A February BBQ

What a busy beginning to this week we have had; really busy in lots of unexpected ways. I'm pretty late starting to type this update (it's already 6pm and dinner is well under way) so we'll see if I even get to publish it this evening. Onwards.

Guests

The theme for this week has been guests. Lots of them. On Monday night I was just about to head to bed when I had a message from Venko, the lovely policemen/musician who made friends with me at KAT and helped me so much with the trailer registration. He had some time off work and wanted to bring his family to the countryside and immediately thought of coming to see us. After a brief chat it was agreed that he would come over on Tuesday for a BBQ at lunch time. Short notice, but a lovely idea and we're really pleased he came.

Venko's kid watching as A plays with Louise

All the puppies joining in

He's an inquisitive kid

We got ourselves ready (I swept the balcony, which is a quick task but one we've been putting off) but then we realised that the roof terrace would probably be warmer as it'd be more in the sun so we moved the BBQs up there. We found we were a bit low on charcoal so Venko agreed to bring some which saved a trip out for A. It was the first time he had visited so he got a little lost and I had to drive down the bottom of the hill to meet him. I pulled Thomas up heading back up the hill and sat on his roof so I'd be obvious. This worked well and they were here, greeting Rambo and loving him, and the fowl, and the puppies and the whole place. It took ages for Venko's wife and child to come inside as they were so interested in playing with Rambo; he thought all his Christmases had come at once. It was so lovely to see a child who isn't scared of a big dog and (other than running a couple of times, but then understanding why when he was told not to) acting very sensibly around him. He also loved the puppies and spent lots of time playing with them; indeed he hardly ate anything he was so into the animals and nature.

Venko taking a big bite out of a Lidl burger

He likes them

Just after we both shot; they must have been good ones

Venko shows us how it's done; six from six in the distant bucket

His son has a go; good parenting, I think

Dangerous woman!

I wasn't keen, but I had a go anyway

The breeze was getting more and more and though the sun was warm it was quite chilly on the roof terrace by the time we finally finished eating; one thing over here is people don't eat fast and they don't eat much. The BBQ was a success though, Venko brought some home made bread which was very tasty indeed. After we finished this it was time for some recreation as he had brought both his homemade Hungarian horse bow, and his hand gun, to do some shooting. This prompted me to bring out my long bow, which has been gathering dust since last summer, and we had a really great time shooting arrows along the land. He then got the hand gun and shot holes in one of our buckets and then encouraged both me and A to have a go. It was so loud I thought my eardrum burst, and A struggled also. Louise really did not like the loud bangs and was clinging to one or the other of us while the shooting was going on.

During the afternoon Bekir turned up as well, with his son, and stayed for a little while talking to Venko and then looking around at what we've been doing around the place. It was lovely to see him and he is looking very well indeed. Fingers crossed he can start back working here soon as we have SO much to get through this year. He was off home, having been to market day, though so didn't stop that long. Our other guests headed off about 3pm and both A and I were exhausted; it takes a lot of concentration when neither you nor your friend speaks the others language very well and I'm sure Venko and family were tired as well. It was a really lovely visit, though, and I can't wait for him to get back over.

Other than this, today we had another visitor. A had given a lift to a man into town this morning on her run to the shops and he came over, with the Little Lady, with a gift of some baklava to say thank you for her driving him to town. We invited him in and A made some filter coffee which we shared with them in the living room, along with the lovely banana and walnut cake A had made on Sunday. He speaks quite fast but we were communicating OK. He is another ex student of the school and it's lovely to have another person see what we are doing to such a large part of their personal history.

Gardening

The glorious weather of the end of last week has continued right through this week so far so we've been able to get outside quite a lot and get stuff done. A's back, while it is slowly getting better, is still quite bad and so she is being very careful about what she does but being outside in the sun has helped it a lot I think. She's had to take the week off work because sitting at her desk was making it seize up quite badly. Anyway, we have got quite a lot done.

A checking out a seed packet

A wheelbarrow full of sticks from the lawn area

Starting to dig out a flower bed

Flower bed dug, Thelma wants me to throw her toy

A mix of random seeds goes into the flower bed

Covered in plastic to keep the ground warm

One of my bulbs from last year is coming up

A bee which stopped on the table to say hello

On Monday A was back outside planting seeds for various things. She did some more food based items but was also keen to get some flowers going as we have so many packets of seeds for them as well. I took a quick potter around what will eventually be the lawn and started picking sticks up, and A joined me and between us we collected two wheelbarrows full. At lunch time I went outside again and helped by digging out a flower bed along the concrete between the two lawn sections. A then scattered a mix of seeds from various packets and we then covered them over, watered well and put plastic over hoops on top, to keep them warm over the slight cold snap forecast for this weekend. Spring really has sprung early over here and the bulbs in the Tortoise garden which I planted last year and left in the ground have started to show already. Also there were lots of bees flying around which is great to see; we need bees on our land for all our crops to be fruitful.

Pond to be cleaned, and the gunk I removed

Super happy to be back in their pond

Monday night as I shut the chickens and ducks away I opened the valve to empty the pond for cleaning in the morning. I had forgotten I had done this by the time morning came, particularly with the excitement of Venko's visit, but A reminded me because the ducks were less than impressed at not having a pond to swim in. It took about ten minutes or so, no more, to scoop up all the green gunk (mainly duck poo) from the concrete into a bucket and the job was complete. I turned on the tap to refill the pond, and then on a suggestion from A I poured the goop out around each of the trees in the orchard. The water pressure, after having none at all last week, is back to being really good and the pond filled in less than three hours which is super fast. The ducks have been very pleased to get it back, as you can see in a picture taken this morning.

A once again carefully staining the garden furniture

It is hard work pushing a manual lawnmower on animal pasture

Lots of sticks were still hidden under the grass

Looks so much better after a mowing, though

The front stack of wood fell over

Today was another day for getting outside as much as possible. A was able to get out for a little while and do the table for the balcony dining set which is good; just one more chair and she's done now, though with her back and the weather forecast this may wait until the end of next week now. I popped outside for a late lunch and to push the manual lawnmower around the other half of the lawn area that I hadn't done at the end of last year. Despite all the time we've spent picking up sticks and stones from the lawn I managed to fill another wheelbarrow with sticks, and threw loads of stones out onto the lane as well. It took longer than I wanted to finish this but it hasn't ever been done on this area before so it'll only get faster. I've got blisters on the palms of both of my hands now as well. Soft office workers hands. While we were out there a sudden rumble made us jump and we spotted that the wood pile had collapsed again. This is something that will need thinking about. It wasn't all that well stacked in the end anyway, but maybe we need some more support in there? Another nice thing was the really nice cousin from the farm is back from working in England and he came to say hello while I was cutting the grass. He's a very nice bloke.

Animals

You've got to see a few pictures of our menagerie already in this update however there's a couple of pictures that are worth putting up which don't fit into the earlier sections.

Here she is trying to get her back legs inside

She made it, though she didn't stay in it very long

Sassy is still really enjoying her run being on the balcony and she loves playing with all the structures and things I've put in for her. She's a very big rabbit now, however, and can barely fit inside this little tent. Earlier in the day she'd tried to get in while A was watching and failed but she tried again and I had the camera ready to capture her looking out in triumph from inside. The puppies, as you can see, were most intrigued as well.

Thelma and Louise share a stick/tree/sapling

Playing with the ring toy on the roof terrace

Louise wearing the toy as a necklace

Rambo making sure Louise doesn't take HIS stick

Thelma being camera shy

Whereas Louise poses

Rambo surveying his kingdom

The puppies are as playful as they ever are with Thelma being the chief instigator of anything related to a "T.O.Y." though once it's being played with Louise is just as interested. She loves sticks, though this is actually a sapling we had pulled out of the garden, but her favourite thing ever is the chew toy ring thing we bought a few weeks back. She's managed to pull a couple of the nubs off but it has survived very well considering how much use it gets. Thelma is very camera shy and it's hard to get a good picture of her when she isn't playing as she drops her tail and runs away when she sees the camera come out. Louise is the opposite and is quite the tart. Rambo has had a great week with all the attention, and us being able to be outside more, and is a very happy dog indeed.

Magnificent skies

And again, as usual, we've had some amazing displays in the sky. Here they are.

Sunday ended with a golden glow

Monday was attended by scattered clouds

The first rays of the day shine across the valley fog

Smoke rises into the sunlight

A and Louise enjoy the sunset

Further round the horizon, the clouds capture the colours

Sunday night had a lovely sunset but it was over very fast; it was golden, unlike the usual red ones we get here. Still gorgeous, though. On Monday night the sunset was made special by the scattered clouds around the horizon which caught the colours as the sun went down and made a beautiful display for us. I took some panoramic pictures of this and have saved them out as maybe being good for a background on one of my model railway scenes that I am going to do. On Tuesday I was running around trying to find my camera as the sun came up and I got onto the balcony just in time to capture the first rays of the sun illuminating the top of the valley-fog. The days have been warm recently but it is still cool at night and you can see the smoke from a morning fire in the farm. Last night the sunset was back to its glorious red best and we went onto the roof terrace to enjoy it. Five minutes later the sky was grey and it was completely over. The skies have been clear every night recently and we've been able to enjoy some amazing star gazing but I haven't taken the camera out to get pictures; I'll get round to doing that again soon I hope.

Other stuff

A few bits and pieces that don't have photographs associated with them.

After much thinking, and me going in with a DVD and my harddrive to check it out, we've bought a new surround sound system. This will eventually go into the "theatre room"we have planned but mainly it'll be great for watching blu rays as the previous DVD didn't really cope well with 5.1 into a stereo mix. We listened to some Mozart over dinner this evening and it sounds great.

I've not got on with any more of the floor since the weekend as I've been too busy however I have managed to find a supply of plywood, and they deliver. I ordered very thin stuff this time which may not end up being right for some of the purposes I have however they have other options and they do next day delivery for basically the same price as the slower one. Very strange pricing model.

Superb duck egg omelette

The birds are still giving us loads of eggs; today we got five which means only one of them is at risk of Easter Dinner. In all seriousness we have so many eggs it's untrue; check out the amazing omelette A made this week to use up some of our supply. It was made with duck eggs and was beautiful. A word of advice to anyone thinking of getting ducks or chickens; we have four chickens and two ducks and I reckon that is sufficient for us, egg wise. We won't be getting any more unless we decide to keep them for meat.

So there you have it; a super busy beginning to the week as I said. Now to go and watch Sopranos through the new sound system.

Some grey days

Here we are again, Sunday afternoon with the fire going, A sat on the bean bag in front of it playing her game on her phone, and me about to tippy tappy for a while to get this update out the door as soon as possible.

Contrasting weather

The title for this update was decided on Friday as the weather had been really dull for ages; there were no sunrise or sunset photographs to show you, nothing interesting in the sky but just grey and drizzle and mizzle and dullness.

This is what we had for a few days

It was getting cold as well, though not below freezing yet, and the wind was biting. Suddenly we were very happy of the fire in the living room and once more we had the curtains shut continually in Room 13, what with there being no thermal benefit from the sun as it wasn't out. It didn't effect us too much as I was working all day Thursday and A had a rest day (after the shopping trip) and so we didn't really go out anyway. Friday we also kept ourselves inside for most of the day (we tidied through the lab room and packed away a lot of the glass items into bubble wrap and also found the rat nest in some of the papers I had saved for the museum. Fortunately most of them were still OK and they are now packed in seal plastic boxes). There was no way I was suggesting we do anything outside, not with the forecast I had seen.

Saturday morning we see the sun again

Thermometer hits zero

Cold start to Sunday morning

A heavy frost on the top bank

The sun pokes up over the mountains

Below freezing this time

That forecast proved correct and Saturday morning dawned very bright and very cold and this weather has stayed over the weekend. The sun has been out all the time and while the temperature of the air is cold with the sun on you it is actually quite warm. Yesterday I even took my jumper off while outside for a while, it was that warm. This morning you could not call it warm in the slightest, though, as there was a hard frost on the ground. When I went out to clean the duck pond, emptied over night, everything was frozen and the standpipe out the front didn't work as the pipe above ground was also frozen.

Doing stuff

Our pattern of getting stuff done has very much followed the weather. As I have said we did get some stuff achieved on Friday by getting into the "rat room"/laboratory, checking it for rats with the puppies and then, when it was clear that there was no rat in there at that time, tidying a bit and sealing the holes by the window with expanding foam. There is still quite a lot to do in there but it was a start.

The Christmas tree is done

Thursday, after going out shopping and spending ALL the money (not really), A came back and redid the Christmas tree. We had decided together that we needed more lights and also more colour so she bought two more sets of lights and a load more red baubles and now it looks absolutely brilliant. We've been turning the lights on every evening when we shut the curtains and it's feeling very festive in here.

The frames we made last year coming in handy again

Fixing the frames together, and to the hutch

A stapling the steel mesh a bit more securely

Sassy's new run

On Saturday morning the first thing we did was head onto the balcony to sort out a run for Sassy. We had put her into the rabbit hutch out there on Friday while we were in and out of her room and now she was there it seemed a good time to get her situated there full time. I pulled the frames we had made for her winter run at SandS's out of the green building where they had been stored and passed them up to A then we worked together to fix them to each other and secure all the edges with the staple gun. We put a roof on with a lifting section near her hutch, and solid supports with old window frames over the rest, and blocked up the gap underneath the cage so she can't escape (easily). It took a bit longer than I had thought it would but not all that long and I'm really happy that she is finally in a place where she can be part of the family (we go on the balcony many times every day and during the evening as well) which hasn't really been the case since those first few weeks last year when she was living in Room 13 with me, before I got her into that room.

Pre-use checks on the chainsaw

All the chopping done

Lots more soil spread on the floor o the orchard

After this we both went outside to our allotted tasks for the day. A was stuck behind the chainsaw again for a fair while as she chopped up the pile of branches I had gathered together during the week. She worked away until the fuel ran out and in that time completed almost all of the available wood so she didn't bother to refuel. We have a task to go around the whole land and trim whatever remaining damaged branches there are so there'll be another pile to chop soon enough. While she was on with this I was on the end of the shovel and wheelbarrow shifting soil onto the floor of the orchard again. By the time her fuel ran out in the chainsaw mine was getting quite low in my body so a quick chocolate bar to prevent me from dropping and we shifted the wood inside and then called it a day. It was a nice feeling to have achieved so much, particularly as the working days are so short at the moment.

Lots of rugs hung out in the sun

This morning, being Sunday, was tidying morning. I did the humanure and cleaned out the fires before A joined me and then we worked together to get the rest of the cleaning done. I swept the corridor and stairs while she cleaned Room 13 and got it all mopped out. We beat the rugs and hung them out over the edge of the balcony and when we brought them in mid afternoon they were sun warmed. While A was in the bedroom doing that, and the living room, I went into the roof and split the two different types of track up and shifted it into the drawer units I had bought. Now that I have freed up the boxes I can go through and sort through the rolling stock and other bits and get rid of all the cardboard boxes up there.

Foods

So a large part of our pleasure here is provided by food, both that which we cook ourselves and by going out for meals. Even though the "kitchen" is just one wall of Room 13 at the moment A is able to rustle up some amazing meals which spoil me totally.

Super tasty curry

Excellent eggs frying up with  bacon

The perfect bacon and egg butty

This week was no different but the only picture I have is of the awesome curry she cooked on Thursday night. There was enough to feed ten people but somehow we managed to eat almost all of it, leaving a little to be reheated the next day for lunch and it was if anything even better then. The chickens have started laying again in earnest and we had a lot of eggs backed up so we've been treated to fried breakfasts this weekend. Our eggs are even nicer than the shop bought ones, even though we go to get fresh eggs from the little shops.

By far the best Parlenka we have found over here

The house special - and it was

Pork in mushroom sauce

Biscuit cake for two

Friday was far from a total write off, despite the weather, and in the evening we headed out to a new place up near the dam above the local city for a meal with SandS. We had seen the billboards for this place and been a little unsure whether we wanted to bother trying it but when it was suggested for this meeting we agreed and what a good decision that was. It is a really nice place, very well set out and with plenty of space but even better than that was the food. Everything was cooked perfectly and very tasty. The only thing that let it down a bit was the service with a couple of items we ordered not arriving until after we reminded the staff who had attempted to take the order by memory, and hadn't written it down. This was a minor gripe as we had plenty to eat and didn't miss the missing items much.

Th'animals

We have such a menagerie now here (and I am outnumbered as there is only Rambo as the other male) and this week we have pictures of them all, and a video.

The puppies keeping warm

"Hang on, didn't this used to be OUR house?!"

Louise digging a deep hole

With the temperature dropping so much, though Room 13 doesn't ever seem to get much below about 10 degrees as the fridge/freezer is on and probably has quite an effect, the puppies have been struggling in the mornings. Their favourite trick is to be put inside one of our jumpers to warm up. Louise is more interested in this but Thelma does get involved. Shortly after this picture was taken we put their coats on and sent them outside to run around. With Sassy on the balcony on Thursday night they were a little unsure and wanted to say hello to her, or growl at her in Thelma's case. When the run was finished we let them out and they spent a lot of time running around, growling and whining and yipping but now, on Sunday, it seems that even Thelma is getting more used to her.

Dragon breath dog

Rambo has been his usual self, running around too fast without looking where he is going and getting too close for comfort whenever you sit down outside, and once I did have to put him on his lead as he was being too bouncy around the chicken run. He's looking so much healthier now than when we picked him up way back in the snow in March and we have been pleased to see him doing his rounds of the land in the evenings. He's settled into the routine of being shut in for the night as well and doesn't seem to be too bothered by not having his freedom then.

First steps into the new enclosure

Munching her breakfast

Sassy has really settled in to the run already and doesn't seem at all bothered by the minus temperatures over night. This morning she was sat out watching the sun come up when I went out to get the pictures. I've climbed in and put some more hay into the little house I made for her last year so now, should the wind howl in she has protection whatever direction it is coming in. I would like to make a shelter for her toilet tray before the weather changes again; I'm sure she wouldn't be happy if it got rained on, so that probably should be a priority.

A with her little flock

As already shown the birds are finally laying again. We're getting one or two eggs a day at the moment from the chickens but the biggest excitement was today when I checked and found our first ever duck egg! It was in the nesting box which gives the amusing image of one of the ducks squashing itself in there. They are really very friendly birds and always come running whenever either of us go near their enclosure however they definitely like A more and even come to be fed by hand which is brilliant to watch.

And finally...

And so we reach the end of this update. We've both been slightly under the weather for the past few days; nothing serious just general sniffles and tiredness, and this afternoon/evening has been no different so I've taken it very easy typing this up. I've just finished eating a fabulous slow cooked pork with mashed potato and turnip and the fire is crackling away as I've put some more logs on it. Before I sign off there are a couple of final things to write about...

Our Christmas photograph

The Old School

... the first of which was me fulfilling a request from my dad to provide him with some photographs of the place as it is now for him to send out to his friends as an update letter. I set up the tripod last night and took a picture of us sat together, A with wine and me with whisky, in our lovely new lounge and then this morning I went to get a photograph of the Old School from an angle that shows off the biggest change we've made this year which is the driveway, garage and balcony. He had me get some before shots as well out of the archive however you'll have to wait for them as I'm now going to build up a set and maybe create a page in its own right for before and after shots of the whole build.

A getting ready to fire the gun

Me having a go

Secondly this evening we finally got time to get the airgun out and get A to shoot it a bit. I pinned a target up for her and then marked out about 10m away from it. She had a few goes and I shot it once but we didn't hit the target once. We need to get the sights zeroed in I think. It was fun and now we've shot it I'm sure we'll do it more often. It is louder than you think, though the gun is just a spring powered one not compressed air. What fun.

Right, that's me done. I'll catch you all in the week.