A hot cup of tea.

 It was quite early when I decided to write a post today, but after making a cup of tea and feeding the cats, it's nearly time to get out and feed the livestock! 

For now though, I'm back in bed with my lovely Earl Grey, my beloved dogs beside me and the most beautiful view over my garden. It's so important to stop everything and take a minute to enjoy what we love in our lives. The last few years have been so hard physically and mentally that I often forget to stop and look at the beauty and the small magics that make it all so worthwhile.

My decision to stop the paid job has been so heavy on my shoulders and I've wasted a lot of time second guessing myself. I often look for signs that I'm on the right path and this week something big happened.  This winter has been a constant struggle getting enough firewood and after my woodpile at my other field, Tanglewood, was stolen I had and expensive time finding enough to keep the house warm. So when a tree surgeon turned up on my doorstep on Monday and offered me all of the wood that was being cleared from my neighbours property, I was totally stunned. I said yes and a little later he was back asking if I wanted the chippings from all of the branches. He was amused at my eagerness as it's considered waste and he was trying to convince me it was a good thing while I was inwardly jumping up and down! My son helped me to shift one of the biggest piles and I'm slowly getting the pathways through the potager laid out with all the gorgeous wood chips. 

 

I honestly feel that the universe is on my side and my decision to focus on making the farm work is a good one. I'd love to hear what you all think, although as yet, I'm still unable to reply to your comments. I'll get my tech savvy son to clean up my computer as technology is more than a bit beyond me for the most part, lol!

Thank you all for commenting, it means a lot to have you stop by and enjoy a cuppa with me 😍

Very strange!

 For some reason Blogger is playing up and won't let me sign in to reply to your comments on my last post!

It seems that I can publish a new post, but not comment, so I'm sorry if it seems like I'm ignoring you, I'm not.

Thank you for your comments on my last post 💗

This week has not been the best, I've been working hard on getting the farm up together but I've had too many days away from my actual work, running erands and delivering plants to people on my FB group. I did however end up with some lovely alpaca fibre as a donation to the spinning guild. No one else came to the meeting so I snaffled the alpaca but still have a car full of wool for everyone else! Last year one of my spinning buddies died and her husband is slowly clearing out her craft room, hence the huge stash of wool.

Some friends have asked me to return to one of the local markets to sell my wool and jewellery, so maybe I might make a little money that way and I can also promote the farm and the products that I want to sell direct from the gate, like eggs and surplus veg and salads. My new poly tunnel goes up this week, so I can get planting and have a supply of foods to sell. 

My first clutch of ducklings (aka the raptors) are nearly 3 weeks old and doing really well. The second clutch was really successful with another 50% hatch rate, apparently that's good for a beginner! Only one of the goslings survived though, so maybe in the future I'll get it a companion. At the moment it's in with the tiny Pekins (aka the Buffys, as that's what was on TV when the first one hatched!) who love it deeply, we're calling her Hank (honk!) but we have no idea what sex she really is. She is very delicate though. I'll get a picture up and add it from my phone.

For next week I've totally cleared the diary so that I can focus on the business of actually making money!

Hugs to you all 💗

A brand new start

 

My last post was just so negative and I can't have that on my blog. The last year has been hugely trying and there was a time when I was about to throw in the towel and head back to the UK. For financial reasons I've not been able to do that in a hurry and as time goes by I'm more settled and even content here. I won't be revisiting the situation that lead to me being here alone, it's time to move on and leave all of that behind me.

This year is proving to be as big a challenge as last year and it occurred to me a while back that I've not made an easy life for myself by becoming a farmer so late in life. I'm dealing with livestock and as I read on another blog, livestock often becomes deadstock! So far, I've managed to save my animals, but it's been hard and often traumatic.

I have successfully raised my first batch of ducklings, only 3 out of 6 survived the incubation process but I have more due to hatch this weekend so I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I don't lose any. Fool that I am, I even have a couple of gosling eggs ready to hatch!

 I have no idea what the future holds for me now. It's very early in the morning and I can't sleep because my beloved horse Bo is sick with laminitis. He's currently at a friends field so that my own land can recover from a very wet winter. This means that I have less control over his condition and need to get him home as soon as he's able to make the walk along the lane.

In a short while I'll do the morning rounds of feeding and letting out the poultry, I have 5 chickens with another 2 joining them next week and at the moment just 3 breeding ducks, the parents of the 3 above. I enjoy my morning routine, it gives me a chance to walk around the farm and check out what needs to be done, fixed, cut back, or repaire. It's my quiet time when I feel grateful to live in such a beautiful place and it feels worth the stress and hard work and I realise I wouldn't go back to my old life even if I was paid a heap of money! 

Talking of money though, it would be good to have some as my income has dried up! I can't have the students here any more, they're just too difficult to deal with and I'm tired of parenting other people's children. They come to me to learn English, not manners, those, they should already have!

So, it's going to be quite an interesting process this year and I've decided to share it on my blog, what will work and what will be a disaster, I have no idea!