community

One of the wonderful things about living at Timbertop is the fantastic community of people that we live amongst. As well as the very talented and energetic members of staff, there are the partners and children of staff, who also live here on campus. We partners tend to rely quite heavily on each other for company and for support, particularly on weekends when our spouses are working. There is certainly no need to feel lonely - if you want to find someone to talk to you only need to step out for a walk or pick up the phone.

Over the past two years we have taken to holding a playgroup at someone's home on a Sunday morning. We all turn up for morning tea, a craft activity and a play, organised by whoever feels like doing it that week. Now, speaking of creative friends, our friend Sue, today organised a Christmas Card making activity at her place for all the kids. The Christmas cards are then available for anyone on campus to purchase and the funds go to the school's sponsor child.

The children loved it and made lots of cards. Once they had had enough of that they all went off to eat home cooked muffins for morning tea and played discos in the bedroom. Then the Mums enjoyed making some cards too as well as coffee and chats. We even discussed how lucky we feel to have the support and friendship of one another - it's a big reason why we continue to be happy here.

The newest member of the community, baby Serena, is one of the major attractions when we all get together. She gets passed around for lots of cuddles...

Which provides her Mum, Marina, with a little break...

The Dad of the house popped in for a shower after the 'King of the Mountain' run up Mt Buller and couldn't resist a Teddy cuddle...

Even Teddy made some Christmas cards...

Somehow I missed getting photos of the other kids so here are some of other playgroups we've held. On this day we had a puppet show...

And then there was the time we had a lunch of chicken noodle soup (the Chinese believe that eating noodles on your birthday will bring you a long life) for Lori's birthday. It felt quite decadent for all of us and Lori said it was the first birthday party she had had.

Being thrown together in a somewhat isolated community gives us the opportunity to become friends with a wide variety of people whom we may not otherwise have had the opportunity to meet or get to know well and to learn to appreciate everyone's strengths and differences.