Zoe's first Tarra Festival parade

Today was huge. Every Easter our local town, Yarram, celebrates the Tarra Festival and at its heart is the parade. Colourful floats representing just about every facet of community life pass by thousands gathered on the footpaths and the centre plots. This morning, Zoe sat proudly among her friends on the kindergarten float, resplendent in yellow gardening hat and apron while waving a paper sunflower regally at the crowds. It was something of a rite of passage – I still remember clumsily twirling a Calesthenics baton decades ago along the same route – and she was in awe.

At the tail of the parade came three trucks: two B-Double milk co-op trucks and one belonging to the parade sponsor. The milk trucks are part of the community too and were warmly applauded.

The co-op's milk trucks part of the festival parade

After face-painting, slides, marvelling at the magicians, laughing at the clowns, catching up with friends and gobbling way too much fairy floss, we headed home to round up the cows. I was very proud of my tired little girl. She walked the cows in to the yard over 1.7 kilometres while making up lots of silly songs and giving me important directions.

Madame Butterfly stops traffic at the trough

We have a rule to let the cows drink for as long as they like on their way into the yard and in the picture you’ll see Madame Butterfly giving orders to stay clear of the drinking cows. After that, we checked two groups of cows, got in two mums and their newborns, fed grain to the yearlings and the springers, shifted the rising two-year-olds into a fresh paddock and checked in on a very sleepy and well-fed Laura.

Zoe will sleep well tonight!