Oh What a weekend. On Saturday we celebrated Kate's 30th Birthday. Kate is my middle sister, one of three that I've been lucky enough to grow up with! She shared the party with a school friend, they had invited loads of people from all over the place, we had around 150 people turn up to the barn. The theme was Frisky summer fate. The girls did an excellent job of theming the Barn, and the yard in a summer fate style. There was bunting everywhere, along with stalls for tea and cake Jelly and Ice cream, skittles and splat the rat. Most of the guests turned up in fancy dress of some kind from vicars, to WI, and for a while we even had the only gay in the village, which proved a bit of an eye opener!

The Finishing touch however was the catering this was done by my younger sister Victoria who is studying at a fancy catering school in London, and me. The only thing I'm good for is a roast so it fell upon me to cook a roast for 150 people while Vicky to charge in the kitchen on all the green stuff! I discovered the only way to cook a roast for 150 people is on a spit, so that's what I did. I'd built a spit roasting kit for the Hannington country fair last summer so I used that. This is not just any ordinary kit this one is massive I reckon that I could cook 6 lambs on it, and with a bit more welding I could do 12. I was looking forward to doing this as its proper natural instinct cooking with fire to play with and whole animals to cook and carve up. In the end we cooked a lamb and two deer all locally sourced and well hung to get the best from the meat. When it came to serving the food it was too dark to do outside so me and Bandy (Kate's boy friend who was helping me) carried the meat into the barn and carved it up. It looked amazing the DJ played the meat in with "I've got a brand new combine harvester", then he arranged the lighting so that all the food was lit up, the guests just stood back in amazement.

After the food came the dancing and drinking. I had been of to my beer supplier and brought a cask of ale which we ran through the beer pumps on the bar, and we'd set up a water trough so that all the guest could put their drinks in to keep them cool. The DJ had an amazing light rig which worked really well on the white wall of the barn. The dancing carried on till 5 or 6 o'clock. Then came the shock of the big clear up the next day luckily there were plenty of people around to help and the barn was back in order in no time (it didn't feel like that at the time though).

At the same time we had two groups of people using the estate for their walks, firstly was the RSPCA Charity walk on Saturday which apparently was a huge success. Then on Sunday there was the Rogation walk which went around the Hannington parish. I love it when the estate gets enjoyed by so many people, it really make it all worth it.

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As Promised on my wedding invite here are some of the local B & B's

The White Hart Inn, Charter Alley, Tadley RG26 5QA

http://www.whitehartcharteralley.com/ Tel. 01256 850 048. Tell Carol its for our wedding when you book because they'll do us a special price, 7 rooms left.

The Swan Hotel, Kingsclere, RG25 5ST Tel.01635 298 314. The swan have also said they would put room aside for us so make sure that you let them know it our wedding your going to! www.swankingsclere.co.uk

Cleeves Guest House Sherbone St John Basingstoke RG24 9LF. Tel 01256 855055 www.basingstokeguesthouse.co.uk

The Carpenters Arms, Burghclere Newbury RG20 9JY  Tel. 01635 278251 http://www.carpentersarmsburghclere.co.uk/

Apollp Classic Hotel, Basingstoke RG24 9NU Tel. 01256 796700 www.apollohotels.com

This is just a collection I'm sure there's loads others about

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On Thursday we did something that I recon every farm should do. We got the whole family together and talked about our business. We discussed for a short while what has been going on in the last 12 months since our last family meeting, and then spent the rest of the time discussing the future. We didn't really dwell on tiny details instead Dad and I gave an overview of what we would like to achieve. When I think about the future in business terms I like to split it into 3 groups short term, medium term and long term. With my short term plans I can be more specific with the details, and time-lines, I put things that are going to happen in the next 12 months in this category.

The medium (next 5 years) and long(5+ years) term items are far less specific, but I still think that they are really important to talk about because it gives everybody a clear idea of where we are aiming to get to. Talking about the longer term aspirations for the business in a meeting like this is really good for me because it brinks the focus back away from the every day problems and onto the bigger picture. It helps to remind me why I'm doing all of this.

This meeting was one of our quarterly board meetings that we have. These meetings are the most valuable things that we do in the business. I remember as a child we used to call them boring meetings because all these exciting people would turn up at home for lunch but never stop and chat to us, they were always to busy talking grown up stuff. However now that I'm involved in these meetings I find them great. We have a great team of directors bringing in their knowledge and experience from out side the business, and asking some proper questions like why? It makes Dad and I think  a lot about the decisions we make, because we know there's always the chance we will have to answer one of these why questions. The bit I really look forward to in our meetings is the any other business right at the end, because it's a great opportunity to drop the odd bombshell out of the bloom. Most of the time any other business is used for things that have come up since the agenda has been sent out, but I like to use it to introduce new items to discuss at the next meeting as well.

Any other business?

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Finally its my turn (if you reckon I've got any of this stuff wrong then please add your comments)

I am engaged to the lovely Sharon aka Shaznee, we are getting married this summer and we will return from our honeymoon ready to go straight into harvest. Sharon and I met at a young farmers do a couple of years ago, where she fell for my boyish good looks and natural charm.

I have been back on the farm full time for 5 years now. I studied at Harper Adams University college, where I got a degree in agriculture with marketing. I got this degree following a more practical route than usual instead of doing A levels, then going to University. My agricultural education started when I was 13 I went to Brymore school in Somerset (see link from this website) which is a school based around all things rural and there was a farm which all the students were involved with, having to take turns at feeding the pigs, chickens, beef or sheep or milking the cows in the mornings before school, and again in the evening. I left Brymore with my GCSE's intact including one for agriculture and horticulture, then went onto Berkshire college of Agriculture. When I went to Berkshire, I was too young to go straight on to the National diploma course so I spent a year doing an NVQ and 1st diploma in agricultural engineering. The middle year of the NDA was an experience year so I took myself of to New Zealand on an exchange program with the Jersey Cattle Society, and stayed with some really good people out there, many of whom I'm still in contact with. I also went to Australia and worked on a massive 250000 acre station in New South Wales. After Berkshire i went to Harper, and started a Higher National diploma, this was supposed to be a 3 year course but because of my previous studies i was able to do it in 1 year. I then took 18 months out and did some more work experience I tried a spot of office work near London for 3 months where I enjoyed 1 1/2 hour journey to and from work! I also went to America to do the 2000 mile harvest, which was a great and interesting experience. I managed to fit some time in South America in while I was there too before coming back and topping up to a degree which I did in 18 months.

When not working or sleeping I sometimes manage to fit in other stuff I enjoy sailing Dad's boat which he keeps on the river Hamble, I'd like to go skiing every year but it doesnt always happen, and I do a wee bit of shooting in the winter months.

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