Eggs !!

Very exciting as I sat in my office I peered out the window and spotted a chicken bottom in the goat paddock it wasn't moving , I called Nev to tell him I thought one of the poor old Bantums had accidently gone to bed in a paddock last night and died. He and Finley promptly went outside to investigate and came back with 8 eggs ! That's right she wasn't dead she was laying an egg. The eggs are about a size five at a guess.

Last weeks plan to kick the roosters out didn't quite go to plan, we got the old house out for them aka the playhouse/goat house/chicken house . Grabbed all the roosters and popped them over the fence within about five minutes a few of them had figured out how to walk around the main farm and were just running around in the front yard, by evening 5 of them were back in with the ladies and the other 4 were just sitting in the grass. So this week we need to come up with another plan , one is going to a neighbours as she wants to breed his breed, Gold Laced Wyndotte, They are a lovely looking bird with nice sized eggs. The rest we need to either build a high fenced enclosure to keep them in or get rid of them. Currently they are all back in the main chook pen bar the naughty rooster that was causing all the trouble in the first place, he is free ranging with his girlfriend the old bantum that is laying.

In other exciting news we wont be having any showers for a wee while as Nev mowed a cap of the end of the septic system causing a medium sized water feature to appear in the yard when the shower was used this morning. I haven't experimented with flushing the toilet to see if the same water feature appears ..... 

Charlie is almost well again a bit of a runny nose but no more sick tummy so that's a relief. He is a word machine at the moment with new things popping out all the time dog,cat, chook, goat, truck, boots, all sorts.

Finley has had a really happy weekend as he has caught up with both of his best friends, which means I'd be suprised if he spoke ten words to me all weekend as he was too busy with his mates.Mixing things in the sand pit, puddling around in some clay you name it he's been doing it.

Sick boy

Highly unexciting week in the household. Today started magically with Charlie walking in a circle around the front room whilst vomiting banana and milk. No playgroups for us today.
Charlie bean was a little cuddly yesterday so I should have suspected something was amiss. A day at home is a long day for a young Fin but he is doing OK, admittedly he has had the help of about one million DVDs. Fin does do pretty well at amusing himself but he does hanker for more company than I can provide, when Nev arrives home this evening he will be swamped with a bored wife and a bored three year old.

We are moving the boys out tomorrow , no not our boys the rooster boys. They will just be out in the main farm helping the sheep to keep the grass down and apparently not fighting, I'm under the impression they only fight when they have hens around to fight over so watch this space and see if the theory proves true for us. So that's the major project for tomorrow construct somewhere for the boys to sleep at night and kick them out. Sheep are just sheeping around their not very friendly so haven't really had much of an impact on Fin or Charlie. Charlie who refers to them as goats.

So that's us home projects with dad tomorrow and all going well and no more sick Charlie a catch up with a very special Aunty on Sunday. Weeks seem to fly by, our four year Anniversary was Wednesday we will go out for a coffee or a wine together next weekend while nanny has the boys for a couple of hours. 

Cockadoodle do

That's right our babies are all grown up we had our first cockadoodle do this morning, at precisely 5.22am. At which time it was still pitch black but Nev had just left so perhaps he woke him and he won't be so early tomorrow morning ?? The sheep arrived yesterday . They aren't used to people as they have come from 170acres so it's probably a good thing stop us from getting to friendly with them.

I have found anther great reason not to eat Billy yet, although he has no balls he still trys to jump Jean when she is on heat. So we need to keep him around so that he will let us know when Jean is ready to have the 'Billy' goat to come and stay for a few days. Nothing to do with the fact that he's my mate.......

I have found a lovely family that are keen for me to be their home daycare mum however they won't need me until January. So Yippee a Job great hours, great people, perfect fit just a little while away.
I've also had a response to a room for offer so if that comes through that might be perfect, supplement the income with the rent until I can start my work.

Finley and Charlie are pretty fun at the moment with Charlie following in his brothers footsteps and being a truck nut. He runs around the house saying trucks as he drives anything with wheels anywhere he possibly can and will actively seek out his favourite truck book and thrust it at you and plonk himself on your lap, plenty of new words coming out all over the show now. Finley is good, happiest when there's something going on,  he had had three timeouts before we even left the house this morning for brother bashing but once we were at playcentre he was too busy running around having fun with his mates to bash anyone.

Pizza Night

Nev's first week of new job has gone well. To be honest it hasn't really made any difference to the amount of time he has with the family as he is just getting up even earlier to go in to work in the mornings, he has always left before we are up. He is going to bed a bit earlier, but all in all says he is coping well so that's great news it will make life a bit more comfortable. The house seems to be running smoothly too so I must have found myself a nice routine.

I have started a family tradition of having Pizza night on Friday. A bit dorky to have a set meal but it's nice to have a tradition and Fin enjoys making it with me, we make the dough in the bread maker and just add what ever we have to the top.

Saturday will see us completing some chores, I'm going to build a little table to put the goat food on. I read somewhere it's not good for them to have to lean all the way to the ground to eat, and it should stop them from stomping in each others bowls. We have an old side table frame which I will just put some wood on top of . If the weather is better hopefully we can move some rocks out the front we have decided to try and tidy the driveway up a bit. Nev has drawn an awesome Birdseye view picture of the outdoors layout.

very cool he spent a while doing it , showing house, deck, planter boxes, gardens, water tanks sheds, driveways. I think it's still a work in progress but it's nice to have a bit of a plan in mind and it's easier to chat about it and move things around this way than building it and then deciding it's stink. Btw Russ, Ruth, Tilly and Fins veggie garden still stands but I think it's going to have a bit of an extension from young Nev. The line between my triangle garden and the deck is where we are planning on having the driveway finish, also going around the front corner of the house is just going to remain driveway metal for now but one day will become something a bit prettier and be called a path. The garden in front of the front window is already in just needs me to get around to barrowing a bit more dirt up to it and taking a picture. Again framed in wood pile wood and looking not to shabby.

Oh yeah the boys, Poor Charlie looks like a beaten child. He fell of the deck the other day and ended up with a great big graze on his noggin. I couldn't for the life of me figure out why on earth he would just go and head dive of the deck as he's really good at stopping before edges and going backwards when he does want to hop down. My answer was to come later that day when he climbed onto his trike. Great stuff that he has figured out how to ride his bike not so great that he hasn't mastered the art of going fowards, poor little lad must have done a backwards motorbike sumersault of the edge of the deck. Yes this is the deck with the rocks and clay around the outside, hence the grazed head.
Fin is great so happy to be back at playcentre , his confidence is really impressive and he is building great little relationships with the other children and mothers. Very proud of my little boy.

Worms

Just to add some more excitement to my previous gloomy rainy day post. The boys have worms !! Yep that's right it was previously suspected even joked about in our family. But I can confirm the family has worms,  I won't get any more specific than that otherwise someone will grow up and disown me but I have seen it with my own eyes.

Rainy days

Yep it's pretty grim at the farm. We haven't been outside in many days as it is too windy and rainy for the young men. The gas bottles ran out on friday which is pretty good, they do all of our hot water and the hob on the oven they have lasted well at almost 8 months. The power has been pretty good during the storm, there were multiple cuts on sunday but none of them lasted more than five minutes so I was happy. I did however pop a torch in my pocket just incase after it got dark.

We have all been sick over the last week as well with yet another tummy bug doing the family. That would be our third or fourth stomach bug this year. I am happy to report everyone is better now so we will be able to get back into our routine now that those pesky school holidays have finished.

Neville has taken on a cleaning contract so will now be doing 12hr days, 8 hours work, 2 hours cleaning and about 45mins each way on the commute. Poor boy I think winter will be tough for him as he certainly won't be seeing much daylight.