Its raining!!!!!!

It hardly ever rains here........to think 2 weeks ago it was 42 degrees....when they say it will rain here we never believe them!

The boys are going to get wet and cold, they have gone for a bike ride and i dont think either of them have credit LOL

In one of the shots you can see the girls on the motorbike at the end of the row.

First pic is looking over to the cemetary, second is straight out of my front door and third is looking towards the end of the block.

Thanks Krissy the rain dance must have worked:)

Our new babies

Here are the new additions to our family! Yes i know they are ugly and have no feathers and yes we do feel sorry for them but in no time they will be covered in feathers and be so tame their little cages will be a thing of the past!

They wont replace our babies we lost to the dog attack but they will sure will fill the pen:)

The kids have picked their faves and one has earnt the name vulture cause it has a long neck and a big tufty tail......hahaha. I will upload singular pics later on:)

Have a great Saturday!

Should have done this post first LOL

The first pic is one of our pear trees and as you can see they had quite alot of fruit on them...all in all it has been a good year for the pears.

Second Pc is Dh on the afron picking the tops of the trees, these bigger trees were here before MIL brought the property on 1956...so they are very old trees.

Pic three are pears in *sweat boxes* after coming out of the coolroom. We pick them green, they go into the coolroom for 7 days and then sit in the shed for another 7-10 days to ripen.

Pic four is a stack of trays cut and ready to be put into the sulphur tent to be sulphured.
They get about 72 hours of sitting in our sulphur tent and being sulphured then we stack them singularly on pallets....see how there are two trays side by side,,,well we will split them and put just one stack (of 25) per new pallet. So instead of one stack of 50 on one pallet there will be two stacks of 25 on two pallets)

Hope you liked this information.
I am going down later and will take photos of the stacks drying and some that we have scraped off into bins ready to take to Angas Park fr processing.....stay tuned
char......now im off to scrap:)

Pear Photos for those interested

Okay i shall post them and then title them after:)

Wow that worked! Thankyou to Zoe for being the model here:)

We use a triangular shaped knife as you can see. You put the pear with the calyx towards you...(the end bit) put your hands on either side of the pear and push down and away from you slightly very gently.

The calyx part falls into the bucket to be thrown later and you place the pear on the tray which we work on in stacks...

You need to be careful as the knives are very sharp and many a time you get skun oh so very slightly but it stings like mad!

Am going to post again about the picking bit of it...stay tuned and i shall see if blogger will play now!

We are in!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We have been at the new house for one week today and how fast has that gone!

We have been SO busy im not even going to try to recap what we have been up to.

I will however post some pics but these were taken before we moved in and i shall post new ones shortly as i go:)

The kids have been amazing, DH is absolutley loving this place and i find myself smiling at odd moments when i see him on the tractor or the kids driving around in their ute:)

And as for myself, i too am happy, i am implementing a no junk, and clean up as you go policy at this house and it is working! It includes telling DH to pick up the bath mat and hang it just so LOL.....well it is me that has to do it other wise and he may as well learn how i want it done haha.

DH and i went to the old house on Monday to get some more stuff and u fortunately found four of our five pet chickens dead:( Some dog had gotten in to the yard and killed them,,,,,to say we were upset was an understatement!

The survivor is here and she is doing very well.....and actually she has company! DS and friend brought *frederick* home for her as company. He is the ugliest chicken....and im betting it will be a rooster, he just has that look about him LOL...i must take photos of him. He is soon to be very tame!

The boys are building their pen at the moment. DD has a friend visiting and i have taken 5 mins as i have been on the go since 7.15 this morning...that job was scrubing floor tiles by hand:) Easier than using the mop and i wanted to see if the brown was part of the tile or not.....ummm nope it wasnt LOL

Anyway im going to go for now have to drop the friend home andorganise some tea i guess....im very tired i would love to scrap but all my stuff and i mean ALL of it is in the shed...and my scrap room is full of crap...need to do a fair bit of sorting out before i can get into my room:)

I also have my sister and her 5 kids coming tommorrow so i wanted to do some baking to feed the hungry hoards...not much food at this place at the moment:)

Happy Easter stay safe and have fun!

First pic...part of kids bathroom it is a 3 way one)

Second...kitchen

third ....will be my scrap room

fourth.... dining off from the kitchen

fifth....lounge and down hallway heading down to bedrooms, bathrooms and laundrey.