Everything Has Changed

Hello and welcome to June, and alas, winter. Hello winter...The first day of winter here was freezing! 5 degrees! For the winterless north, it was cold. I don't usually mind my earlier milking starts because the earlier it is the warmer it usually is. Typically around 6am it starts to get quite chilly and the good old fingers start going numb, which isn't the most handiest thing (see what I did there?) when you're using those fingers for work related reasons. But oh well, life goes on. Anyway, this first day of winter didn't follow instructions, it was freezing when I left for work at 4:40am, and when I got there at 5 it hadn't warmed up in the slightest. Not fun at all.
I realised with great sadness that morning that I'd need to start wearing woolly hats soon, which is a pain because I wear my hear up in a clip and you just can't get a hat over it. So that will mean I need to start plaiting my hair, which takes up more time. Thus I'd have to get up five minutes earlier in the mornings and my hair doesn't behave very much when I put it up like that. First world problems, I know! It's just frustrating. But then I thought, it's only my ears that are cold, so all I need to invest in is some fluffy earmuffs! Hehe in the winterless north, I might just get a bit of stick for doing that.


Today is OK though, you can sit in the sun and be warm but the wind has a bite to it. Made me glad for my sleep in this morning. It seems with the current work schedule, for the next couple weeks I should be able to squeeze in every Thursday morning off work, which makes a nice change from those early starts. Until the calf rearing starts up again in about six weeks time that is.

Life here at the moment is going well, as of yesterday we've been living in good old Northland for 14 years and we left Waipu and came back home three years ago. So we've been here doing what we're doing now for three years, it's such a relief to still be going so well!

I still haven't gotten back into studying, think I'll just flag the idea and come back to it next year, if I still want to do it, great. If not, oh well. I'm not really fussed, all I know is that I'm full out enjoying not having deadlines to meet with assignments and not needing to study up on things that may or may not be helpful in the future. Who knows, I may discover something else worth studying in the next six months, so it gives me time to plan if that was the case.
I quit being part of the young farmers' regional committee last week and it feels great to be well, set free, if that is the best way to describe it. I think I'm walking away from the club itself as well now, as are a couple other members - which surprised me. Yes, it means the club will die a cruel and lonely death, but hey, not my problem anymore. Maybe in a couple years I might go back, but right at the moment I'm not very keen.

However I'm not going to sit around at home doing nothing in between work hours. I'm taking up scrapbooking again. One of my favourite hobbies that I sort of lost interest in for the last few years. I just need to go and get a whole heap of photos printed and set myself to work. It'll be nice spending my money on things that I enjoy for a change, which is essentially what life is about, right? I dunno, at the moment it feels like everything is changing. For the good, for the better, just because it has to, I'm not sure. But I heard Taylor Swift's song "Everything Has Changed" on the radio one morning on my way to work this week and I guess a lightbulb flicked on in my head and I sorta just - realised. It's hard to describe, but it's good.
I'm ditching a whole heap of things and taking up some better things instead. What a better time to do it than with the change of season?


The puppies are up to absolutely no good these days. Actually, sorry, I meant Tessa the Terrier is up to absolutely no good these days. See, the other week I caught her on the lounge coffee table sniffing at a packet of wrapped up Gingernut biscuits. She got a yelling at from me for being on the table (what the heck?!) and I carried on with my day. Anyway later on I came back inside to hear Jackson barking pitifully about something. Ok, I thought, that doesn't sound right. I discovered Tessa on the beanbag and Jackson looking really sad - watching Tessa eating a Gingernut biscuit because she wasn't sharing with him! I honestly couldn't believe it, threw away the next couple biscuits in the packet that may have been contaminated by doggy breath and put said packet on the bench instead.

Fast forward a couple days, I discover the dogs - on two different occasions - have gotten into the bathroom and helped themselves to some absolutely delicious and extremely appetising toilet paper. Of course they were told off by me again. Later in the week, half of a Moro bar was left on the coffee table again, nobody thought much of it.
Mum found Miss Tessa chewing on something - part of the wrapper it seemed. Moro is missing in action but my detective skills showed some caramel on her jersey so the culprit seems obvious. What I want to know though, is what the heck is the dog doing helping herself to chocolate, and if we as people find Moro's chewy and difficult to eat - how did she do it so well!? Don't worry, the dog is okay, the chocolate didn't seem to harm her thank goodness.
Later on Mum and Dad went to work, and (for some unknown reason) Mum took a half bag of winegum lollies out of one of the vehicles and left them inside, out of dog reach, on the wall unit. That was fine, except that I came back into the room about ten minutes later to see Tessa chewing on something hard out whilst trying to act innocent. And poor Jackson was chewing on a pen that Tessa must have thrown at him to shut him up while she climbed up there. The bag was ripped open and a few winegums were laying around, so. That was thrown in the bin - no way were we having any more of those!

But alas, it doesn't stop there! That very same day before Mum left, she had gotten some sweet, short crust pastry out of the freezer to defrost. The intention was that I would cook it during the day and she would make custard for the pie later. Tessa got there first. She must have climbed onto the back of the couch - which is just below the bench, and helped herself to at least a quarter of the raw pastry. It was only because I went to cook it, that I realised a fair chunk was missing...I think she felt kinda sick later on that day. Possibly. The issue is that you really, really want to yell and scream at her. But you can't stop laughing that she wouldn't take it seriously anyway.
Today Mum saw Tessa go into the bathroom, grab a hold of the toilet paper - and ran with it, a long length flying around in the air behind her as it unrolled at high speed. She is so darn comical, but so darn naughty. We can't leave the room without her doing something troublesome.

Tessa

There are a few days, quite often where I just sit at home and get seriously bored out of my mind, to the point where I can stalk through the house, possibly zombie eyed, trying to find something to set my mind to. There are a few things I can do, sure, but they are the sort of things you can only do if you are seriously enthused to do it. So if you aren't enthused, one must go find some job to do that takes no concentration but it needs doing and nothing can be harmed by doing it wrong if your mind isn't set to the task.
That being said, there was one day last week where I was left home alone to watch the dogs and hang out by myself, so I weeded the garden. Quite honestly. I was that bored, I went out there and hacked away at all the deadly nightshade that had taken residence in the potato patch and biffed it all in the compost and also planted some kumara. Some of the sacks of kumara we've bought in the last month or so had started sprouting tubers, so Mum and I thought we'd give it a shot, and put the tubers in some water for a few weeks until I got around to planting them. They're in big pots in the glasshouse now, so at least the cooler weather shouldn't harm them. I'm pretty excited to grow my own kumara, it's like one of the best foods on the planet - just saying.

So now, instead of wandering around bug eyed, looking for something to do, I flick through my new recipe books Mum and Dad gave me at Christmas - 200 chocolate recipes and 200 baking recipes. Sometime last week I made these marbled cupcakes, you know, with real chocolate and a sweet, sweet butter icing. I honestly wasn't too keen on them, but everyone else really enjoyed them. Although I'll skip out on their butter icing recipe (white and chocolate coloured to match the cake) and just do a normal icing next time round. Or perhaps do less icing, something anyway because it was just too sweet./
While yesterday I made a beetroot chocolate cake. Yep, you heard right. I've heard of people doing it before, but scoffed at the idea - eww, beetroot in a chocolate cake, no way. Basically because I hate carrot cakes and that's all I can think of when I imagine vegetables in a cake! But everyone swears by this type of cake, it was in the recipe book, it doesn't need alcohol (why do yummy looking chocolate cakes need alcohol?!?!) so I gave it a shot. I'm impressed.

Apart from looking at the batter with the deep purple colour, and not being game enough to try the batter raw like I would with any other recipe, the cake is perfect. Let me just say that recently I'm not the best at making cakes, the intention is good but no matter how hard I try to get it done quickly without over beating, it always takes far too long to cook and turns out hard on the outside and not quite cooked in the centre. (Our old cake tin died, it makes a difference).
However, this blimmen cake filled with beetroot, so, so good. It is moist, not too sweet, cooked perfectly all the way through, almost 24 hours later it hasn't gone stale and you can't even taste the beets. There is this somewhat after taste in the back of your mouth where you know you've eaten beetroot, but it's not a bad taste. Coming from someone who thinks beetroot is OK but nothing to sing home about, that's a pretty decent result!
So long as we have access to beetroot in the garden, I'll be making it again! And I think I'm going to make it for a few people so they can try it too. I mentioned it to Hamish on the weekend and my neighbour yesterday, but neither of them seemed too convinced. I will convert them! lol


Now you might've noticed above I mentioned the word "dogs". No, I didn't make a typo, we now have two dogs. Puppies, little animals. Whatever you want to call them. Last Wednesday Mum and Dad traveled north to get Dad a puppy, who we'd known about for less than a week. Yes, it might've been an impulse decision, but it certainly wasn't a bad one!
Tessa is a little 10 week old Jack Russell x Foxy, she's gorgeous. If you ever had a "Spot" dog teddy as a kid, she looks almost just like it, with an almost entirely white body with black ears and face, and two large black spots on her back. We all adore her, but she's definitely Dad's dog. The idea is that she will go to work with him to keep him company, such as sit in the spray ute beside him or go fencing with him and Nick. She's gonna need a little hi-viz jacket to look the part, but she's gonna love it. She already happily goes for rides in the vehicles with Dad places and travels really well.

Jackson is absolutely smitten, they have massive play fights where they're both chasing eachother around the house, inside and out. Although she does have that killer instinct already that we're going to need to keep in check. She grabs hold of poor Jackson's floppy ears and does the whole, death shake thing, or latches onto his legs until he yelps in pain. Of course they're just playing, but her jaws are already very strong. With that in mind she respects the cats so now I'm not worried about her harming them, she and Pippa play and chase each other as if they've been mates since birth. Quite seriously, Pippa, Tessa and Jackson all run around outside playing like the crazy animals they are, Pippa with her large psyched eyes filled with unmistakable joy.
Originally we thought that Jackson thought he must be a cat, now we're more inclined to think that Pippa thinks she's a dog, and it's great that after more than a year of her being here she has two best buddies when as a kitten she was constantly traumatised from the other cats beating her up.

I think perhaps the biggest joke is how soft we've gotten. Or, Dad's gotten. Two dogs, in the house, when years ago a dog couldn't step one paw in the house without getting a blasting. The dogs each have their own little pet bed to sleep in, and I got one for Pippa recently too from one of those clearance stores where everything is excessively cheap. Although we think that Tessa snuggles with Jackson at night to keep warm. So at about 9:30 every night, unless I'm already asleep, we all take our little friend to the porch and pop them into their little beds. Kiss them goodnight and they all snuggle down to sleep, it's so cute. The other night Pippa was being so cuddly, she gets like that when she's really tired and it is simply the sweetest thing.
When I was younger the cats were put out at night, no matter what the weather was like, and they were left to their own devices to find somewhere warm and dry to sleep. No matter how much I cried when I was little during those really stormy nights, knowing my poor cat was out there somewhere, Mum and Dad held their ground hard. But nowadays....ha ha! Tessa even sits on Dad's lap at night and watches the TV. Ridiculous.


You have to admit though, she's pretty darned cute.

Trials of Being Owned by Cats

Keepin' busy. Lots has been happening but I've little to say. So, what's been happening? Hmmm. Well, first on the agenda - my Magnolia. A few of you may remember last Christmas Mum and Dad bought me a Magnolia tree - my childhood dream. Well, it's flowered for the first time under my care, and I'm stoked. It's gorgeous! I can't wait until it gets bigger, reaching it's 6 metre height and covers itself with that lovely colour. Mum's plan is to eventually buy more of them to put on that small new section of land when we eventually get it - it'll be great to see so many of the different colours we could get.




Our vege garden is now well underway. The glass house is filled with miniature pots with all the seedlings growing, the seed potatoes and beetroot seeds are in their bed, the strawberries are spread in among straw and marigolds are around the perimeter of each individual garden. The garden is separated out into three sections - four if you include the strawberry patch - to make it a bit more easier and distinct where everything should be. And I'm not too much of a fan of Marigolds, but heck the bees like them and that's the important thing, right? Mum's growing all sorts of other flowers as well, so the potted colour around the place should look pretty neat too :)
It's quite nice to see everything growing, flowering, fruiting. It definitely is that feeling of spring/summer when you start getting fruit on the trees. The Loquat is delicious, the grapes have taken off in growth and we have minuscule grapes growing on them for the first time, and more importantly the Peach tree is fruiting.
This Peach tree, it's a pretty special tree. See, when we first moved here there were two heritage peach trees in the backyard - they were absolutely delicious! But, we thought they were so good and well, so did our Husky, Chy-Anne. She would stand on her back feet, reach up and pluck fruit from the trees, leaving the stones everywhere, so we had to pull them out and move them to a new location so she wouldn't destroy them. However, they didn't survive the move and died - gutting. We moved north, Chy-Anne died a few years later, then we came back here one day to find a Peach tree growing in between the fence and pigsty - Chy-Anne's legacy. We transplanted it, crossed all our fingers it would be OK. It has since grown massive and is now fruiting for the first time, absolutely stoked about this, where would we be without that dog? Man she was awesome.


Labour Day traffic was mental, there was one non-fatal accident on one of the local busy roads around here, meaning poor old SH1 was exploding with traffic at every entrance to it, due to the diversion. Meaning I had to take a slight back route to work, not the most ideal road, part of it is like a one lane driveway so coming across others like me who are skipping the main road was a little interesting - especially when some of them appeared to not know how to drive a gravel road! (Aucklanders, why you come north?! Where did you even go?!) Monday was a good work day, I got to take back control of one of my favourite sheds, where I haven't been able to work at much this season due to my other commitments at other farms. I have hopeful thinking that they appreciated having me back for a change, and Tuesday night I got to go there too - where, on this occasion I somewhat said it straight to the farmer. You. Need. To. Take. Some. Time. Off! He's a stubborn person, we're all a bit like that though, I guess, and came up with every excuse in the book as to why he couldn't have just one sleep in for a change (he hasn't taken any time off this season yet, and it's showing). This is the one farm I work on that I'm covering for the staff and not the boss. Ridiculous



Frodo has made her mark recently, quite literally. Rewind the clock to Wednesday: Pippa is sitting in the scullery, staring in the corner where we keep things such as bags of potatoes, onions and kumera. She has quite a perplexed look on her face, keeps looking at me saying, "Mum, there's something in there." Me, well, I'm not the biggest fan of rodents so I just tried to ignore her looks. My mum, however carefully lifted the bags out of the way and then yelled, "There's a mouse!" Me, freaking out, laughing, hiding in the kitchen so I wouldn't have to try catch it. Darling Pippa is also like, omgosh, it moved, I'm outta here! The guys were outside working, so we couldn't have gotten their help, Mum eventually caught it and we let it go outside, while trying to convince Pippa that she was a cat and needed to kill it. I think she was just amazed that her new toy moved all on it's own. Frodo, not all that concerned either to be quite honest. 

Last Thursday was my day off, Mum and Dad were out working and Nick had just gotten home. I crawled out of bed, discovered a pile of feathers at the bottom of the stairs (thanks Frodo, I'll clean them up soon) and found Pippa sprawled out on the floor, staring underneath the couch. I'll have you know, I avoided the couch for a while, Nick had gone back to his house. Eventually I got the courage to pull the couch apart, and here is a mouse with the spotlight on it, sort of thinking, 'oh crap, uh, hi?' Now I'm seriously freaking out, grabbed my cellphone, messaged mum "there's a mouse!" Help! (what on earth was she going to do? Other than yell via messenger to not let it escape?!)

Pippa is absolutely starstruck, staring at this mouse. It runs, I yell. You can probably imagine it about now. It took probably half an hour, until I managed to trap it. How? Stuff a plastic bag down one end of the metal vacuum cleaner pipe and force the mouse in the other end, spin pipe around and mouse is in the base. Release mouse outside just as Frodo arrives, where she looks pitifully down at the poor creature who's had quite an eventful morning and appears to ask if it's quite OK? Later on I see the mouse flying through the air as Frodo plays with it, she's so sweet would never hurt a fly, that cat! ;)

By now you're probably thinking, gosh, they have mice in their house? Wouldn't want to go there! No, quite honestly, we don't. I'll explain.
Saturday night, I'm 'asleep' in bed, it's about 10pm and I've got an early start. Mum and Dad start yelling, why? Because Frodo has just arrived through the cat door, battle cry and all, and released yet another mouse in our house. She's quite pleased with herself! I'm in hysterics, laying in bed above the lounge, where below me Mum and Dad are going ballistic at the cat, because said mouse has run here, there and everywhere in a mad panic. Hehe. Our house is pretty open plan, there's no doors downstairs except into the bathrooms, so you can imagine having a mouse on the loose, who knows where it could go? Eventually, it was discovered in the bathroom, Mum biffed the cat in there shut the door, told Dad it was his issue (his cat) and went to bed. lol. The mouse was caught, released and gone. One wonders whether each time it was the same mouse? What a happy thought.

Now, I get to the main part. I got up for work at 5am, nothing seems amiss apart from the couch still being in pieces from the night before. Off I go to work. A few hours later I come home again, to hear that after I left for work Mum and Dad came downstairs to discover a. RABBIT at the bottom of the stairs. Quite dead, but in quite a state, potentially looking like a murder had occurred there (thank goodness I was working) and to think that our carpet is a very light, tanned sort of colour. Hmm, we're still trying to figure out what will get the stain out, it's pretty awful. Flippen cat, left her mark alright.
And to think, I'm pretty sure it's the Chinese Year of the Rabbit....thank goodness it's not the year of the blimmen Horse. o.O

But anyway. Sunday I get to see Sam and Chantelle again - first time since August, you wouldn't believe the trials of trying to sort one date where we can catch up, if only for a few hours for dinner somewhere. Going to Chantelles for a while on Sunday night, having dinner and watching a movie. Should be nice :)
Today is Mum and Dad's 21st wedding anniversary and we've got our YF meeting on tonight (how exciting, to be honest the only part I enjoy about going to these meetings nowadays is being able to eat the lemongrass crumbed chicken....mmmm).

We have had 10mm of rain so far in October, over last weekend. Now it's drizzling out there again - a fantastic sight as the ground is all cracked up.