Little things mean a lot

I think Tellus often looks very serious but here
he seems to be smiling.

It's the little things that mean a lot... so the saying goes. Well they do. One night I went to put the chickens away and I was thinking that I really must try and find time to clean them out. When I got down to the chicken arks I found out the job had already been done. Yey! The next little thing was the day I was working late and trying to get work done; when I had finished for the day I found that hubby was in the kitchen already making tea, Yey! Okay that last one might not seem a big deal but we've had the arrangement for years that I cook and he washes up. Well it is getting more frequent that he is doing both. The problem is that I am the one who knows what's ready in the garden, and stored in our various stashes around the place. Is it in the blue box in the barn? The root cellar? In the fridge in the barn? Maybe in the cardboard box in the caravan? Or even the shelves in the caravan? All of these places are within 30-50m of each other or thereabouts. Farm to fork might not be far but it feels longer when you have to do all the walking to put it together. 

Socially distanced cats. Slowly though the older
cats are beginning to tolerate the kittens and I 
mean slowly. Eyre and Ron were curled up on Ian's
lap today for quite a while. Ginger Tom though
is still quite shy.

Oh dear Aggie! Why so glum? Aggie is not 
friends with me as usual. Her leg has healed 
nicely but I realised that her feet are now cracked
and sore. She was not happy about me putting
cream on those, but they are getting better. Not
that she seems to approve of my efforts to help.

That was not the only little thing. One afternoon we decided to have coffee in the boys field to take advantage of the last warm sunny day for a while and watch our alpacas. We had just begun supping our coffee when a lady rode by on a tandem. No this isn't a joke, it's real. One person riding a tandem. She slowed right down and came to a stop and the next thing we knew she had parked her bike at the bottom or our road and she was walking up the driveway. Ian went down to chat. Something we haven't done in a long while.... no not the chatting bit, but welcomed someone onto our land who was driving or riding by. I carried on finishing off my coffee while Ian directed her onto the land with her bike and started the tour. I had vegetable beds to dig, so couldn't stop for long. I said hello and left them to it. 

Fleabane. Yes my nails are awful!
I blame the gardening.

Chanel is another who does not seem to appreciate
the effort that goes into helping her skin heal. She
had another round of treatment this weekend. A
good wash to soften the clumpy bits in her fleece
and the scaly skin and then a good lotion rubbed in.
She wasn't as bad as before but later on in the day
she went up to Ian and spat at him. Not normal 
behaviour for her, it usually is provoked to make her
spit, like trying to put cream on. Hahaha. Anyway
she hasn't done it since.

Several hours later I went into the greenhouse and Ian and the lady joined me. "Have you got far to go?" I asked her. "About 7km I think," she replied. Hmmmm! By now it was getting rather late and a ride of that far on the dirt roads with no lighting didn't seem like a safe option to me. Ian offered to take her home and I'm proud that he did. She didn't need much persuading. He managed to squeeze her tandem into the horse box that he had been stacking wood in that day and off they went. I made our tea that evening. By the time he got back it was already starting to get dark, so dark in fact that by the time I got the chicken food ready the chickens they had already put themselves to bed. Whoops! The nights are getting longer so fast.

Her skin might be wrinkly and need cream, but
it doesn't stop her from practising her yoga.

Chanel has been training her daughter in the ancient
art too.

Even the boys take their practice seriously.

A winking Lady V

I managed to mix up a timesheet for work the other day and thought I had a day off, so I booked to go and see someone for the day. Only it wasn't a day off, it just so happened to be that I was looking at the wrong month, errr December. In my defence the timesheet is usually posted to me with the correct month showing and I only looked at the dates. Did you realise that September 24th and 25th fall on the same day of the week as December 24th and 25th? No? Neither did I! I often miss the fact there is an Estonian public holiday and so just thought this was one of them. Whoops again! In my defence, the day also turned out to be a good networking event and I've worked through a few holidays this year. Anyway it also turned out to be the perfect de-stressing day. We sat and chatted in the beautiful garden modelled on an English country garden for hours and had a barbecue. We came home, rather late, but with a bag of apples and pots of flowers for our garden. Now I just have to work out where they are going to go. 

At least Herkules sores are beginning to heal up 
properly now. I don't have to bandage them because
the flies are not so bad. Phew!

Not sure who Sofie is training at the moment. She
brought back a weasel today. Unlike the hare last
week, she wasn't bothered about eating it herself.
First Eyre ran off with it, but then got bored of it. 
Then Ginger Tom found it and started on it. 
He even growled at Eyre to keep her off it.He 
puked it up though!!!! 

It's been a long slow process for Turbjørn 
unfortunately. We got the x-rays back and now
Ian can start to discuss treatment again with the 
physio - well now that she's back from holiday
that is. He has really been bothered by flies, he
can't shake them off, so he has to put up with me
putting clove oil on him (rubbed onto a tissue
and then wiped over his fleece) and cream on his
ears and nose. We tried fly spray, but really its
mosquito and tick spray, the flies don't care, they
still are attracted to him, which is why I started
with the clove oil.

I know that mixing up days off in some places could get me into trouble, but employers who cannot exercise some sort of flexibility in these days are not good news. Fortunately mine are flexible and I get my work done, so we both win. If it had been a particular problem or something needed doing on that day, I would have got it done, I can be flexible too. I caught up with emails in the evening anyway, especially as there are many folks who are working odd hours and I was in communication with people in different time zones too. It's hard to know when people are working these days, which has its good points and its bad points I guess. I can understand the need to switch off from work but I also like the flexibility that comes with working from home and I've been doing that for a very long time now. 

Mari sporting the newest hairstyle.

I see the pruners are back!

You do realise Brencis that you aren't supposed to
be eating those leaves? It doesn't seem to do them
any harm though. It would if they were weak though

"Hahaha! At least I don't have to have cream on",
says Freddie.

There is some tasty grass here somewhere

Initially the boys took quite a bit of interest in the
girls, but now they seem to be ignoring each other.
I'm sure that Aggie and Chanel would give them 
what for if they came anywhere near.

Give us a kiss! Brencis, Jakobs and Josefs went 
out for a walk with visitors this weekend. The 
first time we've let visitors take them on a walk 
this year. Covid19 and mating meant we weren't
prepared to let visitors take them earlier on in 
the year. Knowing that outside there is a lower
risk though helps.

The girls on fresh grass.

George about to put his head through the fence 
again. We'll have to stop him one way or another.

Puffballs. Definitely not for eating. At
least these ones are. Too far gone and
not sure if they are edible or not. The
white ones are fine, unless they smell
horrid.

I feel like I should turn this picture around
but this is the angle the mushrooms were 
growing at 

I wish bracket fungi were edible, but
definitely not these, they are nearly
as tough as the wood in which they grow.

More mushrooms requiring id. Fortunately
there were still enough mushrooms we
did know about that we could have for
our evening meal.