No title!

A strange sight indeed, a clear sky!

A rather strange week. Now sit back, I want to tell you a story. A few weeks ago two ladies in Latvia with an obsession for plants put in an order to a dear lady who sells seeds at a reasonable price in the great kingdom over the water (MoreVeg if you want to know, highly recommended). The two ladies sat and waited with eager anticipation for the delivery. Time ticked on, no seeds. Eventually one of the ladies in distress emailed the dear lady and said, "Alas, our seeds have not come. Do you know where they are?" The dear lady got on the phone to the deliverer of letters and asked, or rather waited and waited because there seemed to be many on the phone. 

Time for a bit of sunbathing says Brencis

Josefs often has his ears down, rather like his
mother

Eventually success! An answer was procured from the deliverer of letters, the seeds were in....... Portugal. Portugal? Why are the seeds in Portugal? They normally travel via Poland and isn't Portugal in the wrong direction? All were aghast! Has someone mixed up the bags? Portugal is nearly like Poland isn't it? A tracking number was given and checked up from time to time, but apparently the seeds have decided they like their unexpected holiday in the sunshine and have not moved since the 18th November. It's not looking hopeful as they were ordered to ensure they arrived before the disaster befalls, aka Brexit, when seeds from the great Kingdom can no longer be procured. So it looks like we might just get a refund instead. Still three more days before we find out if they are officially lost or just on an extended tour. Typical though, this has never happened before and there is no time for another order now.

Like mother like son. Aggie, Josef's mother

Wonder if the three kings had three alpacas not
camels? Wrong continent and not a beast of
burden though I guess. You can see the family
likeness though.

Another story for the week was that Ian's computer went "pop". That's never a good omen for a computer. It has done some years, after all it is probably about 11 years old now, as it was a computer I bought for my studies when I first started. However, this incident caused much consternation and anguish and sire was a tad put out. Fortunately he has another cast off computer donated by our son-in-law but this sturdy beast, also built in the days of yore, is an ancient creaking beast that works well, but slowly. I added to sire's anguish by announcing that perhaps I could upgrade my computer for work and he get my cast off. For some reason he was a bit dischuffed. This has been resolved and I will get my new computer and he will get my cast off but things were a little tense for a day or two. 

Sunshine! Now why wasn't it like this yesterday
on my day off? I feel duped! The forecast said 
there would be sunshine. Instead the sky cleared
just as we were heading home, unlike today that
was nice and bright but chilly.

Soaking up some sun

I thought my food prepping days were over for the season, but for some reason the squashes are not lasting as well as usual and they are going off too quickly. I've been having to process them instead. I found a recipe in one of my cookbooks for an appley mincemeat. I repurposed the recipe to use squash instead of apples and it works well. I will have to work on some savoury versions though as we could do with the veg and not just sweet stuff over the winter. I will also have cabbages to process tomorrow as I picked them before the severe frost finished them off. I spent Sunday cutting spruce trees that grow like weeds here to use for protection of my new flower beds, celeriac and Brussel sprouts (sire is praying that the frost finishes these off really, he's not a fan). We'll see if that works. I know it works fine for the flower beds but have found it is best to let them get cold first before covering them, as they need to go to sleep. Covering them too early just confuses the plants I think. So far the hay bale and fleece covers are working on the carrots and turnips as they are still in good shape.

Me and my shadow or how many alpacas are there?

Now boys, no fighting over the Christmas tree

Today was a little different as I got an unexpected phone call from our youngest - just for a chat mind, nothing urgent. So we watched on my phone as our grandson bombed around the room, rather reminiscent of his father, always on the go. We also had a nice chat with our granddaughter who was looking smart in her school uniform. Generally the days rumble on pretty much the same, as we settle into the new regime of Ian going out to work on the land and I working in the apartment. Just before he comes back I light the fire and then we both have a coffee. This task gets a little earlier every day, but it won't be long before the days are at their shortest - the rhythm of the year is much clearer when at least one of us has a day set by the length of daylight.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas, munch,
munch

Christmas tree. Yumm! Don't mind if I do

Me neither!

A little scratch, just there! 

Hmmm! That's better.

Definitely a good time of the year, foodwise

The fluffball, 

Three fluffballs

Off for a run now

What else do you do but sunbathe on a freezing
cold but sunny day?

Maybe a little snooze

Or maybe a run around to get warm

Not sure if it is the sunlight showing up the 
difference between Chanel and Ilvija. Normally
it's much harder to tell them apart.

The girls got their Christmas trees too

Aggie just soaking up the sun while she can

Valeria in inquisitive mood

This looks like one of those sepia shots to make
the picture look old, but it is just the colour of
the grass at this time of the year.

Silla likes to sit outside whatever the weather

Somewhere, down here, I'm sure there's some 
green grass.

Josef with his ears up this time. 

Jakobs looks like he's growing to me.

The warmest spot in the greenhouse, on top of the
caravan in the sun.

Another of the jobs this weekend was to raise the
chicks ark up onto its base. This gives the chicks
plenty of roosting space, especially welcome in the 
sunshine on a cold day. We had to be sure they
would all go in before setting the ark on the base 
as they would not be so easy to catch if they didn't
go in and we don't want to lose these to some critter.