Chestnut Festival

Last year we wandered down to the chestnut festival at Kalorama Reserve because it was close and we could walk there. Also it was to check it out and hopefully the kids would have a good time.

After much organising by Kirsten, this year we had a stall for the Sherbrooke Community School. Kirsten and Andrew spent some time the night before setting up the gazebo.

In the morning Kirsten and I went down to the reserve and dropped off all the bits and pieces. I had to run away to do some last minute printing of fliers. I headed down to the office works in Chirnside Park only to find that SP Ausnet were replacing a transformer and the shop was shut on account of no electricity. The next stop was Ringwood. This was open and I was able to do my printing. I used the self serve. Apart from the painfully slow terminals and the bizarre limits on paying for the prepaid card, it all went smoothly.

Zooming back up the mountain, I found that a high school student and a primary school parent were helping Kirsten. Their assistance was enormously appreciated, particularly the twins, who helped all day. Thought I did not know they were twins until afterwards.

Later in the day others helped, including Rose and family. Sadly though only one teacher visited, I think the drama teacher. I was disappointed by the lack of appearance by the principal, teachers and staff for what is meant to be a community school visiting a community event.

Andrew brought the girls up in the morning and they seemed to quite enjoy it, though having a stall meant that it was a bit boring.

I returned from shopping after lunch. As there were no parking spots near by as there were cars parked from below the kalorama post office to about half way up the hill towards Fiveways, I left the car at home and rode the trike down to the show. That way I could park right behind out gazebo. Apart from one typical obnoxious woman worried about safety and Kirsten, who seems to just hate the trike, it was a hoot of a ride down the hill to the reserve. On the return trip I used some back streets, so there were more ups and downs. Having not riden much in the last 12 months it was a hard slog. But I made it up in good time.

Later in the day we packed up, managing to fit in what took three car loads to deliver into one car load to return it.

Finally, Kirsten ran a guess the chestnuts in a jar competition. The school provided the chestnuts, though strangely the jar of nuts was not the prize. The other twin and I counted the nuts by putting them into piles of 10, counting these and adding the remainder. The final total was 415 nuts.

All in all I think the stall went very well.