Highlights of my golfing year ...

Winter or the cooler months is when most club championship matches are played.  Ours being in June through August are all over and finished.  I had a couple of little successes which are always hard earned and greatly enjoyed.

  Last Saturday we held our presentations over a barbecue lunch.  It was a relaxing way to deal with something that is usually quite formal.

Don and I  were the nett runners up in the 27 hole foursome championship

Most of the tournaments are women's only but there is the occasional mixed match.  Don's usual playing partner was away touring so I ended up playing with him.  I was very apprehensive as he is a single digit golfer and I'm still very inconsistent with my game.  On the day we combined quite well.  He is an extremely straight hitter (unlike a lot of males) so he got us out of trouble a couple of times with my wayward shots but I putted really brilliantly so I redeemed myself in that department.  It turned out to be a lot of fun.

Marj and I were the gross runners-up  in the ladies championships over 27 holes

Marj and I are similarly rated with our handicaps so we are both as good or as bad as each other.  Marj is 80 years old and has only just started using a motorised cart.  She is very hard on herself and abuses her ball unmercifully.  Hope I can follow in her footsteps without all the grumbling ...

Yoey and I were respective nett winners of our grade in the single Stroke Club championships over 72 holes.  I was division 1 and Yooey for division 2.

This event is probably the toughest - it goes over 4 days so fairly demanding on the stamina and changing weather conditions so also testing different skills.  I find my fitness probably wins a large portion of this for me.  Anyway it was particularly gratifying cause it was my first season in Division 1 therefore I expected to not really achieve anything in the prize department.  However on the days I had some absolute blinders and erred only marginally.  I was really rapt cause I beat a lot of the "big girls".  Very satisfying!

Anyway I have a long way to go towards my golfing goals, last year my handicap was 22, this year it's down to 20.5 which I'm consistently playing to so that is largely gratifying as well.  My goal is to have a handicap of 18 which doesn't sound particularly great but unless I spend more time practising I think 18 is a realistic target for me.

A young notable award ... young Vance

One of those nice moments when the offspring shine ... a particularly proud time for Mum and Dad Poke to share the occasion with young Vance.

A very pretty Mum, clever Vance and gummy Kai

A group entry by Vance and some classmates contributed towards a winning entry in the Young Territory Authors Award for their school.  It was a collaborative effort with apparently Vance's efforts being in the illustrating department ( I reckon he was the brains behind it all).  If he is in anyway creatively-inclined, it's probably his dad's genes, a teensy-weensy bit of his mother and probably most of it is from Pops Peters.

Proud authors!

Whilst the school benefited financially, it's probably a very good feeling for the kids to know they are a little better in some way and pretty rewarding for parents too!  Well done group and especially Vance - good job.