Variety the spice of life!

The snow started to melt and then it snowed again

It has been a varied week as per usual. One day out on the farm, other days sat working on the computer and another doing ordinary jobs like cleaning - only they don't seem that ordinary to me at the moment, but something slipped into the schedule out of sheer necessity. Don't expect a spotless house if you visit. This week I also taught at a workshop and I actually got paid for it, which was lovely.

But you have to admit, it does look pretty

A weird build up of ice on the car

The workshop was such a joy. It was actually quite simple in many ways, but it connected with the people in a way that sparked some amazing interactions. I didn't have a huge amount of teaching time, so they were more discussion starters to get people thinking. I first had a game to show how the local economy could work better, showing people how money can flow when we think creatively. We then looked at wider networks and where people had connections to other places.

My glass sculpture from a glass workshop after my presentation.
It will be fired and given a frosty look

Working on an activity, artists and workshop attendees

My last exercise was my favourite and linked artists with others to tell their stories. It was interpreted in some quite different ways, which was brilliant. It showed how interactions with artists can initiate new ideas and how artists could also convey the information in visual forms that communicated well with others and were great for conversation starters. I was also sent a sweet letter afterwards, that thoroughly blessed me, thanking me for taking the workshop. It felt like we, the leader of the organisation and I, had both appreciated the work each other had been doing.

Other pieces created in the glass workshop

Mr. B. seems to have settled in well now. Here he is eating
snow alongside Turbjørn. All the alpacas have been eating
snow again this week. They have got fresh water, honest!

As I said I also spent sometime out on the land. The mite problem is kicking in, as it seems to do every year as soon as there is a hint of spring. Hopefully we are now much more aware of the issues and know how to deal with it, but it is worrying that it keeps coming recurring. It won't be enough to keep using the same treatments over and over again and so we will have to keep an eye out for alternative treatments too. At least it only seems to be a problem for the girls at the moment, the boys seem fine, even Herk who usually seems to get the problems first. That was a relief as our youngster Mr. B. (or Brencis for his full name) has only just been moved from the girls place and thus was a likely carrier of mites.

Peedo, finally has a nickname and from now on, will be known
as Mr. P. Here he is looking a little frosted after stopping out
in the snow. He could have gone inside

No signs of concussion now

Ian got a little worried about one of our cockerel's this week. He found him flaked out and being stood on by the other chickens. He got hold of him quite easily and laid him on the floor by the side of the ark and he didn't move much. He then realised that it was not a good idea to leave him there in case he recovered and wasn't able to catch him, so he put him in our usual recovery place, the cat box. He put water and food in there and almost immediately he started picking at the food. Not much later he seemed to have made a miraculous recovery. The only thing we can think of is that he must of slipped off somewhere and concussed himself.

Chanel enjoying the spruce tree

Mr. P. investigating what Ian is doing

He's been fine ever since. So fine in fact that he actually started crowing just before I was due to set off for the workshop on the Friday. I had literally just got to the door when we heard the cockle-doodle-doo. Even our new cockerel hadn't made that sound so far since we got him and so we were shocked. We headed back to see who was responsible and saw the shocked look on the previously concussed cockerel and thought it must have been him. Then the new one started so we changed our mind, but next a competition started between the two of them. It was almost like a fanfare to send me off on my new adventure. It hasn't lasted though, none of them have crowed since. The new cockerel though, has finally gone in to the hutch part at night. He just didn't seem to understand or bother to investigate why the girls all disappeared every night.

The signs of an unwelcome visitor, dog footprints around the
alpaca enclosure. The dog had raced around too. Herkules
sounded his warning cry but Ian didn't get to see the culprit,
just the evidence.

A frosted forest of grass

We have taken on one of our friends to help us with the farm. It is much easier for her to write emails and get price lists and so hopefully we will get things running more smoothly. She will help us with the alpacas too and be available for visiting groups too. It is a bit of a step of faith that having someone available to help over summer will help us to get things moving in the right direction to be able to support our lives here.

This oak tree has grown around some barbed wire that must
have been nailed to it in the past. How long ago
did that happen?

Not time to plant anything yet!

It is unlikely that the farm will be our only source of income but it needs to be getting us there. At least we do get most of our food from off the land, although it is going to be close this year. Our freezer stocks are getting low. We have loads of frozen berries and tomatoes and not much else, we also have stores of potatoes, beetroot, carrots, onions and squashes but most of those are low too. At least I do know what we can eat in terms of leaves that are going to start to appear soon so there will be fresh onion leaves, dandelions, nettles and a whole host of other greens that are good in Spring. Of course it is not the end of the world if we run out, there are still the shops, but if we can avoid it, we will.

Frosted sheep too. You can tell their coats are keeping them
well insulated as the snow doesn't really melt in the cold

Signs of spring in the greenhouse. When the sun comes out
the temperatures actually get quite high in the greenhouse

I often hear moans about the youth of today, but let's be honest, when was there ever a time they weren't moaned about? I'm sure folks used to moan about my generation too. I think we need to give these kids space to re-think their future, not one constrained by the greed and selfish of our generation.

Different generations getting along

The storks are not back on their nest yet. 

I get heartily sick of folks knocking these generations for being self-absorbed, but has anyone asked them? Selfish? That's rich coming from the generations that have over- used resources to such an extent that some of them, if not many of them, will either run out or be badly polluted. A same generation that moans has saddled the next ones with debt to furnish their comfy lifestyle whilst they might not live to reap the storm of the future trajectory that we have set this planet on. Selfish? Let's give the younger generations a break and help them to put right what we started and to re-imagine a new day. I think this Guardian article sets out the problems they face quite well

Ian has been looking at my Kitchen Aid mixer, which is showing
signs of wear. The delight though is it is easy to take apart and
the parts to repair it with relatively easy to obtain

Signs of Spring at our other apartment too

I have been digging out a few poems I wrote a while ago and this one was originally written in 2009, but I think it still has echoes for today, as the chill snowy wind blew around this week.

When the wind of history blew

When the wind of history blew

The banking system shivered

Drew its coat around itself

and carried on

Tree felling before Spring to give space for more growth

When the wind of history blew

Governments trembled

Threw some money into the banking system’s begging hats

then carried on

When the wind of history blew

The people paused and

For a moment considered a future different

To one they had relied on

When all seemed to be restored

Once again they carried on

Not as much snow here, but a cold, cold day

But a few saw the cracks

Opened up by the wind

Growing, creaking its way into the system

Space is being created

Space into which a new Kingdom will come

Quietly without much fanfare

But sweeping across the nations

Blowing through

Sculpting a new tomorrow

Still on the tourist trail

You can never have enough cute kitten pictures

We are still getting visitors to see the alpacas. Hopefully next year we will have as many people coming to see us for when we get organised and actually start activities like alpaca walks for which we will charge a fee. We are unlikely to charge an entrance fee, because most of the time people could stand on the road and see the alpacas anyway and we don't want to cause an accident, we would rather people come onto the land and talk with us. We could of course take donations and by next year we will be organised enough to have wool for sale or wool products. One of the visitors was very interested in the newly spun alpaca wool and took some away for a generous donation, which was encouraging. She also mentioned she would like to come back for more next spring.

A rather autumnal looking sunset, but really the leaves
aren't that brown yet, it is just the way the light is shining
on the trees

We processed the barley and the buckwheat this week. It
isn't much, especially after the wild boar got in, but it gives
us an idea of how the winnower works and how much grain
we can expect from an area of land. 

I now have to back track a little and mention our other visitors. Our neighbour paid us a visit again with her youngsters who are getting very used to the alpacas and the alpacas to them. They brought carrots for them to eat, which the girls enjoyed. The boys are just not interested in fresh vegetables at all, which is rather irritating. They also brought another of our younger neighbours with them as well and so we have another alpaca fan.

It still needs some work on it, but at least getting it to this
stage is good. We have animals who can deal with a bit of
straw anyway.

Unwelcome visitors. Meet the yellow
jacket metropolis. It is hard to see and
I wasn't getting any closer to take a
better photo, but that tunnel goes down
quite a way and is a huge paper nest.
Something has been digging at it
though. Big downside is it is next to
where we are starting to grow berries.
Yellow jackets are similar to wasps but
make nests underground, not a good
combination with berries.

The next group of visitors were from Sweden and were friends of our translator. He had asked a little while ago if they could come and of course we said "Yes." They are regular visitors to Latvia as they belong to a sister church to the one that our translator attends. They were a little surprised that I actually understood a little of what they were saying, which amused me. In Aberdeen there were quite a few from Scandinavian countries and so my brain had started picking out words from people's conversations. I actually find it quite tiring at conferences when there are many languages being spoken that I am vaguely familiar with, as my brain then tries to process what people are saying and I find it hard to switch off. Just a pity that ability doesn't actually translate into speaking them. Being in Denmark for the afternoon and hearing a lot of Danish also helped with triggering memories of the language and since Swedish is sometimes similar it helped with our visitors. I still envy our translators ability though, to speak many languages, as far as I can remember he speaks French, Swedish, German, Russian and of course Latvian.

Our supermoon picture

There weren't just Swedish people in the group, there was another Latvian besides our translator and for some reason he told Ian that his job was in drainage. After the Swedish visitors left he showed us a website where we could find out where all the drains were that had been put in on our land. It was fascinating as we knew there was land drainage (I think mainly from the Soviet era when the idea was to make the land submit to the dictates of the state) but we didn't know exactly where they were, apart from those we had already dug up in excavating ponds, ditches and our barn. It was important information that we need to know, because it explains many of the issues we have with drainage and wet areas on the land. It is fascinating who comes our way.

Tracey the tractor with fangs! Actually
it was just the sickle mower attachment
stood up against the front loader, but it
amused us.

The chap who worked in drainage used to live nearby and his mother still does and so the next day he came again - I did say anytime you are in the area do feel free to come and see us. He also came with his sister and brother-in-law. Apparently he had been telling them about his visit and our alpacas, since they are on holiday in the area they wanted to see them before they go. Embarrassingly we were actually just having a kip when they came, fortunately Ian had just woken up and then heard voices. It was funny to work out some connections of this group to people we already know, which I suppose is inevitable when they used to live in the same village. The mother we found out taught weaving to the lady who spun our wool and the sister works with the daughter of one of our neighbours in Luxembourg.

A rather ethereal picture of the supermoon this time

I actually ended up talking to the brother-in-law because I found out he was doing a PhD on local foods in Latvia and so we had some very similar research interests. I gave his wife my card, so she can send us photos of the mittens she wants to make and I hope he will get in touch so I can read about his research. Again it is absolutely amazing the people who are coming to see us. I look forward to seeing what other connections we make, especially as we have a rather large write up in the regional newspaper this week. No idea what it says yet, but we will find out soon enough.

Getting started on the stack

One of our neighbours helped to organise some wood for us, which I mentioned we had delivered last week. This week he came with a chap who has a mobile saw mill and for part of the week they have been busy cutting up the wood and Ian has been stacking it. It didn't look a huge amount of wood until it was stacked, but it looks like it should keep us going in small scale projects for quite a while, like new alpaca housing. It also helps Ian to visualise what can be done with the various sizes of wood. It's hard to picture how much you can get out of a decent sized tree, until you see the people working on one. As usual though, most of the wood is wet wood, which is fine for the kind of projects we have in mind, but not for a house. That would have to be cut and stacked for a while.

The mobile saw and its operator

Not finished yet, but covered in case of rain. If the rain
holds off, then there will be more tomorrow.

Winston Churchill once said, “When you find the work you love, you will never work again.” We have had a busy season this year with many visitors, which is good and many times we sit with our coffee or tea and thank God for what we have. One of the reasons for leaving the US when the Danish company Ian was working for sold the division to a US company, was the thought of working in a culture that says only ten days holiday (vacation) is good. At least in Europe it is around 20 days minimum. Nowadays we rarely take holidays, but to some extent most of our life is a holiday - at least at the moment it feels like that. Especially when we spend so much of our time living in the caravan, in fact this is Ian's first night home for a week. I only came back because we have a milk delivery twice a week at home. Today we were moving the sheep fence and I could smell one of the smells I really love, it comes from a patch of swampy ground where the cranberries grow. I have no idea what makes the smell, as I have never identified any plant that smells like it yet, but it is a smell that makes me breathe deep and it makes me feel incredibly happy - I wish I could bottle it and take it with me wherever I go and if I ever identify the origin of it, I will.

A final supermoon picture.

The only downside is our continual battle with mites on our animals. Veronica has a nasty looking blue splodge on her side, due to a spray that we have to put on her, as she keeps chewing at her fleece, we assume it is due to mites. What makes it worse is once there is a patch of raw skin the flies then get in and cause even more irritation. Fortunately they are not the ones that lay eggs, just they are persistent - they drive me mad and that's only because they buzz around my ears at times. We have to use a fly repellent, but it is the nasty DEET stuff, which I hate using, but needs must. Next week we will have to empty out the alpaca houses of all the bedding and steam the place again. Lovely job, any volunteers? Payment, a place to stay and food fresh from the garden to eat - we even have grapes and blackberries at the moment. If you want to, I can also show you the patch with the lovely fragrant smell and breathe deep.

Green Winter

The sun made an appearance today

Okay we had the dry hot season when nothing germinated, followed by a cold spell, a brief warming spell now followed by rain that has steadily got cooler again to the point that not much further north they even had snow and we are still only in June and we are in the Northern hemisphere and not the Southern one. A few have asked how are we enjoying the "green winter." We had a bit of a localised storm out on the land and Ian heard the roar and then a cracking as he was hoeing around some plants in the field plots, next thing he knows a tree comes crashing down on our buckwheat. Fortunately the patch it ended up in wasn't doing so well, as it was over an area where he had recently pulled some tree roots out of and hadn't got around to throwing some fertiliser on it and fortunately it wasn't a big tree either. I feel sorry for my Latvian neighbours as they are celebrating one of the biggest festivals of the year here, Ligo. They stop up to see the sunrise, well maybe! One of our friends has got a marquee all set up for her family, obviously not chancing the weather. I've booked a place on the ark another friend declared he was building. Hope he doesn't take 150 years to build it like Noah did.

The clouds even looked quite pretty at times

Sunflowers! Not ever so tall yet

Since the drought broke, I am not sure if there has been a day without some rain at least. At least it feels like that. Even I, the hardened Lancashire lass, brought up in a rainy, wet place and misses the clouds in those really sunny places, am getting fed up. Ian who likes the sunny days is even more miserable and just about hanging on to his sense of humour. It doesn't help that I need to get out in the garden. I finished the potatoes that I got half way through last week and not been able to get in the garden since. We have had two and a half days where I could have got out in the garden, but I had other jobs to do and so missed the opportunity. The first dryish day we finally got Snowdrop sheared. Not exactly the best job, but the best we could do. Unfortunately we also discovered that she has a nasty active infestation of mites. Not like Veronica, which seems to have settled down and her fleece even growing back, but nasty red lesions going up her leg. I got the bottle of mineral oil that Ian was using on the shears and plastered the sores with that. After consultation with the vet we gave all of them, the boys included a shot of ivermectin - something they have to have twice a year anyway for liver fluke, but it deals with all sorts of infestations and parasites, although in this case we have to give weekly shots for the next three weeks at least. We also managed to get a scrape of her legs after wrestling her down to the ground for the vet to check on a diagnosis. The vet couldn't come out, she had too many operations.

Alfalfa - we think! The problem was the bag wasn't labelled.
If it isn't that it will be red clover so no worries.

The boys out on the grass and the girls in their paddock.
Their choice! The girls could go out in the field if they
wanted. Mind you Estelle got a bit of a shock the other day.
She was eating through the fence and when she pulled back
because we were coming to give her a telling off, she
snapped a fence post and started charging about carrying
the fence post with her. I had to block the others from
following and Ian had to catch Estelle and disentangle her
from the fence.

And all of that is to say, that scuppered the next dry day, as it meant clearing out the alpaca houses, steam cleaning them and then spraying with some noxious chemical, then putting in fresh bedding. I really hate spraying with the nasty stuff, but at the moment there is not a lot of choice, we have to act fast before all of them are infested. Having said that, apparently mites can live on them quite happily and not cause any problems, then one day some balance is tipped and they have nasty sores. The main problem with Snowdrop, is she is our largest and strongest alpaca. Even Ian has a problem holding her down. She also kicks. We both wrestled her down to get the scrape, but putting more oil on her legs was really difficult. We are not quite sure how we are going to manage a course of it, without inducing more stress that will only make it worse. Herkules has been having oil put on dry skin for quite a while now (that also could be mites but a different sort, more like Veronica's, but also I suspect brought on by being ill with his eye infection earlier on in the year), but he will with a certain amount of reluctance, stand there while Ian holds him and let me put the oil on his legs. Sometimes he protests more than other times, but on the whole not bad. He does look awful poor guy, all mucky looking from the oil and the fact it is dissolving the crusty skin, but at least pink skin is finally beginning to show through again.

That was hiding under some long fleece
poor girl. 

Sofie sleeping in the greenhouse

We have still been mating Tellus to the girls, or attempting to. We are still not sure if any of them are pregnant or not, as they don't seem to be exhibiting the great protestations that suggests they are, but they do seem to be suggesting to Tellus that his presence is not required. If they would just come out and spit at him, we would know for sure. Ian has been putting him with Estelle, as it would be quite incredible for her to be pregnant with him already, unfortunately one attempt demonstrated her improved show jumping skills as she jumped clean over all three bars of the gate in the alpaca house. She also attempted to jump through the stable door, but fortunately Ian hadn't secured that properly and she just crashed through. He was worried she would have hurt herself if it had been secured. She does all that, but still no spitting. We wonder if she is more interested in Turbjørn, the problem is that he hasn't got all the tackle and so that won't work. Oh boy! This is proving more difficult than in the books. Still I'm sure we will find out by the end of the year if they are pregnant.

Estelle gazing over the fence - probably at Turbjørn not Tellus

Estelle and Agnese. Estelle is still not quite sure is she is a
child or an adult. She is two years old

This is turning into a bit of a purely alpaca blog, but then there hasn't been much else happening besides raining a lot. Agnese continues to have a bottle, but quite often she is refusing now. She is putting on weight and getting stronger, so she must be getting her energy from somewhere. The only other things that got done was some more work on the Sociology course I'll be teaching in September (although trying to upload anything on that, was tricky with heavy rain affecting the internet connection) and finishing a draft report for the reflection workshop I did at the end of May. I could have done it earlier but I was waiting for some translation and photos which I got towards the end of last week.

We have grapes

Working in the greenhouse at least. And yes I have a
sweatshirt on, even in the greenhouse

The peas are growing well - in the greenhouse

But the blackberries are flourishing outside.

Winter's arrived

Sunrise at -18C! Beautiful

Winter looks to have arrived again, only this time we know it is likely to be a bit more permanent than the cold we experienced in November. Now we have the problems of frozen water for our animals, because, despite the cold, there is not enough snow for them to eat in its place, which is what they do normally when we have a cold spell. We have too many animals to carry water easily out to the land and the water situation is not sorted out yet, as it hasn't been the right time to dig the well. We have ponds, but they are frozen over now. Still Ian is resourceful enough to work it out and has been chopping a hole in the ponds to get at the water and today he boiled some up in the kettle, as he thinks the girls are not too happy with the cold water. It took three kettlefuls to get enough to warm the water up and they loved it. Fortunately the boys prefer the snow for now, what little there is of it. Ian is going to have to gather some up from elsewhere and put it in the paddocks. Not that it is hard to collect as the temperatures are down to around -18C (0F) in the mornings, so what little snow there is is not disappearing fast, even in the bright sunshine we've been having, in fact it seems to be increasing with the frosts we've had.

Soaking up the sun in the greenhouse

Two of the newest chickens took up residence in the ladies alpaca house, as I have mentioned before, but unfortunately they seem to have also taken to roosting on the feeders inside the house and for anyone who hasn't had chickens, they poo a lot at night and in this case it was into the hay. Not good! The chickens have actually been doing well up until recently, as they make good cleaners. Any food that the girls don't get, the chickens finish off. Not much use though if they then go and deposit their waste all over the girls food. Ian has put a cap on the hay feeders to try and stop this, but if it carries on, they will have to be removed all together. 

Soaking up the sun outside the chicken house

Soaking up the sun in the paddock

The vet came again this week and gave the alpacas there monthly vitamin injections. She wouldn't have done that, but she was also checking for a skin problem on one of our male alpacas. I am sure the next lot of vitamins will have to be given by me, otherwise I have to learn how to handle the alpacas better. The skin problem must be mites as the none of the boys had a problem until long after the ladies arrived. Maybe the mites arrived because of the stress of moving, we don't know. We need to do something about it, but we can't at the moment, as putting oil on their skin in these temperatures would only make matters worse, even if it did smother the mites. We did suspect the chickens might have introduced the mites, but we have checked them over and they seem okay. 

Even the sheep are enjoying the sun, after so much dreach
weather

More hay please!

Although I am still not actually back at uni yet, I've still got a lot of work to do. I am gearing up to the workload and starting to get more organised and disciplined, which helps enormously of course. I think making a point of doing some knitting (even finished another hat off this week) or sewing is helping, as it gives me a brain break and time to mull things over. I am definitely a great muller over of things and that is where my inspiration comes from in those quiet moments. It is funny how it is the life changes that have thrown me the most and not necessarily the workload. I didn't realise I would find it so hard that the grandchildren are so far. I think it was because I had spent so long as a stay at home Mum that it is strange having to go through the emotions of not seeing the children so much. Especially as my grandson was one this last week.

Yum! Snow!

Still there is always Skype and I have had a lovely couple of chats with the babies and Ian was even around to talk to our grandson. Our grandson was playing with playdoh with what looked like a large plastic swiss army knife and he played quite happily sat on his dad's lap for ages. My little granddaughter was sat in a high chair eating and playing with toys (not at the same time), but she also was quite happy for a good while. Occasionally they would realise that the picture on the screens of either the phone or the computer was actually interacting with them and they would smile at us, which was lovely.

See! Very tasty!

Snowdrop doesn't get a look in very often. Usually off
doing her own thing, but she is getting a little more
interactive these days

I mentioned last week that I was away at the time of posting the blog. Oh the wonders of being able to pre-write a blog and then set it to post while away. I didn't get home until about 9pm and had gone out at 8:30am - a loooong day indeed. It was a fantastic time though. I got to speak to four wonderful ladies who were very patient with me and answered my questions thoughtfully. I did warn the first two that it was the first time I had asked this set of questions and so I wasn't sure how it would go, they were my trial run. My favourite quotes of the day though, were when I asked one lady if she grew her own food because it was tastier than supermarket veg and she replied, "I wouldn't know. I have never bought vegetables from the supermarket." I then asked, "If she had enough money would she still grow her own food?" "Oh yes!" she replied, "because it's mine and it is fresh outside the door." By the way, her tomatoes were tasty. She had then in a jelly of some description and not cooked down like mine, but they had a wonderful taste anyway. Summer in a jar!

Ripe for a caption competition this one. This is Tellus and
he is often photographed.

Looking good even in these
temperatures

My translator also had a wonderful time too. He was a local lad who now lives in Riga and it was an opportunity to take a trip back home. He would love to move back, but it is a problem for youngsters to find sufficient employment so far away from the city. I think it fired him up though to think more seriously about it and try and find ways to move back. Hearing me ask questions about the community and how people help each other out, about the way people grow their own vegetables, made him feel quite nostalgic for his home village. Not a bad start anyway. My heart is to see more young people move back, but how they do that is another thing.