It came, it went

A magical Narnia like scene once again

I guess it has been that kind of a coming and going week in more ways than one. The Brexit deadline came and went and the UK is still in the EU for now. March came and went. The snow came and went. It is frightening how fast this year seems to be speeding by. We even moved out of the apartment and into the caravan for the summer on Sunday. Although it snowed last week, the days since have been sunny, which makes staying in the caravan okay. It is still in the greenhouse protected from the wind and therefore has some insulation of sorts and soon heats up with an electric radiator.

The snow then headed to the land and this is Ian's photo
just as it was arriving

The day after was a glorious but cold day

I do feel a bit responsible for the snow. I did say in last weeks blog that it would snow because I had planted some seeds outside, so lo and behold it did. It didn't last long though and now the snow is only lingering in the shadiest of places like the forest. The grass is beginning to show some small signs of recovery and the weeds are racing to get ahead. It meant I was able to forage enough leafy stuff to add to a meat soup. It makes a change from squash and onions anyway.

Dear, sweet little Freddie. He had his splint taken off
on Friday and so far he is doing well and his leg looks
good.

The young men of the group. Soon to be joined by two
little ones

Talking of Brexit, I got an email from the Estonian authorities outlining what will happen as a British citizen in Estonia after Brexit either with a deal or without. It was reassuring on the basis that they will issue British Nationals with the relevant ID and there will be no hurry. They will also allow me to return to the country, which is a relief. There is so much unknown, especially with the MPs in the UK Parliamentarians still discussing the issue at this time in the process. As the MEP Guy Verhofstadt said, please can the Parliamentarians vote "for" something and not just vote "no" all the time.  Such a shambles!

Oh Mr. P. You do need your teeth cutting.
Couldn't you have waited until shearing
time?

A stork visiting our pond

Anyway leaving politics aside for now, we've also had some comings and goings on the farm. The storks have come back from their long jaunt and visitors have been arriving to see us and the alpacas. The first group consisted of one of our local friends from the nearby sheep farm and camp and a guy from England who manages a large walled garden. I remember many years ago watching the Victorian Kitchen Garden that was set in a derelict walled garden and I always loved the idea of having a sun soaking walled garden. I did use to do some gardening for a friend at one time in the old walled garden on her farm, but that wasn't quite so grand as our visitors' 4 acre plot. We had a good time though talking about some of the ideas we use here on our farm and thinking how we could incorporate a no-till garden into the set up at the sheep farm with a demonstration plot too. This will be Ian's part-time job to develop over time with probably a bit of input and moral support from me.

Up close!

Brencis looking very stately and calm here. He's lovely
really and will come up and allow you to stroke his
neck - well most of the time and if you have food.

We also had another three groups who had come to see the alpacas. One group arrived as we were walking Josefs and so they were thrilled to see us walking across with him on a lead, but I don't think Josefs was that thrilled as were were just on our way back to his mum when we spotted the group. He was fine though and we soon wandered over to take him back. The next group were an international group, a Dutch guy with his Russian wife and two children now living in Riga. They came for the tour and then walked two of our alpacas. We took Tellus, who is a steady plodding sort of alpaca and Mr. P because Brencis is getting a little more unpredictable. He is just coming into full adulthood and I am sure he will calm down a bit later, but he's too big for young children to take for a walk. We hold on too while youngsters walk the alpacas but we still need the alpacas to be calm and sensible all the time.

George and Freddie, sill best buddies

You could even call them drinking buddies

The last group were an interesting group. They had come from the north of Latgale (East Latvia) and so north east of where we are. They have lots of animals, ostriches, emus, horses, goats and so on. They are another mini-zoo and had bought three alpacas last year from Lithuania. They had a good tour around and fortunately organised for a young woman to come and translate for them, so they could find out a lot of information. They also went away with some of the special alpaca food, lots of advice and we also got another booking for shearing. In addition to all that going on we got our first enquiry online for the felting course we will be having in August. All in all it definitely feels like we are heading into summer.

Turbjørn

Tellus looking like a wise old sage

What are you guys looking at?

Oh so that's who you've seen. Some female red deer

They stayed around long enough for Ian to run back to
get me and then back again to get his camera with the
long lens on. Not the best photos but as you can see from
the photo of the boys' the sun was going down. It's sights
like these that makes putting up with the cramped and
sometimes cold conditions of living in a caravan all
worth while.

Uggghh!

Our old oak tree covered in snow and lit by the sun looks so
pretty

After a week of Narniaresque type weather with beautiful snow covered trees, it rained. The snow is still here but it looks rather drab and dreary now. Such a shame as it all looked rather festive, although it did keep Ian busy clearing paths with the snowblower. Of course there is still plenty of time for snow to return before winter has finished, but for now the dark days are back.

Chanel with a bit of festive frosting

A path made with the snowblower

This time of the year is one of beginnings and ends. It is the end of the milk season for one of our milk suppliers. We have two sources for our lovely, thick and creamy unpasteurised milk. One has milk all the year round, presumably by staggering her cows delivery dates and the other opts for time off in the winter. I can understand that, as milking animals is quite demanding. Our friend the goat farmer looks forward to the rest she gets at this time of the year as she prepares for her goats to start kidding.

Mr. P shows up much better against the snow

The ponds are frozen but our well was still filling up until
a few days ago

The lighter days with the snow has meant some of our hens have started laying again and they seem to have got over their autumn moult. When the cold weather really kicks in the number of eggs usually drops off but come February time they should be starting to lay more consistently. We are going to buy some eggs this next year to raise more stock. We have managed to breed out consistent egg laying out of them, but some of them are a decent size for meat birds, so not all bad.

Eyre or Floss as we usually call her has got a good long coat on
now. So long it is starting to get all matted again. She isn't so
patient as Sofie but she let Ian comb out a huge chunk of matted
fur with the new super duper combs that have rotating teeth.

Lady V checking out the weather before heading out ....

We have our first booking for next year, on the first of January from a Russian family. We subscribed to a site that advertises rural holidays and activities but also puts tours together for individuals and groups. It will be interesting to see what else comes of this. We really do need a shop building for our products rather than bring them backwards and forwards from home though.

... for a roll around in the snow. I mean! At her age too

Investigating the old jar of oil 

On the subject of buildings, we were discussing our wish list and besides a shop we would like a purpose built workshop. I would love to have a round building that looks out over the alpaca paddocks with an offshot kitchen. The shop would be next door to that and then a barn at the end nearest the greenhouse. We were thinking of putting the barn nearer the alpacas but I think it would be nicer for people to have the possibility of seeing the alpacas better whilst doing some felting and not just when Ian brings them on a walk or far away in the distance. We would need to find funding for this though and so will have to submit proper plans, which is not too much of a problem, but we have to get organised and although we are getting there, we are getting there slowly.

Sunbathing father (standing) and son (sitting down). Brencis
is getting huge, he looks like he might be bigger than his
father. Let's just hope he remains a laid back sort of guy like
his dad.

I thought of decorating this tree for
Christmas, but I think the snow did a
better job of it

Last year we made some wine from our grapes. It was not a stunning success and the wine was at best palatable, however, it does make some rather nice gluwein. Well we like it and since we have plenty of bottles of the red stuff, we have been having a cup of gluwein on a rather regular basis. If we haven't had gluwein, we have had a hot juice drink with similar spices. We have plenty of juice from all our berries to get through but we are not big juice drinkers. We go through phases. I would rather have a hot drink though and so this makes a good alternative.

It was nice to see the sun this week

A bit cold for using the outside loo these
days

I noticed that a friend of ours had what looked like a turkey one mealtime and I asked her where she got it from. It turned out to be a goose and she got it from a friend of hers. I thought that would make an interesting change for Christmas and asked if she could help us get one. She gave me a number for someone called Martinš. We know of someone with same name and it sounded like they were in the same direction and so wondered if it was the same person. The name was on the noticeboard in our caravan with the number, so Ian checked and no it was not the same Martinš. A few days later I asked Ian to phone to arrange for the goose for Christmas, because I wouldn't be home. Eventually he remembered to phone, but the person who answered was not Martinš and neither did they speak English as we expected. Whoops! Turns out Ian had phoned the number on the board, it may have been Martinš' number before but not now and it wasn't the one I asked him to ring. Finally he got the right number and the right Martinš and so we are definitely having goose for Christmas now.

I would think the chickens are grateful to be inside these days.
This was meant to be removed and put under cover

Blackcurrant bushes forming snow sculptures

I have been busy trying to process some apples that were a bit past their best and squashes that were not going to last long. We had run short of jars but after a sort out of various jars with small amounts of jam or chutney in them I managed to free some up, a friend gave us some more and after sorting out the boxes of empty jars I managed to find some the right size. Amazing what a little sorting out will do while procrastinating a writing project. So there is blackcurrant and apple jam, wild strawberry and apple jam, there is spiced squash and dried fruit marinating waiting to be turned into christmas puddings and some orange peel being turned into candied peel. There is also dried squash and dried spiced squash.

You can just about see the sign

Tree and snow art

Another reason for the sort out was that we need to free up freezer space for lamb. We cannot keep the male lamb as his mother was the best mother of all our ewes, she gave birth unaided and took good care of the lamb, hence his good size. The other two were rotten mothers, one didn't even attempt to feed her lambs and the other was not much better and her lambs didn't really thrive. We hope it is just inexperience and next year they should be better. I say next year, they are all pregnant again and we don't know when they are due. Whoops! If the lambs from this round survive then we will cull the ram, if they don't they have one last chance before the ram has to go.

I thought I might try to cover the Brussel Sprouts, they are about
pea size now

Aggie with her dusting of snow

Such is the farming life and trying to at least maintain some genetic integrity and not inbreeding them. Next year we plan on making a better shelter for the sheep at the top of the land for routine husbandry and hopefully what was the old alpaca house will be strengthened and repaired or replaced for winter quarters. We'll see what we actually manage. It is a problem when the alpacas are our focus but the sheep do a valuable job of providing us with mowing services on rough ground and provide us with some meat. The idea is also that the fleeces we get from them will help with making felted or knitted items. A little bit of sheep's wool helps alpaca fibres to felt or hold its shape.

A bit more obvious on Chanel and looks like that fungus that
kills bats. Fortunately this will not do any damage

Digging for Jerusalem artichokes

At least this week I managed to get some skiing done. Last winter season I managed to get my skis out only once in the whole season. I hope this year to get more opportunities than that. It is always with a bit of trepidation that I get back on my skis and I always practice out of sight, well mainly out of sight. Of course the bit where I started to wobble was in sight of the road, just as a car was going past. Despite the snow, the ground is not frozen and so I also managed to dig up another bucket load of Jerusalem artichokes, so the chickens will be happy and I brought some home for us to eat. There is not much else I can do on a winters day out on our land, Ian had made all the paths necessary.

A full bucket and deep snow. Good job I had ski trousers on

The lines across are my ski track, honest!

To do lists

On Sofie's to-do-list is sleep. Actually she does do a very
good job of keeping the vole and mice population in check
and away from our animal feed. Here she is sleeping on the job

An eclectic week as usual with a long list of to dos that described the variety. Two presentations to prepare with online groups from varying countries, reading for courses, writing of papers, advertising for our summer felting workshop, gardening jobs, car technical and so on. There were nights I have to confess to feeling pretty tired, but I at least felt I was getting somewhere as I worked down the lists. I wish I didn't have to do the courses now, but they are useful and just at the right time in other ways.

A damp looking alpaca. We are not quite sure what happened
the other day, but Tellus got out from the electric fence and
since then the boys have been a bit on edge. They wouldn't
even go in one night

Advertising for our farm and felting workshop was a top priority to sort out. Some parts required translation and when I got the translation through I had to add the translation to the poster I had designed, which required some jiggling around of the set out. Felt in Latvian is a longer word and so I had to move pictures to fit it in. Most of it worked the same though. I have also sorted out business cards for Ian and if all goes to plan we should have those and some posters in Latvian ready tomorrow.

Mr. P. having a bad hair day

Both the courses I have been doing recently required online presentations to be prepared. It is quite a challenge when people come from different circumstances with different access to the internet and different works schedules. In the end I set up a Facebook group for both of them  just so we can discuss the things we need to do without having to stick to trying to arrange Skype calls that not all of us can make at the same time. It did amuse me that I would do that as the oldest one in the group, but then perhaps the younger members would have suggested something different to do the same thing. The main thing is that we got there in the end and the presentations, worked well enough.

How could anyone resist a picture of an alpaca when they are
as cute as Mari? It is a good job she is cute though, she is
proving a bit of a handful for eating through fences, which
does not do the fence much good. That and her mountain
goat impressions inside the alpaca house when she wants
some hay. She has a sweet temperament though

Friday was my birthday and we had a day off, well kind of. Ian got a day away from the alpacas and I got a day away from academic work. Just to celebrate we went to the big town to take the car for its technical. We were a little surprised that it actually passed and so the work we know will need doing on it is not so urgent that it has to be done immediately and can be fitted in with our schedule better. The prices though for technicals and road tax (which has to be paid at the same time) have gone up with quite a jump over the last 8 years.

Any suggestions for a caption for this picture of Chanel?

We also had a meeting with a lady at the museum in the town, she was acting as translator for an older lady who wanted to book a trip to our farm. We wanted to meet to make sure about the arrangements. The older lady who was doing the booking was a very lively lady who gave me a handful of forsythia, a very spring-like gift. She didn't even know it was my birthday. She loved the pictures of our alpacas that Ian showed her on the computer and she had with her the article from the newspaper that featured us last year. We now have a booking for 54 seniors to visit in May. If they are all as lively as she is we will have a busy old time keeping up with them.

Hopefully Lady V is enjoying her year off from being pregnant

We rounded off the day with a late lunch at our local hotel and then got ready to spend time out in the caravan. We are slowly getting more organised for this and although the mornings have been on the cool side, even though the caravan is still in the greenhouse, we have slept well. Ian is often disturbed by our neighbours who are early risers when we are in the apartment - not that they are particularly noisy it is just he hears them moving around. I don't, but then I am as deaf as a doorpost really. It does mean though that we get up later out in the caravan, but still early enough to let the alpacas out at a reasonable time and I don't think we would get to sleep in much later with the cockerel in an ark right outside the caravan.

but is Estelle pregnant? We are still not sure, some days she
looks like she is and some days she doesn't

Since we are out on the land so much now, it means that when it is dry I can get out and do some gardening. I can plan my day around the rather too frequent showers. If it is due to rain in the afternoon, I will do some gardening in the morning and then reading or writing in the afternoon and even into the evening, if need be. If it is dry all day (not many of those just lately) I can do my reading and writing interspersed with a bit of time off in the garden. The chickens are loving the buckets of weeds though and I hope that their eggs will be turning bright orange with all the greenery. At least I have now planted up the broad beans outside, along with sorting out the Jerusalem artichoke bed. I have extended it as we plan to have quite a few beds of those so the chickens can eat them over the winter. We didn't have enough of them to give them on a very regular basis. The alpacas can have them from time to time too. Actually so can we.

Aggie is changing and is now at the stage where she is ready
for mating. Our first alpaca to be born on the land, now
possibly ready for having babies of her own

Ian of course has been doing much more land work than I have. He has moved a wood pile that was in the way for fencing off the next section of garden where we will be planting vegetables. Once that was moved he could then shift the manure heap around with the tractor to make some raised beds. The manure is well rotted - at least most of it is anyway and that means we can plant into it and not have to do a lot of digging and rotavating. We left some rows for rotatvating because the cabbages and such like will not like being planted into the manure even if it is well rotted. We will mulch them with hay to add bulk to the soil. It is nice to see how our orchard plot is beginning to turn from a sandy colour to black from the amount of chippings, hay and compost that we have added over the years.

One of Ian's jobs. Moving the manure into heaps with the
tractor. Now they are in place he can fence the garden areas.
The beds that were made last week weren't straight and so the
first job was to straighten then up and then put the remaining
manure in the second plot. Eventually we will have four plots
that we can rotate so the sheep are not on the same plot
each winter and the chickens move from plot to plot too.

In between moving fences, showing visitors around, fixing the car, piling up wood and rotavating the field ready for planting, Ian has also been carding wool. At least it is something he can do when it rains. The drum carder is doing a nice job of cleaning the wool of the vegetable debris that our alpacas love to accumulate by rolling around in the hay and is a lot faster than hand carding of course. It needs at least two passes through the carder to get a relatively clean product and possibly three to really get it clean, but since it is relative quick to do, that isn't a problem. As I said Ian has also been showing visitors around and every weekend we have had a group or family turn up. It will be much nicer though on a warm day, it got rather chilly when we were chatting to our last group of visitors and one little girl decided that it was too cold and went and sat in the car. Her mum was fascinated though with the alpacas. I guess we must print out the brochures for the workshop so they can take one. We are not getting them professionally printed because they are too expensive just for the workshop, we will get them printed for general purposes though.

Rotavated fields in the background. She will need moving soon
but the grass is only growing slowly in the cooler weather 
this week

A friend of mine has been the source of a good few contacts, more recently via Facebook. I got chatting with one chap about development and we realised that our interests and thoughts were on the same wavelength. On my birthday we had a Skype conversation where we chatted about encouraging people to get involved and how problematic that can be, both getting people involved and then sometimes expecting too much from people who have lives to live. We both found it very encouraging from a professional point of view. It was funny though to hear how he felt I was the only academic doing the kind of work I do in the whole of Latvia. Scary thought too.

Green grass! Yum!

Just to finish off with something that caught my attention on the BBC, a Greek granny hosting several Syrian refugees on a meagre budget. I often see posts where the Prime Minister of Hungary is talking about Europe being a Christian country and therefore should not accept refugees but I feel that the Greek granny displays more of what Jesus meant when he said in Matthew 25:37-40

“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’
“The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’

The bible encourages us to care for the sick, the orphan and the alien amongst us. Aliens means not the same as us. There are no excuses for not caring for people in need and fear of the one who might cause us harm is no excuse for ignoring the plight of the rest. The Greek granny and others like her who reach out to the refugees and offer hope are my heroes.