RIP Lady V.

Lady V outside late last year. You can see her
bent front legs.

I was going to title this blog, "Pootling About," but circumstances changed that. Rather sadly our elderly alpaca, the matriarch of her herd, died this morning. We had been kind of expecting problems going into winter as her legs got more and more bent. We had been giving her higher doses of Vitamin D, but if it was doing anything it wasn't enough. She started losing weight and that could have been down to problems with her teeth - a common problem in older alpacas and maybe also related to a lack of Vitamin D or just getting old. We can't be 100% sure. She was nearly 18 years old, so not very old for an alpaca but certainly on the older side. The do live for around 20 years and some can get to 24 or more, but this winter turned out to be a bit tough for our old lady. 

Even though she wouldn't get up, she looked
perky and alert until close to the end

Turbjørn eating his food in peace with his 
neck warmer on. It came in useful for also
providing Veronica with a bit of extra heat
yesterday.

Veronica is her proper name but she always had a rather regal bearing and so was called Lady V. When she came she was a feisty animal. She was always one of those I dreaded trying to hang on to, as she was so long and quite powerful. Fortunately, she wasn't ever so tall. She calmed down a lot after Brencis but this could be due to the fact she wasn't pregnant again. She was definitely the boss. No one, but no one stole food from Lady V, right up till the end. When Ian gives extra feeds to Turbjørn, our alpaca with the slightly dislocated neck, he separates him from the rest of the boys to give him peace to eat, he never needed to do that with Lady V.

The boys looking on while Turbjørn eats.

Josefs today (note the skulking cat that he
just chased away)

One thing Lady V was really good at, was looking after the little ones. There is often an aunty in the herd and she let the little ones sit next to her. This was a godsend for Josefs as Aggie rejected him at first, Mari wouldn't tolerate him and Chanel wasn't really happy with him either. Lady V though would sit with him, giving the company he needed when he was little and learning to be an alpaca. Even when Aggie eventually accepted Josefs she wasn't a nurturing mother and so Lady V continued in her role as Aunty. 

A frosty Josefs. Don't worry he's
warm underneath.

The snow is deep enough to cover now to at
least 20-30cm. A good job as it meant that we
didn't have the same performance digging the
grave to put Veronica in that we did with her 
friend Snowdrop who also died in January
and I wrote about that exactly three years ago
to the day.

In her last few days she refused to stand. She ate well and Ian would use a hoist to get her up and massage her legs. At first she would remain standing once he got her up, but as the days wore on she refused to stay up or couldn't. At the very end she wouldn't even put her feet down on the floor when she was hoisted up. Gradually over the last three days she started to take less interest in food and water. Ian decided to be guided by her and didn't try anything invasive apart from some injections to keep her comfortable. We knew that even if she recovered this time around, she was going to struggle in the rest of the winter. Maybe the very cold nights hastened her end, but she was warm under the old sleeping bags and blankets Ian put on her. When Ian went to her this morning she had passed away. Still warm, but obviously gone. Mourning for Lady V is mixed with a lot of relief. She almost seemed to have decided that it was time to go and just accepted it. This made it a lot easier for Ian than when Herkules died and Herkules went through several rallies before Ian had to call the vet in. 

The snow got quite deep around the girls' alpaca
house.

From L-R: Vanessa, Veronica's daughter, Valeria
Vanessa's daughter and Silla (not related to
Veronica)

We still have a few of her progeny. There is Brencis who was bred on our farm. He takes after her in a few respects, he's a gentle giant with a sly kick. He's long in the body from his Mum and long in the leg from his Dad (Tellus). We also have Vanessa, her daughter and Valeria, daughter of Vanessa and therefore granddaughter to Lady V. We bought Vanessa and Valeria from the same breeder in Sweden that we got Lady V from. We would have loved to have got a baby from Valeria this year and then we could have had four generations on one farm, but it wasn't meant to be. Valeria is not pregnant again and Lady V passed on anyway. We should welcome another grandchild though from Lady V, as we bred Brencis to Amanda.

Brencis, Veronica's son is the white alpaca
eating the snow nearest the gate.

A peaceful sunrise out on the land. The days
are definitely getting longer at quite a pace now.
Ian used to be back by 4pm as it was dark by
then, now it is still light at 5pm. What a change
in less than a month.

As I mentioned, I was going to call the blog Pootling About. To pootle: Move or travel in a leisurely manner. Well there's not much point in rushing about these days as there aren't many places to go to at the moment. Instead I've been home like most folks and Ian has braved the rather brutal sudden drop in temperatures. We've seen temperatures that we haven't seen in about three years with the thermometer in the car reading -23C one morning. It was a beautiful day but so very cold as there was a gentle breeze. Ordinarily a gentle breeze wouldn't be much of an issue but at that kind of temperature it feels much colder. I went out to take the recycling, which is a couple of blocks down the road and it wasn't bad going one way but when I came back the draught was going down the back of my glasses making my eyes hurt.

There are skiers on the ski track and discgolfers
trying to play discgolf at the same time. Not 
heard of any clashes yet.

There is a dirt road and then a
tarmac road but I think you
will just have to trust me on that!

I had a lot of meetings this week. I find that sitting at the table I get cold as we don't put the heating on until around 4pm-ish, otherwise we are sweltering in the evening and it uses too much fuel. I can wrap blankets around my knees while sitting in an easy chair and that works well, but it's harder at the table. If I'm just listening to a webinair I can pootle about the kitchen to keep warm, but if I'm an active participant it is harder. Standing is warmer than sitting and better for us really, but my back begins to ache if I'm standing for too long. I finally found a solution and that is to put a plank of wood on the floor and prop my heels up on that, or stand on it and point my toes downwards. 

Down by the lake. I love the blues in
this photo. There is also one ice
fisherman in the very centre of the picture. 
Yes! Right in the middle of the lake. 
There are also ski tracks across the lake.

The hill where one of my son's proposed
to his girlfriend - quite a few years ago and
three children later.

The rest of the time has been filled with learning Latvian and sewing. The language lessons have been a healthy mix of frustration at not knowing so much stuff and knowing quite a bit. I discovered some bad habits that haven't helped. They are good habits in the right place but not for learning a language. I speed read. Great for reading large volumes of academic literature when sifting through them for relevant articles to read, not so great for learning a language. I don't notice the details, such as the Latvian letters used, just the keywords needed to understand a sentence. The teacher I'm learning with uses Flash cards on a site called Quizlet. I've found that very helpful for checking the words I do know and making me learn the spellings. What I did discover though is it isn't so helpful for me to learn verbs. I need to see those in a table so I can see the pattern. Anyway, I'm making progress.

The pond by the ski track

Bundled up for the cold weather.

I've been continuing with the sewing projects. I didn't have any sewing machine problems this week as I worked a bit more with the over large t-shirts and fixing underwear. Probably too much information but I was tired of the fabric disintegrating before the elastic. Some I've used the old but perfectly usable elastic and some fabric from old t-shirts and some I've fixed the fabric before they disintegrate more. I used to be a great M&S fan, not any more. The other more enjoyable project has been to cut out squares from old pieces of fabric to make patchwork dresses for my younger granddaughters. I'm not sure how much of an impact it is going to make on my stash of fabrics but it has been fun, since I got myself a new smaller cutting board and a rotary cutter. I have even ironed fabric - now me with an iron is a very, very rare sight and I think I only iron for crafting projects these days.

Believe it or not, these are my errant
seeds that have been sunning themselves
in Portugal. Every now and again I 
would check to see if they had moved
from Portugal and suddenly discovered
they were supposed to have been delivered
only they hadn't as I was in all the time.
My friend rang the post office and they
said the parcel was there. They have been
struggling with Covid19 there and so
maybe they had tried the wrong door. 
Sometimes happens with new folks.

After so much gloom, it's been nice to see the sun

Ian had the usual car problems for this time of the year. He was heading out to the land on the coldest day when it died. Not sure if ice had got stuck somewhere or wax had come out of the diesel - the more likely problem as they haven't put the additive in for low temperatures. They are never prompt enough and there is an additive but we have to find it. Ian has seen it once somewhere. Fortunately a friend of ours drove out to him and towed him to their farm. He had some of the additive needed and put it in the tank. Meanwhile Ian had managed to keep the engine running and that seemed to do the trick. Maybe it was just a very small amount of wax, enough to cause issues but not to clog up the whole thing. Seems to have sorted itself out anyway, thank goodness.

Apparently she has been following Ian everywhere.
Not so easy for a little cat jumping from one
boot print to another.

Just saying hello to Silla.

Initially Aggie chased Eyre like she always does

and Ian was worried that Aggie was going to stomp

on her like alpacas do sometimes if they feel threatened

but Eyre just stopped and Aggie just sniffed her.

Ian cleared the snow from the paddock of Aph2 as
we call it.

This is Aph1 at the bottom and Aph1b. Here the 
snow is quite deep.

Aggie enjoying the sunshine.

I think George has been eating the snow.

Ian hasn't had chance to clear the boys' paddock 
yet.

A pathway has been cut up to the girl's paddocks

Such a wonderful sight. I love winter but it is hard
on Ian and the animals.

Chanel has been enjoying the snow and the sunshine
too, can you tell with that smile?

Freddie thinks the snow is delicious

Ian draws the water from the well that is fortunately
still flowing this year.

Brain freeze, despite the water being above freezing

Looks like someone has been drawing pictures
in the snow. Not sure which artistic alpaca this is 
but I think it is a good likeness of an alpaca in a 
shed - well for the artistic abilities of an alpaca
it's a good likeness.

Chilly times

A bit dark and dreich today. As you can see the
snow came and went from last week, but we had
another dusting today.

My seeds are still sunning themselves in Portugal apparently. Obviously not in a hurry to move on to the frozen wasteland up north. It has been rather chilly just lately and not sure it has been above freezing all week. At least the wind dropped at the weekend and it meant I could get on with some jobs in the garden, albeit no digging. That would have been impossible as the ground is now rock solid. 

Chanel on look out

Mari's okay with her nice thick fleece to keep out 
the cold

I spent one day over the weekend at our apartment, just trying to straighten up - it's like semi-moving house twice a year for us. I sorted out some cabbages I had cut, so they are now sautéed and added to the freezer. Some wine that didn't work out from a couple of years back and hasn't matured well has been added to large jars with extra sugar and cloth covers to hopefully make vinegar. I guess it might be a while before I find out how that experiment worked. I managed to squeeze in the stores of flour and oil that were brought back from the land into my already stuffed cupboards. Prepper! Yup! Having said that I always was the kind of person who had large stores of dried and frozen food even before a pandemic, although I had been a lapsed prepper in more recent years. Not now though.

I love Aggie's curly hair

Frozen viburnum berries

On Sunday I went out to the land with Ian and, together with our neighbours who came to help, we got Brencis' toe nails cut and gave him his injection of vitamin D. He wasn't perfectly well behaved but we got the job done. Our neighbour rather liked giving Brencis a hug.... err I mean hanging onto him to keep him still. I'm so grateful for good neighbours who will do this sort of thing. Ian helped them with some shopping during the week as their car was in for a service and we got help with our alpaca - seems like a good trade. 

A glorious sunrise.

Having help these days though is fraught with decisions we would not be thinking about over a year ago. We are still in an area with very little Covid19, so relatively insulated from the virus. We are not entirely clear of the disease, under 5 people have it somewhere in our municipality, but areas not far from us have had rapidly increasing numbers. The country as a whole had a bad week for Covid19 numbers and the hospitals went into emergency mode as they are officially full. Latvia has patchy medical care, some parts are excellent and some are pretty poor - particularly in the more rural areas. Of course that meant that restrictions were imposed everywhere and we have to remember that only food shopping is allowed at the weekend. Of course there are all sorts of other regulations but generally they don't affect us in our day to day life and one of the advantages of living in a rural area.

Lady V poor lass with her wonky legs. She still
gets about though. Ian says she's been a bit
hungry just lately and perhaps her teeth are not
so good at grinding up the hay. She's been 
getting extra helpings to help out.

The other major job for the Sunday was pruning. Our blackcurrant bushes got rather straggly this last year and lots of berries were wasted as they ended up on the floor. We might not get so many berries next year, but at least we should be able to get to the bushes properly to pick them and slugs and snails won't be feasting on them. I also cut back the asparagus, marshmallow plants and tidied up my herb bed. After that I redistributed the mulch that Ian had added during the week - well I say redistributed, some of it was in clumps as it was fairly well rotted bark peelings that had frozen. I will have to wait until it defrosts before I can spread it out more evenly. I helped Ian to move the chicken ark that had been abandoned in the field after the chicken massacre earlier in the year. Ian had put it up on some logs to stop it freezing to the ground, which sort of worked as it was easier to dislodge it off the logs than it would have done if it had been left on the ground. 

A sign appeared on our oak tree one day this
week

Ian had a frustrating evening when he got back tonight, he went to do the five minute job of swapping the home water filter, only it started to leak when he tried to fasten it back up. Of course one shop was shut and the other had the wrong fittings. It's sorted for now, but he wasn't happy. He has also been finishing off some carding of fleece in the evenings and now onto the final spinning of a project that has been ongoing for a while. It is a winter job and spinning isn't good on the back - well not with the chairs we have and so he can only do a bit at a time. I do hope I get to see the finished product as one of our neighbours is having it knitted up into a jumper by his mum.

An officially recognised tree

You want to photograph me? Hahaha so funny!

I was pleased to hear the other day that I will get a pay rise next year. I'm going down to four days a week, which will give me some flexibility in my time, so the pay rise will offset that to some extent. I will have to think carefully what I do with my time so I don't just fritter away the opportunity. There's so much I could fill my time with, such as Latvian lessons, dealing with the mountains of fleece, creative crafts, reading and.... and..... and..... Boredom is not something I struggle with. Procrastination, perhaps! But not boredom. 

I'm not looking

I'm still not looking

Ilvija sporting the minimalist hairpiece

I did have a hiccup with work today. I needed access to google drive today for work files only to find they wouldn't open and I couldn't send a google email. So yes I was a casualty of the Google outage. Fortunately there were other things I could do in the meantime, but just shows the precariousness of relying on it. Backups of online material is needed too apparently. No good pretending the cloud is the answer to all our storage problems. We definitely need more flexibility in what we do and cannot rely on just one platform.

They've spotted something

One of Ian's little followers

We're watching you

It's still there, we are watching! Apparently GT 
aka Ginger Tom went for a walk with Ian and 
Brencis the other day, they are getting quite
adventurous.