How can living the dream be so hard?

The view from our apartment on Christmas Day

It was a tiring semester and it took time to recuperate. Getting my brain to slow down from the million mile an hour swirl had been necessary if a little melancholy. Half of me wanted to be with the grandkids in their various locations - not that this was actually possible (see below) and half of me just wanted peace and quiet and rest. I got the peace and quiet and my brain feels a lot less frazzled. The downside or upside to a less frazzled brain is actually time to think. I'm not sure that is always a good thing, you should ask Ian. "I've had an idea" is not his most favourite phrase.

The boys! There is a hint of spring in the air. Over
winter they are very placid - well most of the time.
As spring starts to arrive, they start to jostle each
other a bit, with some major disagreements from 
time to time. 

Karla, you are supposed to eat the hay, not wear it

Yes Freddie, it looked like someone stole the
snow

We are living our dreams and yet our dreams are not quite how we imagined them would be. I dreamed I would have a new project, a new baby and I would be called Doctor. That all happened and being in the right place at the right time with the right skill set needed (or at least some of them anyway) I ended up getting promoted to Head of the Masters Programmes for our department. It is all a bit bewildering at times if I actually stop to think of what has happened over the last few years. It's hard to believe that this is actually the first "proper" full-time job I've ever had. 

After all the snow we had in December, this was
a bit unexpected for the 1st January. It didn't
last though and our snow came back.

Don't blame you Freddie. It will be nice and 
warm by the side of the alpaca house in the 
sun.

Brencis is a handsome chap, very curious and very
greedy. Love him anyway!

That's not to say I haven't done stuff, that's how I ended up with most of the skills I've needed. I've done leadership training, counselling training, home educated my kids, tutored kids online, headed up Sunday Schools, moved countries and dealt with taxes (try sitting down to a 100 page form to update a tax consultant on the current state of finances going back over 20 years if I remember rightly - that's the land of the free for you). I've organised craft projects to keep 1500 kids entertained and educated over a three week period and craft workshops for about a dozen adults on a weekly basis. I've taken creative embroidery classes to expand on what I had learnt from my mother and grandmothers. I've done flower arrangements for my daughter's and my sister's weddings.  That's a fairly random list of things I've done, but in all that time, I've never had a full-time job. Actually not sure I had the time for one.

Hard to think of Venessa here, squinting in the
bright winter sunshine, is Brencis' half sister. She 
was one of the earliest of Veronica's offspring and
Brencis was her last. Veronica is no longer with
us, but she would have been 19 this year.

Has someone been eating the snow, Norman?

We had to look back to see if Chanel had such
tight curls when we got her - apparently not. 
She had slightly curlier hair than her daughter
but not much, but over the years the curls have
got tighter and tighter. No idea who the
hairdresser is.

What else didn't I expect about living the dream? It's hard! I wonder if I thought once I got there it would all be plain sailing and not the start of another epic journey. I never thought that being called a doctor would involve me working in another country to the one I live in. I suppose it didn't even cross my mind that I would be leaving Ian for a week at a time once a month to do that either. Thank goodness for the internet though and online conference software.

Our cats have a job to do catching moles. Ian saw
GT sat by a big molehill today, so there's hope. 
Meanwhile they continue to act as our drainage
managers and have intentions of an extensive
network this year. Absolute pain.

The soft winter has also meant
more unwelcome visitors - wild boar.
They make a huge mess in a 
very short space of time. 

Marvin out for a stroll with his mum, with Aggie
following behind.

When I was a stay-at-home mum, honing my negotiating skills - sorry kids you were the guinea pigs but I did learn a lot from you - I tried to live by the phrase of "the best ability is availability". Now I have to think in terms of my availability to who? How do I divide up that time? How do we make this work without it dissolving into a nightmare where no one wins. How do I prioritise my time when I have a full-time job, we have a farm and I need to learn Latvian. Why am I doing a blog anyway when I have so many other things I could be doing?

Norm enjoying a Christmas tree. Plenty of 
vitamins there.

More sunbathing! This time it's Karla

There seems to be a lot of sunbathing going on
here. You wouldn't think it was in the minuses.
Having said that, it can be glorious at -10C
when the sun is out in January/February.

Well the last one is easy. I do like to write. I do like to create with words too. It helps us remember, it helps us to leave a trail of where we've been and what we've done that I hope our grandkids can read some day. A friend of mine had a wise friend of hers who said, "Never move to be near to the kids" - did she not like them or something? No! She went on to say, "They'll move anyway" and it's probably true. I would have to find a job nearby, we both would actually in order to afford to live there. My skills might still be useful, but not necessarily in the right place at the right time and that could be more difficult to get employment somewhere else. We would settle down and then the kids might move. 

Last year, Marv needed a neck brace, now he's 
wearing his own fluffy neck warmer.

Only rolling in the snow mum. Honest!

The view from the summerhouse
over the garden. The bumps are
not huge moles but where Ian has
been dumping the alpaca manure
over winter, ready for the 
potatoes in spring. Fortunately
it is not as strong as cow and horse
manure.

So we try to adjust to this new reality that has only been a reality for the last few years. We try to find a new rhythm - even though the rhythm feels a little out of kilter at the moment as we adjust. Changes still need to happen, family needs to be connected to, new global realities need to be adjusted to as well. New friendships, new patterns of learning and a sense of trying to release the next generation to be who they need to be and given the space in which to do that. 

We don't need those fancy Christmas lights, we
have the real thing - real icicles.

Chanel's daughter, Ilvija - not rocking a perm.

Arrrh! The signs of spring! Evidence that the 
electric company are going to work on new
electric lines. Yey! 

The reason we, or should I say I, couldn't join the kids was because it took so long for my passport to get to the UK. I knew I would have to get it renewed early so that it didn't affect my residency. I needed at least three months on it, prior to the ten year term. I sent it off mid-November but it only arrived just before Christmas at the passport office and fortunately was processed pretty quickly just after Christmas - it took 6 weeks and 2 days from posting it to getting it back. Good job I hadn't booked to go at Christmas time. We hope to go later on this year for a family reunion though.

Yes boys! It's just a little pussycat 

See! Only Rocket Ron.

Yes the snow is cold on the paws, but it's your
choice to be out in it.

January wasn't as relaxed as I thought it would be with staff development days, preparations for the new semester and assessing work from the last semester. I also marked the last set of exams for an organisation I've been with since the late 90s in various capacities, first as a home educating mum, then a net nanny moderating their student cafe and finally a sociology tutor. The extra workload I have now has meant it wasn't feasible to continue and I let them know last year that I would be leaving once the current students had finished - I couldn't leave them mid-course. So that chapter closes, but I'm grateful for all it taught me. I often roll my eyes when people get on about the problems of online learning when I've taught students in countries as far as Brazil, Bangladesh and even the UK, from my little caravan in the middle of a field in Latvia. It taught me how to work online too and that's how I got my Masters. So I know that while online learning has its challenges, it is also full of possibilities. So when a student finally emails me to tell me they are actually not around because she is studying and travelling somewhere sunny, who am I to complain! I merely told her thanks for letting me know and gave her tasks she could do and still travel. It worked!

Oh right! So now you are sunbathing in it!

Lolly in the snow. Looks like one of those 3D pics

Our little summer house. Ian uses the small
bedroom so he doesn't use as much energy to 
heat the whole house. Since he's only there
during the day, that works.

So I have my intense weeks at work, in a physical office, and my down days at home working quietly away from the buzz. Both have their pluses. I get to meet my friend who I stay with, my colleagues who I also can call friends and my students who encourage me that there are young people today who have so much to give. I then get my quiet time at home too, not with the alpacas so much during the winter time, as I spend a lot of time in the apartment. Soon enough though it will be time to transition to my summer home and get used to living, not in a caravan this year, but our little wooden cabin. Meanwhile the snow still lies on the ground and the days gently tick by to the gentle rhythm of my old grandfather clock. Tick! Tock!

GT and Betty practising for the next winter olympics

Jumping about because she has decided the snow
is not so nice to be in after all

We had some serious ice rain this year and the 
trees were covered in thick ice, here it's not
so thick.

Ilvija with her son, Norman.

Either looks like someone's been playing or lots
of little snow Buddha's

The skies are often dramatic at this time of the year

Well there had been some pumpkin seeds drying, but
we apparently had a mouse. It must have succumbed 
to something, as we have had no evidence of one 
since.

Wintry skies from our apartment

No I'm not going across that to my car. I'd be flat
on my back. I'm not really good on ice. Fortunately, 
I haven't had to resort to the ice grips often this
winter.

Well how else do you wind up a ball of wool?

Interesting times

There were a couple of moments this week when I didn't recognise someone, very embarrassing! The first person I didn't recognise as they were waving at me, was due to a radical haircut. It made a huge difference, and that is my excuse and I am sticking to it. The next occasion was when we walked into our local hotel. I saw some people sitting at a table but didn't initially take much notice, and then suddenly I realised I knew two of them and was frantically racking my brain to remember who they were and where did I know them from. Eventually I did work out who there were and they weren't from the village and so it was quite a surprise to see them in our locale, especially as they were from Riga, they are also friends of people we know are away at the moment and so they hadn't come to visit them either. It is odd how we do not recognise people out of context, I guess that tells us something about how our brains are wired. It did mean though that instead of a quiet meal for two as usual, we had lovely evening where we were introduced to someone else who lives in Riga but comes from Lancashire like me. We traded jokes and were able to talk "Northern" and be completely understood, it was great. Just hope I recognise our son when he gets to the airport tomorrow (I am writing this ahead of time so I can spend time with him catching up instead of sat on the computer)


Talking of brains being wired differently, it is funny how our perception of old changes with age. One young lass who translates for us on a frequent basis has found a dictionary that is really old and contains some of the terms that we were struggling with the other week. This very old dictionary was printed in ........ 1968! Old!!!!! That makes us old! That makes us very old!!! We were expecting her to tell us it was from the 1930s, now that's old! Well it is to us, being early 60s children.


Since coming to Latvia we have been eating very well, of course there are the fresh vegetables from the garden and this year we are starting to get gifts from friends, such as lampreys earlier on this year, beavers sausages, goat's cheese, chicken the other week and this week we have got half a goat. The lampreys we have to work our way up to eating, they are good but smell very fishy which we find off-putting, but paired up with some strong tasting vegetables and herbs it works well (still got a packet in the freezer). The beaver sausage we are still working our way through too, as it makes good salami for pizzas or a tasty casserole and it hasn't been casserole weather. The chicken was a free range hen that was past its productive years and so had to be cooked for a long time, but it made a lot of tasty juice for stock and still had a taste itself at the end. It made a lovely chicken and mushroom pie and yes the mushrooms were picked by Ian fresh that day. As for the goat? Well that is in the freezer as we haven't had chance to eat any of it yet, I will let you know what it tastes like when we have eaten some. It does show though that you can live very well, quite cheaply when you live as a community. We have also learnt to make many foods that we took for granted in England, such as cheese, bacon, hams, sausages and found that really they are not hard, just not so instant as opening a packet from the supermarket. I planned on giving our son some home-made bacon sarnies one day while he is here but that meant buying the meat Saturday, adding salt and honey to it in a plastic bag and turning it every day for four/five days so it will be ready Wednesday.  


I mentioned last week that Ian keeps saying "winter's coming" well this week it did rather feel like it too as we have had some rather cool, rainy weather, fortunately it seems to have warmed up a lot in time for our son's arrival. Even the trees and vines have started changing colour. The rainy weather has meant that it has been difficult to get into the garden apart from the smash and grab type raids to get some veg from the garden before the next shower and so the weeds which were bad before have increased. Finally on Saturday I got in there and did battle with the weeds, which succumbed reluctantly. There are now three rather large piles of weeds complete with pulled up peas. I managed to rescue enough peas that hadn't been munched by grubs to add to our pie and they were good, just a pity there hadn't been many more of them. I did do some research and found that one of the best deterrents is fleece or fine netting to protect from the moths that lay the eggs, so I think I am going to do an experiment to thwart the beasts, one will be to cover them and another to grow something amongst the peas to confuse the moths, maybe nasturtiums and/or dill. If anyone has any other ideas please feel free to add a comment. I decided against the pheromone traps as they are just too expensive whereas the dill is free as I keep the seed - there's some drying in our bedroom as I write and so are the nasturtiums - if I manage to get some going to seed and the frost doesn't get there first.


One of the good things about winter though is the respite from the garden. There is not much to do in it when it is a metre deep in snow and all there is to do is to plan for the following year. I can really relate to one comment I read on a blog about farming this week

 "One thing that has surprised me year after year is that in spite of all the challenges we New Hampshire farmers face every season we all return for the next summer. The winter seems to refresh and completely renew our motivation for growing and doing what we love."

I can really relate to that. I was looking at a plot of land today and planning for next year as I would love to increase the number of blueberries bushes we have and there is a triangle of land that is between paths and is a jungle of ground elder and wild raspberries. By laying a thick layer of cardboard mulch and then straw and pine needles on top by spring there could be a good soil layer for the plants and hopefully no weeds. Winter will do its work too. 


Our land is our investment for our future. Often we are making decisions that will not be realised for many years, maybe even after we have gone. We are keeping many of the trees that have seeded themselves, some we remove when they are just plain in the wrong place, but if it can be kept and Ian can still manoeuvre around them with a tractor then they are kept, they will provide shelter for animals and fuel for us in the future. Oaks are something we are particularly keen to encourage and yet we may never see the fruit of those, although I would like to try coppicing them as they can be used for straight oak beams - they only take about 25 years I think! Just in time for our "retirement"? Actually past our official retirement age as that is just less than 20 years away (scary!). We are hopefully going to tread slowly into alpaca keeping next year with just a few to see how they cope with our land and our winters before embarking on rearing. They will still provide us with a few woolly jumpers anyway. 


I see these sorts of investments, along with learning how to keep seeds as the best way into our future. Banks used to be thought of as nice safe places to store money and trustworthy places to invest our pensions, now I am not so sure. There are so many question marks over the way the economy is run and how sustainable it is that even the experts really do not know what they are doing, they are guessing too and often just praying that everything will return to normal and it will all go on as before (Delamitri yet again? here and here). The riots in England this last week should be yet more warnings that things cannot go on as before and reverting to authoritarian rhetoric isn't going to help either. I am not going to say much about this as so much has been said already and most excellently on this blog, which talks about the result of investing in the rich and in consumerism that has, like Roger's blog says, meant a lot of unexploded land mines waiting to be triggered. This blog also gives a good account and I especially like Cheryl's comments if you scroll down, where she argues for a return to living together as a society.


As Christians we are told not to store up our treasures on earth but store it up in heaven


 Matthew 6 ¹⁹ “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. ²⁰But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.²¹ For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

Thought you might like a cheery picture to
finish with! A photo of our sunflowers. Sorry
haven't got around to taking any more but
maybe tomorrow I shall post some

But what does that mean in our lives today, we often spiritualise it to oblivion and still don't really tackle what it means. The Lords prayer says "Let your kingdom come, let your will be done on earth, as it is in heaven." To me that means we are praying for heaven on earth, so invest in that. Again what does that mean in practice? Well I can't give you an definitive answers because it will be different for each one of us, but instead of looking to make an eternal difference, look to make a difference now, here on earth using kingdom principles of equality and fairness, and don't store up the money for the future. It is okay to give it out with the expectation that it could come back to you (and I did say "could", it won't always) and then recirculate it again, using it to build up, encourage and restore.There are plenty of folks that need a hand to get started on a project, so invest time, and money into those places. Get a group together to see about investing in some small projects - that's called spreading the risk. Just do something, don't get sunk in despair or believe it is all going to hell anyway and not do something about it. There is a God in heaven who is in the business of sowing encouragement and love into a hurting world and he is into transformation, so sow into it. Get behind what he is doing.