RIP Lucy

Sadly Lucy (the old girl chook) passed away this week. I knew she was on her last legs but she's been looking so strong lately and I think her sight actually came back. Nevertheless she must have died in her sleep cause her eyes were closed and I found her on the floor of the chook house. She's hopefully in a happy place!!! we'll miss you Lucy Loo.

Lambs growing at a huge rate and getting naughty - managing to jump through the fence - they just want to be with us - in the house if they were allowed - and actually jumped into neighbours raised veggie beds to eat her produce. Shit I felt awful. so they are no longer allowed out unless we are all outside and can keep an eye on them. Down to 2 feeds a day and i think they are ready to join the flock. however they still need their feeds so hope they are ready to leave when we go north in January for our beach holiday.

silly season has hit us hard and life is full on this side - in fact won't write much more as so much to do. Also have to sew Miss Stella's Angel wings for her Christmas pageant before tomorrow so just thought I'd touch base and wanted to post some pics of Troy's Xmas pageant this week. Bless them they were all so cute, great modern funky carols - all new to me. Troy was a king. have tried to post the video I took but giving me errors. may be too big. what a pity - was so funny to watch him lose his cape in the middle of it. Crack up.
some pics instead...

some of the angels...

...and so we begin the silly season

Thought i was dead and buried? Nowhere close - alive and kicking, revving at high speed and packing the hours in with everything from regular routine, kids, extra murals, lots of design work, crocheting, decorating, little bit of shopping, yoging, crafting, movies, stretching, tramping, lunching and girls day out to a nearby market.
hence no posting!!!!!!
i'm constantly reminded that i'm slacking off on my blog - didn't realise anyone read it to be honest (not even my mum in South Africa for whom it was first started!!!) so Sunday night - beginning of a new hectic week tomorrow - thought i'd start on a good note.

Christmas is 26 days away!!!! scary thought especially seeing i haven't written my Christmas cards yet let alone mailed them. But the tree is up, the advent calenders are hung (few too many for our tiny space - but kids love them). The wreath is hanging but the one on the door should go up tomorrow, the card tree has started (thanks T for your very beautiful Christmas card - first one to arrive!) and tonight we went to our wonderful community Christmas extravaganza which is 2 hrs of funky carols, dancing, singing, Santa and a serious amount of bling. Some gorgeous friends were up there performing and blew my mind. so much talent in such a small community. awesome.

Made this wreath last year. love it still.

Also made this advent calender last year. Can you spot the glaring mistake? Must fix it.

Anyway a bit of news, Dave won the hearing for the building of the shed which means we can officially carry on building in said spot, with said plans, only criteria is it is now titled a "holiday house". What difference that makes to the environment, to our neighbours, to the community... who the hell knows. Saving face in my opinion.... Dave and Steve (our builder) march ahead and roof should be up before Christmas.

Chickens are still alive (as is Lucy) but only producing 1 or 2 eggs a day so sadly it may be the end of their very happy and free range lives before we leave for the beach in January. Sad and try not to think about it but live with a farmer so what to do.

Which reminds me I don't think I mentioned that we are proud parents of two wee lambs who think they are humans and deserve to be inside at all times. They are fenced in but manage to find a way out and spend their days lying at my back door and trying to sneak in at any chance. They cry three times a day at mealtimes (like they are wearing watches) and drive me insane but are so fluffy, cute and human (maybe a bit too much).
the farmer who is their real owner came around on Friday to "tail" their tails, "earmark" their ears, vaccinate them and doctor the one wee lamb's gooey eye. Well I couldn't watch, hell I was raised a city girl so I was of no help to him and was almost in tears by the end. The amount of blood that came from the poor girl's ear which she tried to rub against her belly getting blood all over her pure white wool, then she couldn't stand up from the pain in her tail, and clearly her eye powder was killing her. Farmer was long gone and these two babies were crying for me to help them, falling over, clearly distressed and in pain. I txted him all the drama and said I was worried - should I be? - only to get the quintessential Kiwi answer "she'll be right!" I should have known. Crikey I was upset. Anyway he was right - a few hrs later when I got back they were as good as gold. And seem to have forgotten all the pain. The novelty of bottle feeding lambs has long gone for the kids so Kippie here is their "mother" and I'm followed around like Mary was. Priceless!!!

Wee Bella is a twin (not to the other one, Angel) and has a 2 painted on her wool.

Stella took this pic for her school "news" the day we got them. So little.

Still related to wool but on a totally different note....
Crocheting (better called "crotcheting" in our circles). Not sure if I mentioned how "hooked" I am but bought a book on 150 squares to crochet which includes circles, flowers, snowflakes etc. I'm working on a few projects, still the big blanket, dropped that for a while to make Stella some triangle crochet bunting for her room. Finished except for joining them but kind of put it on hold to start my Christmas pressies for teachers, and friends. Little snowflake tree decorations. Love them. Some on our tree!

Kids decorated the tree all by themselves! Not bad! 

One of the crocheted snowflakes!

And that will do for now. I'm so gutted I am missing a HUGE family wedding in SA this weekend. Congrats to Keith and Sarah - may you have a strong, long, happy marriage and stax of kids to haunt you!!!!! ha ha would soooo love to be there. Happy days....

the long and slow process of building

Am certainly on a roll now......
We plan to build ourselves another home (can't live in this dinky cave/cottage forever) but the consent processes in this part of the area are just shocking. it has taken almost 9 months of to-ing and fro-ing with council to get the permission to build a shed in which we'll live whilst we build the big house. Given that we live rural and we have hundreds of hectares of farmland you'd think a shed would be a given. the shed will consist of 2 open bays (for tractors, tools, mowers etc) and the third part will be our home. only 92 m2 which is tiny but it will be fine!!! anyway after much debate they decided the shed could not be in the same place where the house is planned as it would be visible for about 1 millisecond as one drives down the Crown Range. Rule with this is nothing should be visible when coming down the range. the previous house we built had to be built down into the earth to achieve the required height we needed so as not to be seen. anyway long story they found another site further away from planned house which we accepted - put in new power lines, water supply, separate sewerage tank etc etc - a lot of expense - just so we have a shed to live in (which will be used for friends and guests once we move out!!!!). approval came through on Friday saying all is good as long as we rip out the kitchen and laundry when we move out. WHY???????
who would invest all that money in a kitchen and laundry - to have it ripped out after 2 years. crazy!!!! so we'll just forget that was written for a while and press on - building starts on Wednesday....

in the meanwhile we have moved a lot of earth in preparing the site for the actual house. not approved yet and may be another lengthy process - however we were required to build burms (false hills to all those not in the know) so in doing so we have prepared the area to build. also Dave has begun the veggie patch which was put there so as to avoid having to build 2 veg patches. He has grand ideas for glass house and lots more beds but this will do for now - so here are some pics of what it is looking like at this stage - which dare i say it - looks rather large and well - ready.

Lucy the old lady

We are the proud parents of 8 brown shaver ladies. they are getting on in years now and have survived a move from one paddock to another (actually one died in that process - weak heart no doubt) and they still continue to produce some beautiful yello-yolked eggs. But there's a reason i'm telling you this, when we "got-rid" of the old ladies before this lot, we never managed to catch one of them - her name being Lucy. she integrated well with the new batch and even though we don't get 8 eggs off 8 chooks, we're still not sure it's old-girl Lucy that's not laying. nevertheless, in the last month or so I've noticed Lucy hasn't run over to me when i've put their scraps out like the other vulture-chooks, and I've wondered if she was henpecked by them so I've kind of singled her out and taken to making sure she gets some food for herself before they finish it whilst she waits patiently under the tree. This has been going on a while until the other day i put a bowl of mash down for her - right under her nose and she pecked at it - but missed it entirely. The old girl is blind!!!! surely not but true's goodness, she walked up the ramp into the coop - went a bit crooked and landed on the ground. I then tested my theory again with the water bowl and she had a drink - i shifted the bowl on purpose - she had another drink but missed it completely. Now you can imagine how awful i feel knowing i have an old lady who can't see and we've just introduced a Grandpa's Feeder to them (for those that don't know it is a large stainless contraption that stores their mash, they stand on a step which opens up the lid so they can feed away. step off the step and it closes again- pic below.) clever - also means you are not feeding all the other birds in the neighbourhood on expensive mash.

So to get back to Lucy, we started feeding Lucy individually - shooing the other girls away from eating her quota, and slowly her comb started reddening up again (it's not quite there yet) and she seems to have way more energy now - poor thing was starving to death. We went away for a few days in the holidays and i definitely thought that would be the end of her - but she's still around, bit perkier, still blind of course but she's alive. long may you live Lucy Lu!!!!

pics below. she's the darkest of them all. this was her personal bowl of mash as the others should be using the Grandpa's Feeder but the minute i stepped back to take the pic - they were at it. also the two pics of the feeder at the end are off Grandpa's Feeder website. Note: these chooks had their beaks quarterised (i believe that's what they call it - tip removed so they can't peck each other to death) before we adopted them. sad!

handmade happiness

it's been ages - sorry - i've been very aware that i haven't written for a while - busy doing all kinds of stuff. school holidays - for 2 weeks - then back at school today. we had a good time but always lovely to have my time for me when they return. we had the most awful weather though, days and days of rain and wind, then snow then a day or two of sun then rain then snow. and it's meant to be SPRING!!!! madness. freezing in my winter slippers with the heater on today and wind is fowl - at least the sun is out - but don't even want to hang the washing out for fear of losing it to the wind! Ugh

to backtrack a bit (pre holidays) - i found my crocheting which was stashed far back in the container from when we moved - months and months ago - i just hadn't wanted to even begin to look for it as had no idea where it was. anyhow - back into it, then went web searching to find tuts on how to make wee hearts and flowers etc. hooked once again. so being doing a lot of that lately. long way to go till it's a blanket though.

Also bought a stunning book called "Stylish Dress Book" from fishpond and can't wait to get sewing. promised myself i'd update this blog before i started more projects. another book I got "Grow Your Handmade business" has me engrossed to. i have so much happening in this wee head of mine - so many ideas - can hardly sleep at night. Focus...

Then made a cushion for a friend in Australia for her 40th using the crochet flowers. I whipped up a quick linen cushion cover and sewed the flowers on (however they are not entirely straight which is why the cushion has found a permanent spot on the chair and hasn't reached Australia - sorry T.) will make a another one for her and this time will make the flowers out of cotton and not wool. but i like it. Handmade happiness!

sorry we back to winter

drove back from Chch yesterday through some driving snow over the Lindis pass but rest of the journey was pretty cruisy. late to bed and woke up this morning to yet another blanket of snow - and this is meant to be spring!!!! those poor flowers and baby lambs out there - my heart bleeds. warm inside our wee cottage and catching up with emails and calls and some sewing.

i quickly russled up a cushion cover for the teeny entrance chair and apart from the fact that my seams don't line up - i like it. made from scraps in my stash of fabrics. in fact the back and one of the front squares is from an old pillowcase i picked up at the thrift shop (you may recognise it). onwards and upwards - long may the snow last - any excuse to stay inside and busy myself making. Time for a cuppa...

Spring and new beginnings

well spring certainly has sprung and what a wonderful feeling of 'newness' (is there such a word?) is around us all. We just drove up from Queenstown to Christchurch today and although the Lindis Pass was a blanket of snow, in areas where the snow hadn't fallen tiny little bulbs were rearing their bright heads - daffodils are the obvious but other small little lilac flowers - oh all so pretty.

we stopped at Lake tekapo and dragged myself (the kids and Mr D went willingly) into the hot pools - not that i don't absolutely love wallowing in that hot steamy water - just that the thought of putting this very wintry body into togs wasn't very appealing. nonetheless it was amazing - stunning views in one of the most prettiest places on this planet (my opinion of course). sun was shining - even though it had clearly snowed last night. sorry no pics as I stupidly left the camera in the car - mind you it was so steamy from the heat it may have wrecked the camera. arrived in the garden city late afternoon to a wonder of magnolia trees and other bright blossoms. wow what colour. will take some pics tomorrow. in a motel ready for bed. just here for the night and back home tomorrow after the appointments in the afternoon.

I am so excited cause last week i decided to design some wall art in the form of quotes and listed them on NZ's local handmade website - felt.co.nz.
I got my first order last night and an enquiry for a custom made one as well. woohooo - so nice to know that others have the same taste. here are just 4 of the many. go have a look. let me know what you think...

night night xxx