Poddy Calves

Last Thursday we went off to a local dairy to pick up some poddy calves.  I have not done any for awhile and am not planning any trips away in e near future so it seemed like a good time to do it.

Five poddy calves drinking at the calfeteria; what a clever name!

I was silly enough to come home with six calves when the calfeteria only feeds five so this little fellow gets a bucket instead.  It all works well enough.

When these guys are down to one milk feed a day I will put them in the creek paddock.  For now they are romping about in the orchard close to the house.

D-Ram

On Monday the 18th of March I worked in the morning, had a PE assignment due and a History Quiz to prepare for.  Naturally this was the day the agent called to say he had just bought us a new ram from the sale in town and we had drive in to pick him up.

This is our 4th ram in four breeding seasons; I kid you not.  Our good Wiltshire Horn ram died on the cusp of our first breeding season and we replaced him with a Dorper and he was a nice little ram with a good temperament; shame he didn't last.  Our next Dorper was a commercial stud bred ram and he was rather expensive; given our previous track record I should have known better, he disappeared into thin air after one season with the ewes.  Sheep-napped? He wasn't with any of the neighbors sheep so who knows what happened; he certainly isn't anywhere here.

This latest fellow is a White Dorper, he is actually not a bad type of ram and I am glad he is a White as the  previous two Dorpers had been throwing a lot of black lambs; I was most impressed with the $25 sale price.  I realised today when we saw him serving ewes that I had not gotten around to blogging his arrival. I hope we keep him longer than the others, it is a pain buying a new ram each season although at least we don't have to worry about in-breeding.

We call him Dram, or Ram number 'D'.  

Summer Storms

I love summer storm season.  There is something fun about the gradual build up of pressure ending in a burst of welcome rain and thunder.  Of course, like many things I like there is a down side... 

Another tree flattened a fence that we are yet to clean up.  Given it was marked to be pulled up this isn't so bad, but still annoying.  

I guess Mother Nature just likes to remind us she is in charge around here!

Climbing Wall

Ages ago I posted about 'The Great Wall' and then never posted any more updates.  The Mr finally asked me to do it because he is pretty happy with his efforts on this project.

On one wall of the old workshop we built a climbing wall.  The walls of the shed had to be re-framed, ply had to be painted, holes had to be drilled and t-nuts had to be put in so the hold could be screwed in.

All the effort was worth it, the whole family enjoys playing on the wall and having some fun.

I prefer trad climbing, but given the lack of rock right here this is pretty good too.

Painting

I think I saw a tumbleweed blow through this space awhile ago.  Updates have been few and far between yet slowly but surely, stuff has been getting done about the place. 

The above photo was taken the day we moved in.  It is an enclosed verandah and this is where the children sleep; Blue up this end, and Possum down the other end.  The ceiling is just over 6 foot 'high' on the low end.

We braved the heatwave over the Christmas break to paint.  We decided to paint all of the timber boards a lighter colour to open up the room.  This was NOT a fun job, it was slow work with a small brush to get in all the gaps between the boards.  It was horrid stuff.  

The end result was worth it.  The small rooms look lighter and brighter.  This is Dulux Whisper White with Royal Beige trim, we painted the ceiling in Whisper White too.  The new plasterboard sections came up well and the children are both really happy to have 'new' rooms.  Just the rest of the house to go...