I should be doing....

What a difference a week makes at this time of the year. The
grass is growing fast, the trees are leafing up and the sun is
getting quite hot at times. We are already suntanned due to
working outside so much.

I know what I should be doing and that is doing some more writing on my paper. I have a jobs list as long as your arm at the moment. Typical May really and something always unexpected turns up, so another job to apply for, another conference to go to and a myriad of other things that take longer than I feel they should do. All need prep work, or finishing off. Life is busy, but I know it is a season and there should be some downtime later on.

The Schisandra Chenesis is flowering this year, last year the
flowers got caught in the frost.

Anxiously awaiting the inevitable

The good news is that we have completed one of the jobs that has to be done every year about now the shearing of our alpacas. We did the boys yesterday. It wasn't too bad at all and Ian has got faster, however it is always the setting up, the clearing up in between and sorting out the fleece when there is only two of us that takes so much time. At least this year, it did not feel particularly stressful, the animals were on the whole cooperative enough when down, apart from Brencis who is proving to be a bit of a handful when it comes to trying to work with him. He's a big lad and so when it comes to manoeuvring if he doesn't want to go it takes a lot to move him and yet when he wants to cooperate like going on walks, he is no trouble at all.

A few outside too. George is the great escape artist and had to
be returned to this enclosure several times

All set up and ready to go

Suave!

When we had finished shearing we had a lady and her son turn up unexpectedly. We hadn't even had much chance to eat. We are open to visitors coming on, but so often they have a knack of turning up, just at our most busy time. Oh well! Can't complain too much. We also had another visit later, but at least this one was planned and we were able to talk farming over a cup of herb tea straight from the garden. Today we sheared the girls. No animal likes being taken for shearing, but Aggie especially seemed to appreciate the coolness of less fleece; she ran up to Ian later on this afternoon and gave him a gentle nuzzle - we like to think it is her way of saying thanks, but maybe we are just anthropomorphising her actions. Still it is nice to feel appreciated.

A rather traumatised Freddie, after his first shearing. He did
recover though and came up and ate out of my hand

The yearly, "who are you again?" They don't recognise the
other alpacas once sheared and so go around smelling each
other to remind themselves who is who.

The three musketeers

Talking of feeling appreciated, we've had a few visitors this week who have lifted our spirits somewhat. There are times we wonder what on earth we are doing, but then there are those moments when people say something and it makes sense again. One group, included a grandmother, mother and son. The son was fortunately very good at English and translated well and he himself was very curious about alpacas and what we were doing here in Latvia. His mother thought it was good that we were here and working on the land, she liked what we were doing. It lifts us when people appreciate us being here and loving the land on which we work. It makes me sad to think that so many folks from foreign lands are not appreciated, even if they work really hard producing from the land, especially those folks who are harvesting the foods for the UK. Not a job that many Brits want to do and yet they are often considered unwanted, economic migrants etc.

Enjoying the sunshine and making up for being cooped up
for most of the day

Mr. P with his trimmed teeth. Oh yes! Ian is also an alpaca
dentist and I am his able assistant

Sorry George, that haircut does not look good on you. It looked
fine when we did it and then it all flopped again and hides his
eyes. He will be getting another trim soon

Sunrise

Another group of visitors were some returnees from the week before. They had asked if they could take photos of the alpacas as a surprise for a couple getting married. The problem was that we are having some quite hot weather at the moment and the alpacas needed shearing and would not look quite so fluffy for a mid-June wedding photo shoot. We explained we would be shearing this week for that reason, so they came with the couple this last Saturday before we sheared for some pre-wedding shoots. The sun fortunately shone for them, as of course it had been a little overcast in the afternoon. The wind was cool, but even so, it looks like they got plenty of good photos and we got some good photos of them taking photos. Brencis was an absolute star, poking his nose in quite often. He's only after food of course, but he's gentle enough not to be too pushy - most of the time anyway. We can't share our photos though until mid-June, so I shall have to leave you in suspense on that.

An elder tree coming into flower

Hmm! I intend making holes in these bales and putting in some
squash plants. I think I may have to deal with some snails first

The ploughed dock field

We haven't spent much time with moving furniture this week, we have been trying to organise the final removals though. The problem is that we are not the only ones busy at this time of the year and so we are still waiting. We can hear tractors going constantly at the moment as people plough their fields or prepare the land. Ian has been doing a bit of ploughing on our land too. We hadn't planned on doing much ploughing but we have an area that has become a dock field. One of the best ways of dealing with it, according to a recent publication by the Organic Research Centre in the UK, is to plough, let the roots dry -which is helpful on sunny and windy days like they are at the moment - then take out as much as possible before planting with buckwheat that will compete with the docks. It's an ongoing process.

Asparagus is growing well. I hope this bed does better than
the last one. We got two harvests out of it and then they all died
on us

It is looking like it could be a good fruit year. Our plums
are actually flowering properly this year. We put them in
about 7 years now, so about time we got something.

Besides the alpacas we also have three sheep. Last year one of the sheep was so loud and persistent that she went for a rendezvous with the freezer. Unfortunately her daughter seems to have inherited some of those traits. She is not quite so loud or persistent, just nearly, but she also has an added quirk. She ranks as one of the most stupid of sheep. Sheep are not renowned for their intelligence and we have had some issues over the years with their ability to panic first and think later. However, this quirk beats that. Last year both lambs were eating through the fence when the grass started greening up, fair enough! This year, the most stupid one has not realised she is now too big to do this. She can get her head through, but not back again. She has not just done this once or even twice but about five times now on nearly consecutive nights. Usually she waits until we are just going to bed and ends up standing their bleating away, until we manage to get her head back through.

Oh yes! The caravan is out of the greenhouse and we can
sleep in in the mornings, as the cockerels are now much
further away.

The grapes are flowering

As I mentioned last week another of those seasonal jobs is getting the seeds in, unfortunately we seem to be going through the dry, windy phase of the year that makes planting most seeds a bit of a waste of time unless we are prepared to water them in by hand or hose. We don't know how long the dry spell will last, often a month, once it was two months and so we are cautious about overdoing it. I have planted trays in the greenhouse and they are doing well and I have planted up some of the tomato and pepper plants I started off a while ago. So at least that is progress.

Two groups of chicken arks outside and tomatoes planted

We have about 20 chicks too. Rather more than we normally
get. The last one to be born has proved to be more resilient
than anticipated for a late one. It was helped out of its shell
which usually means it won't survive. It was kicking and
flailing around, which is not a good sign, but recovered
after all the shell bits were soaked off it. It was put in with the
rest, which usually means it get battered about but it was still
up and running about. I did traumatise it by soaking off some
more stuff off its bottom today and it knocked it off balance.
I found it quivering in the corner. I gave it some fluid, put
it in a box for a few hours and it recovered again. 

A new peony to add to my rose bed

I have to confess to going a bit wild at the spring market this year though. I want to make the area around where we spend our summer months prettier with flowers and not just herbs. Mind you, all the plants I bought also yield something edible, so that's a win. I have been creating more raised beds with rotten wood to put them in and I am pleased with how they are turning out. I just hope I manage to keep the weeds at bay now.

Top right is my new jasmine and I have also moved a
southernwood from a bed getting taken over by autumn
raspberries

Still more to plant in the green box

Pansies from the market and a rosmary under the jar

Our new little portable washing machine for out on the land.
We will mainly be washing fleeces in it

Mari's cut doesn't look so bad at all. At least we didn't
have to scalp her this year. Just a light trim on the head

Lady V moaned all the while she was waiting, but wasn't so
bad once she was down. She knows the routine.

Still waiting

Early morning sunshine

Gosh it has been busy this week. I half expected a Masters thesis to land in my lap to mark, so to speak and sure enough it did. There was not much time to mark it as it was just one more thing to add to the numerous things that needed doing this week. I did spend quite a bit of time on it though, because it was only fair to the person who had put so much effort into putting it together. I had to put off marking an exam for the course I tutored, as I knew I couldn't do both and the Masters student's work had a deadline for marking and a defence this week.

Morning mist

I also managed to get our apartment sorted into some sort of shape for a family to live in over the summer.  They are safely installed now, only they are coming and going, which has actually been a boon for us as we had someone help us cull two of our sheep this week and we needed to prepare them for the freezer. This was much easier in the apartment and being nice and tidy, it was lovely just to get on and sort it. Still took us until midnight before we were back in our caravan.

Aggie looking unusually alert in the cool misty morning.
Normally she just looks tired

The sheep were noisy, demanding things. We were half considering giving them away to a charity that wanted animals for work experience for ex-offenders but we couldn't give them these particular animals. It would not have been fair. Since they have gone the other ewe and the two lambs that were born earlier this year have just got on eating and not made much of a noise. There was no chorus at around 7pm demanding their grain. Actually chorus is too kind a description. The three that are left  just ran up tonight and followed me inside, good as gold. I even had the lambs eating out of my hand. This is preparation for moving them further away from the area they are in now. They need to be able to follow the food.

The alpacas are there somewhere

The week feels a bit of a blur and it is hard to remember what happened. I had time to Skype with my daughter and her three. The two oldest ones read me books, the eldest has memorised most of the books, but the nearly two year old just babbled along - most amusing. He still calls me MAM-MA at the top of his voice. I got a bit more done on my analysing of work to be done for a paper that needs to be re-written and I was so close to finishing that before the thesis landed on me.

A white rainbow

So other random things? We had another coach party. We had a visit from our neighbours who haven't been around for a while, in fact they haven't been around for a couple of year, so nice to see them again. I have planted tomatoes, but still have loads more to do. I have planted herb seeds. I have sorted out restaurants, car hire, invoices, helped Ian move the chicken arks outside onto the grass and done lots of weeding. It doesn't look like I've done lots of weeding, but I have honest!

Griezites-henge

Ian has been trying to get the place shipshape and looking good. He has mowed grass, but of course with warmth and rain it needs doing again. He has moved the tractor equipment away from in front of the girls paddock to near the forest. He fixed the toilet that was sinking in one corner and he started building the next alpaca house, or maybe workshop, shop, barn - whatever it is needed for basically.

Working hard

Impressive he can still get in that t-shirt. You would be
shocked how old it is. 

We both saw a baby moose with its mother. Ian saw it being chased by dogs and I saw them later. I wondered why I saw them in the day time and the baby was behind the mother. I stopped the car as I felt it was panicking the little one but it decided to go down the bank towards the river. I had no idea what to do, I couldn't go and check to see if it was okay, because a moose mum is not something to be messed with. I stood on the car runner and listened and I couldn't hear any distress calls from an animal in the water and decided the best thing was probably to hope it had found a safe place and let it's mum find it.

Looking rather skinny now after shearing. Mind you, Brencis
looks bigger than we thought he would. He's getting a big
chap now. He also decided to act up before shearing and so
he took quite a bit of convincing 

I don't normally mention what happens on Tuesday in a late blog as that is the beginning of a blog week (if that makes sense), but I will this week as it is destined to be busy again as our first felting course of the year starts next Monday. So today I nipped back into our village, picked up the milk, transferred some towels to our other apartment, picked up a big pot for making stock out of bones, kept my eye on some new chicks we have and so far we have ten, we have got the boys sheared, I planted fodder beets, beetroot, carrots, peas and then put the animals away - since Ian is back at the apartment mincing up the bits of mutton, finishing off the stock after our hot plate stopped working and getting a shower.

Still waiting to hear if he is the father of a girl or boy

So all of that and we are still waiting for cria to be born. We half expected one to go into labour today, especially since we planned to do some shearing, but no. Maybe next week.

This picture amuses me because the shadow looks almost
the same as Mr. P

How elegant! Having a roll in the dirt after shearing

Look what you did to me!

Now the flies can get a bit nearer! (Look carefully to the left)
One of the downsides of shearing

Sunbathing without the fur coat. 

Oh so quiet!

Our sign went back up today with a new roof to hopefully
stop it from discolouring as much this year. You can see the
alpacas out on the grass behind.

I feel slightly disorientated today. I have now been at home two days and out on the land for both of them. It has been ever so quiet, except when our very loud and demanding sheep get going. The weather has been lovely and so I have got some gardening done on the first day, but the second day I had to get some accounts prepared for the accountants, as well as get some marking done. It was nice to get outside and in the sun though and even though I had to do the accounts, I could take a walk every now and again and see what Ian was up to.

How on earth caught me in this pose, I have no idea. It looks
like I'm dancing when I am actually trying to break off the
old Jerusalem Artichoke stems

At least here I look like I'm gardening

It had been a hard day!

Anyway back to the previous week. I have enjoyed helping my daughter and her family while they adjust to the newborn. It has been busy and, as you may have guessed, loud. My little nearly two year old grandson is a lovely, huggy little chap, but he has only one volume and only just occasionally is he getting the point that actually he could turn it down a bit. It was funny though to hear him shout Ma-mar at the top of his voice and sometimes he would also run up to me and throw his arms around me and give me the most wonderful hugs. My granddaughter being a daddy's girl was not always so huggy, in fact the morning I had to get her breakfast because her daddy was away was the day she told me that she didn't want me. Oh boy! A good start to the day, but she came round and we had a nice quiet time before everyone was up later.

The older dynamo

The smaller but louder dynamo

A thoughtful little chap and usually quite peaceful once the
ordeal of the nappy change is over

I had lots of cuddles with the little one too, but generally because he is a baby who needed cuddling and was a bit colicky at times. Poor little soul also got a cold, which fortunately didn't last long. He loves his baths but hates the process of being undressed and dressed, so during the bath time he is so content that he falls asleep, but before and after he is screaming the place down. He reminds me of my youngest who also hated the process of nappy changing for the first six weeks of his life. Oh well! Two down, four more to go and then he will probably be fine. He is already better than he was. Still I couldn't complain at having plenty of excuses for cuddles.

Full of cheek and here is his special photogenic
smile

The view from my daughter's house

I did do a bit of gardening too. At least got rid of the dead
stuff out of the beds. After the building work though, it is
going to need some hardwork

The last week seemed to fly by in a whirl of preparing young ones for trips out to take the oldest to pre-school and swimming or all of them for mother and toddler groups. I did manage to fit in some time to sew some more waistcoats but had to bring back two to finish off. I also got to see a friend who I haven't seen in quite a few years now and we had a great catch up. She even bought some lovely flowers for my daughter and a little toy for the youngest. We also talked about assignments since we are both studying even though we are mature students.

On the way to the airport I had lunch with the family at a
place where we used to take the children on a fairly regular
basis. Not McDonalds for us but Caudwell Mill, where they
serve some rather nice cakes.

An eerie day with some weird cloud formations

I also had a meeting with an academic from Nottingham University who is researching the effects of ageing in the farming community, she was in the town where I was staying to connect with those who go to the agricultural centre. It is quite a sensitive topic and it is difficult for families in isolated areas to cope, especially as support networks have decreased over time. It was interesting to hear of the various overlaps of our research and interesting to find some of the areas where it diverges. After talking with little children for quite a large proportion of the week, it was nice to have a more academic chat too.

Errr! I thought it was spring! A dumping of 8cm of snow on
31st March

Not much grass in the paddock

So back to the land, we are hoping the lambs have inherited their father's more demure tones and not their mother's demanding ones. I have been around sheep for a large part of my life, either visiting my Godmother up on her hill farm in the Lake district or going for daily walks through the sheep fields around where I used to live in Derbyshire, but never in all those years have I known such noisy sheep as these. It is not just the volume or the length of time they make a racquet but the tone, which almost sounds aggressive. They want to be out on the grass of course and whereas we have started letting the alpacas out, the sheep are far harder on what little grass there is since they eat twice as much as the alpacas, which means they would do irreparable damage. So for the time being they have to continue to eat hay but what they really want besides the grass is the sheep grain, which they get each evening. So until the grass gets going we have to put up with it, or rather Ian does. Methinks there are some heading for the freezer later in the year.

A rush to get out on the little bit of grass

Mari looking very fluffy

There have been a few visitors again this week, some before I got back and some after. The first couple of visitors booked for a walk with Brencis and he performed admirably. Ian tried to take Mr. P as well but he was more reluctant. This is the first time we have had a request for a walk and been able to let them. The first couple who asked, we had to refuse as the conditions were too slippery. Hopefully they plan to come back again. The other couple happened to see the alpacas and stopped to have a look at the strange animals.

The boys, especially Turbjørn, knew what Ian was doing and
were queuing up at the gate in anticipation

In a rush they are through

Ian's week has been an eclectic one from chipping small branches from trees he cut over winter (which will be used on the road way) to fixing our halogen oven with a thermostat I brought back from the UK. He also managed to chain harrow the grass, which is like giving the grass a good combing after the winter to take off some of the dead thatch. It isn't necessary every year and last year he didn't manage as it was too wet and then the grass grew too long. In between dumpings of snow, there has been enough dry days this year for the ground to firm up, so he can get the tractor out to do those kinds of jobs.

Veronica

Hopefully Chanel's fleece is as good this year. I wonder
what colour her baby will be though. She should be due at
the end of May or beginning of June

Whilst I have been away he has also been processing Chanel's fleece, which seems to be another super warm type similar to Veronica's, so it will be interesting to know how it knits up. There is less time to process fleece in the evenings now though because he is spending more and more time out on the land as the days get longer. Soon it will be time to transition to living in the caravan again and our days will be spent trying to prepare the land for planting and all the other spring and then summer tasks. And so the cycle starts again!

The lizard's are appearing and we have seen fish and
frogspawn in the ponds

The birds of prey are also coming back and we have heard
the cranes starting their very loud mating calls. The storks
too have returned