May 10, 2015

Destination Merredin 2015 Wartime in the Wheatbelt   The Destination Merredin crew from the Shire of Merredin have done it again. They have pulled off another remarkable 4 day event for our entertainment with the theme ‘Wartime in the Wheatbelt’ and combined it with Mother’s day celebrations. It started on Thursday with kite making workshops from the kiteman Michael Alvares of Kite Kinetics  who has joined us for the past two years and Friday night was a return of the diggers dinner at the Grandstand bar. Our local hockey club catered for this dinner. Saturday at noon the main street was closed, the tents went up, tables came out, the band played, dancers danced and a rationed lunch in the street was on. Jasmin from Crazy Fun Amusement Hire brought some giant chess games which the kids loved to play. William Last of Four Seasons lofts held a display to show the important role messenger pigeons played during the war. In fact one of the pigeons in the display is a direct descendant of pigeons that were used during the Second World War. Drew Zweck and Amy and Patrick Rose of Moorine Rock helped put the messages on the pigeons. 12 pigeons carried messages and were released to fly back to the barracks (home) and Sheree and William went to meet them. As they arrived, William took the messages from the pigeons and Sheree text the messages to Anthony Tilli who read them out to the rationed diners who were delighted with the messages back in town. A fashion parade hosted by Kirsty Mackenzie featured beautiful dresses and outfits with the war time theme. The outfits worn by the Destination Merredin crew were all made by Kirsty. A quick dash home, shower and get ready for the night of your life. Dine and Dance at the Cummins Theatre was a real treat. The tables had been set up beautifully by “I’ll make it” I wanted to mention this in particular because the table centerpieces were stunning but easily made and simple which I thought was exactly how things were done during the tough Wartime. The Military band was one of the very best bands I’ve...

Apr 27, 2015

ANZAC Day 2015 A brilliant day in town, starting with an early morning rise to get to the dawn service. The service was awe inspiring. I usually go to the mid morning march but I thought because this was a super special ANZAC day I would get out of bed and join the early one. It was cold, the gentle breeze was almost icy and I was tempted at that stage to run back to my warm bed, but when the march started I quickly filled with anticipation. The military cars and the firies, police and returned servicemen proudly marched and then the cadets and the crowd followed at the end of the line. I wanted some photo’s of the ceremony for this post but I was really struggling to get through the crowd. There was at least 600 people attending this march. The service was beautiful, wreaths were laid, the last post was played loud and clear and then a respectful minutes silence…just perfect. All the while, the army cadets stood with the flags and didn’t move. Well done cadets, you must have been really cold. Straight after the service the fire brigade had cooked some bacon, sausage and poached eggs for us all together with a nice hot coffee. Everyone was in the spirit of things at this point and you felt ready to attend the next service which was equally as emotional. Once again they served us a light lunch afterwards of tea, coffee and sandwiches and then on to the variety show called Entertaining the Troops. At the show we were treated to local talents singing, dancing and entertaining us and they put on a superb show. Through marches, entertaining us, feeding us, photographing us, making and planting poppies, every member of our community was involved in ANZAC day Lest we...