Voni
Legacy Name: Voni

Born in the middle of nowhere in outback NSW, Australia. She loved the bush and wandering around it with her siblings and cousins. She had many tales of those times, including when her brother shot Farmer Browns Cow. Well, they thought they had. They ran so fast they didn't see they missed it completely. She never lost her love of the bush.

At a young age the family moved to Sydney to find work. She was the youngest of 5. The tag-a-long. The baby. Her eldest sister was a teenager when she was born. She was a die hard tomboy who roamed early Bondi in jeans and shirt with short hair when such things were not fashionable. It was where she fell in love with the ocean. Something she never left behind.

She got in fights, and defended her family fiercely from the mean spirited who had harsh things to say of her fathers drinking habits. Her beloved father was never abusive to his family, but he despaired finding work that would pay to keep a family of 7 after the war years. But he always entertained the children. Made jokes and got them giggling.

Her sisters got into nursing, and she followed suit. Wanting to travel the world, and nursing was a fine way to work passage. She worked around Australia, New Zealand, Tonga, sailed the islands and eventually settled in Papua New Guinea in the early 1960's.

She met a man on New Years Eve, 1963, at a New Years party. They ended up talking all night, the nurse and the retired, wounded soldier. They married the following May.

They ran a small pub in Wewak in the 1960s before moving back to Australia and settling in the countryside. She had much trouble having babies and lost 3, before having her only living child. She wanted the quiet life again, a place she could grow food and have animals, and they got a small hobby farm.

Over the following years there was several jobs for both of them at various stages, until her husband could find no more work and got the pension. They still had their home grown food, and she had her charity work. She was a grass hockey coach, saving many small town teens from pregnancy (despite all the teen boys who were unhappy about it), as well as starting the local Girl Guides, helping with politics and teaching strong moral values of equality, equity, and understanding in a time and place where that was not known.

She touched and changed so many people. Her legacy still lives on strongly in the hearts and minds of the young people she once taught, who are now parents and grandparents.

Favourites:
Colour: Yellow
Flower: Sunflower
Bird: Cockatoos
Place: Beach

Occupations:
- Nurse
- Midwife
- Theatre Nurse
- Legal Secretary
- Painter Artist
- Girl Guide Leader
- Hockey Coach
- Sunday School Teacher
- Missionary

She made amazing birthday cakes

She had a wicked sense of humour

She cared so much for others

She always worried she was a bad mother (she wasn't)

She taught me to cook at a young age

She used to sing me to sleep

She always told me I could be anything

She had really low self esteem

Her faith was important to her

The background painting is the largest of her works at 150cm wide, it was a work in progress for over 20years.

(the © symbol is to protect privacy plus they are my inheritance)

Recipes

This recipe she created when a lack of items due to weather at the pub in PNG meant she had to cook fast and filling food with tins and frozen supplies in 1965.

An easy cake recipe