Saturday, June 28, 2008
Connor first steps
well, yesterday we bought Connor his first pair of shoes, and when we got home, he took his first 3 or four steps (not wearing the shoes though). So walking might not be far off.
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Bit of a catch up
Well, it's been a while since I last blogged and since I have a spare hour or so on the train this evening, it seemed like a good idea.
Firstly the house, we've confirmed all the conditions we stated on the contract, and all the checks came back fine, there is a bit of work needing doing, but nothing major, so now the only condition we have to fullfill is the sale of the house. On that front, we had a lady through for the second time last weekend, and she wanted to come through for a third look (promising), but she fell off her horse, and is unable to come again for a while, also he partner thinks it might be a bit too far out. Hopefully she'll be able to convince him otherwise, and be up and about soon! As a backup plan, we've got a couple of open homes, 1 this weekend and another the weekend after, and a fair bit of advertising to coincide with the open homes too. Fingers crossed.
On the farm front, it's not all good news, we unfortunatly lost a goat a few weeks ago. Klaus (the Christmas day goat), we healthy and happy one day, and the next morning was scouring (poopy), and then by 5pm he was dead! From the speed of it, we think it was barber pole worm, a particularly nasty worm that feeds off the blood of the host and kills them! We've drenched the rest, and, touch wood, no one else is showing signs.
On the happy side of the farm, Steph and I have been progressing in our NZQA General Farm Skills course, we've now completed the chainsaw, ATV, 2 wheel farm bike, and tractor driving segments. I passed the tractor driving one before I even got the tractor out of the shed...Just by observing me getting her out (the ground was slipping and traction wasn't great), and parking her up I covered everything he wanted to see!
The 2 wheel bike course was fun, and I think that if we get the other farm, I will have to get a bike to supplement the quad as it will be able to go alot of places the quad can't, but as with all these ideas, we have to sell the house first!
On the Connor front, yeah, the bit you've all be waiting for..He's fine......
Nah, I'm sure I can write a bit more, he's good, sleeping through the night. We don't think he is particulary close to walking, he can get around quite fast on all fours at the moment! One neat thing we did observe on Sunday was when Steph and I were reading to him (a pretty boring book with objects and animals of different colors etc), every time the image was a horse he made the horse sign, same for light, gloves, fish, dog,bird and cat. We think he might have attempted sheep/goat too, but might have got confused with horse (at the moment if an animal isn't a fish/dog/cat/bird, it must be a horse!) It's a neat party trick for a 1 year old! Just shows how much faster their brains develop in relation to their verbal skills!
One thing he has taken to is beating himself up, when he gets frustrated he tends to hit himself on the head, we're slowly dealing to it.
He's still going swimming once a week, and is still finding it great fun, if he had his way, it would just be submersions, but he's only allowed 6/day.
Well, it's been a while since I last blogged and since I have a spare hour or so on the train this evening, it seemed like a good idea.
Firstly the house, we've confirmed all the conditions we stated on the contract, and all the checks came back fine, there is a bit of work needing doing, but nothing major, so now the only condition we have to fullfill is the sale of the house. On that front, we had a lady through for the second time last weekend, and she wanted to come through for a third look (promising), but she fell off her horse, and is unable to come again for a while, also he partner thinks it might be a bit too far out. Hopefully she'll be able to convince him otherwise, and be up and about soon! As a backup plan, we've got a couple of open homes, 1 this weekend and another the weekend after, and a fair bit of advertising to coincide with the open homes too. Fingers crossed.
On the farm front, it's not all good news, we unfortunatly lost a goat a few weeks ago. Klaus (the Christmas day goat), we healthy and happy one day, and the next morning was scouring (poopy), and then by 5pm he was dead! From the speed of it, we think it was barber pole worm, a particularly nasty worm that feeds off the blood of the host and kills them! We've drenched the rest, and, touch wood, no one else is showing signs.
On the happy side of the farm, Steph and I have been progressing in our NZQA General Farm Skills course, we've now completed the chainsaw, ATV, 2 wheel farm bike, and tractor driving segments. I passed the tractor driving one before I even got the tractor out of the shed...Just by observing me getting her out (the ground was slipping and traction wasn't great), and parking her up I covered everything he wanted to see!
The 2 wheel bike course was fun, and I think that if we get the other farm, I will have to get a bike to supplement the quad as it will be able to go alot of places the quad can't, but as with all these ideas, we have to sell the house first!
On the Connor front, yeah, the bit you've all be waiting for..He's fine......
Nah, I'm sure I can write a bit more, he's good, sleeping through the night. We don't think he is particulary close to walking, he can get around quite fast on all fours at the moment! One neat thing we did observe on Sunday was when Steph and I were reading to him (a pretty boring book with objects and animals of different colors etc), every time the image was a horse he made the horse sign, same for light, gloves, fish, dog,bird and cat. We think he might have attempted sheep/goat too, but might have got confused with horse (at the moment if an animal isn't a fish/dog/cat/bird, it must be a horse!) It's a neat party trick for a 1 year old! Just shows how much faster their brains develop in relation to their verbal skills!
One thing he has taken to is beating himself up, when he gets frustrated he tends to hit himself on the head, we're slowly dealing to it.
He's still going swimming once a week, and is still finding it great fun, if he had his way, it would just be submersions, but he's only allowed 6/day.
Firstly the house, we've confirmed all the conditions we stated on the contract, and all the checks came back fine, there is a bit of work needing doing, but nothing major, so now the only condition we have to fullfill is the sale of the house. On that front, we had a lady through for the second time last weekend, and she wanted to come through for a third look (promising), but she fell off her horse, and is unable to come again for a while, also he partner thinks it might be a bit too far out. Hopefully she'll be able to convince him otherwise, and be up and about soon! As a backup plan, we've got a couple of open homes, 1 this weekend and another the weekend after, and a fair bit of advertising to coincide with the open homes too. Fingers crossed.
On the farm front, it's not all good news, we unfortunatly lost a goat a few weeks ago. Klaus (the Christmas day goat), we healthy and happy one day, and the next morning was scouring (poopy), and then by 5pm he was dead! From the speed of it, we think it was barber pole worm, a particularly nasty worm that feeds off the blood of the host and kills them! We've drenched the rest, and, touch wood, no one else is showing signs.
On the happy side of the farm, Steph and I have been progressing in our NZQA General Farm Skills course, we've now completed the chainsaw, ATV, 2 wheel farm bike, and tractor driving segments. I passed the tractor driving one before I even got the tractor out of the shed...Just by observing me getting her out (the ground was slipping and traction wasn't great), and parking her up I covered everything he wanted to see!
The 2 wheel bike course was fun, and I think that if we get the other farm, I will have to get a bike to supplement the quad as it will be able to go alot of places the quad can't, but as with all these ideas, we have to sell the house first!
On the Connor front, yeah, the bit you've all be waiting for..He's fine......
Nah, I'm sure I can write a bit more, he's good, sleeping through the night. We don't think he is particulary close to walking, he can get around quite fast on all fours at the moment! One neat thing we did observe on Sunday was when Steph and I were reading to him (a pretty boring book with objects and animals of different colors etc), every time the image was a horse he made the horse sign, same for light, gloves, fish, dog,bird and cat. We think he might have attempted sheep/goat too, but might have got confused with horse (at the moment if an animal isn't a fish/dog/cat/bird, it must be a horse!) It's a neat party trick for a 1 year old! Just shows how much faster their brains develop in relation to their verbal skills!
One thing he has taken to is beating himself up, when he gets frustrated he tends to hit himself on the head, we're slowly dealing to it.
He's still going swimming once a week, and is still finding it great fun, if he had his way, it would just be submersions, but he's only allowed 6/day.
Well, it's been a while since I last blogged and since I have a spare hour or so on the train this evening, it seemed like a good idea.
Firstly the house, we've confirmed all the conditions we stated on the contract, and all the checks came back fine, there is a bit of work needing doing, but nothing major, so now the only condition we have to fullfill is the sale of the house. On that front, we had a lady through for the second time last weekend, and she wanted to come through for a third look (promising), but she fell off her horse, and is unable to come again for a while, also he partner thinks it might be a bit too far out. Hopefully she'll be able to convince him otherwise, and be up and about soon! As a backup plan, we've got a couple of open homes, 1 this weekend and another the weekend after, and a fair bit of advertising to coincide with the open homes too. Fingers crossed.
On the farm front, it's not all good news, we unfortunatly lost a goat a few weeks ago. Klaus (the Christmas day goat), we healthy and happy one day, and the next morning was scouring (poopy), and then by 5pm he was dead! From the speed of it, we think it was barber pole worm, a particularly nasty worm that feeds off the blood of the host and kills them! We've drenched the rest, and, touch wood, no one else is showing signs.
On the happy side of the farm, Steph and I have been progressing in our NZQA General Farm Skills course, we've now completed the chainsaw, ATV, 2 wheel farm bike, and tractor driving segments. I passed the tractor driving one before I even got the tractor out of the shed...Just by observing me getting her out (the ground was slipping and traction wasn't great), and parking her up I covered everything he wanted to see!
The 2 wheel bike course was fun, and I think that if we get the other farm, I will have to get a bike to supplement the quad as it will be able to go alot of places the quad can't, but as with all these ideas, we have to sell the house first!
On the Connor front, yeah, the bit you've all be waiting for..He's fine......
Nah, I'm sure I can write a bit more, he's good, sleeping through the night. We don't think he is particulary close to walking, he can get around quite fast on all fours at the moment! One neat thing we did observe on Sunday was when Steph and I were reading to him (a pretty boring book with objects and animals of different colors etc), every time the image was a horse he made the horse sign, same for light, gloves, fish, dog,bird and cat. We think he might have attempted sheep/goat too, but might have got confused with horse (at the moment if an animal isn't a fish/dog/cat/bird, it must be a horse!) It's a neat party trick for a 1 year old! Just shows how much faster their brains develop in relation to their verbal skills!
One thing he has taken to is beating himself up, when he gets frustrated he tends to hit himself on the head, we're slowly dealing to it.
He's still going swimming once a week, and is still finding it great fun, if he had his way, it would just be submersions, but he's only allowed 6/day.
Saturday, June 14, 2008
Saturday, May 24, 2008
Property
Just a quicky to say that our offer has finally been accepted, so now we have to sell this place...fingers crossed.
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Connor's Birthday, finding a new "Littlebush"
Well, seems blogging is becoming more erratic, that is partly due to being very busy trying to find a new farmlett.. Hopefully the search is over, we went to look at a place on Thursday, and by Saturday we had an offer on it. The property is about 23 minutes north of Masterton, in the middle of a forest! There is an 1900's house, various outbuildings, including a sleep-out. The house is a 4 bedroom two storey one. On the land is a wool shed, 2 bay implement shed, cattle yards, 2 sets of sheep yards, a few dams, and there is 55 acres of land. Huge is the best description when compared to Littlebush. We looked around about 2/3rds of it as the last 1/3 was covered in native bush. If you want to have a peek, it's here . If they accept our offer, we'll have to start making moves on getting this place sold, we've already got 1 offer, but it was shy by 5K.
On the other things front, Connor is now 1, his birthday was last Monday, we didn't do anything as we are going to celebrate it on Saturday 31st as Amy will be back from Japan, and celebrate we are..we're putting a hogget on a spit for the occasion, we figured with my family, Steph's family, friends, and antenatal people, there would be a few to feed, and the easiest way to feed the masses is a spit roast, we've already got the hogget lined up.
Oh, Connor's still not walking, and we're in no hurry for it either!
This week I had off due to being over stressed, so on Friday, I decided to go for a hunt down in the ranges, only a day hike, but I went 5.2kms up a stream bed, and when I finally sat down for lunch, I instantly saw a herd of goats!, I took a shot at the buck as he had good horns and a fantastic hide, missed, tried again, and again, at which point the rifle during the recoil hit my head with the scope..nice little cut above my eye. The forth shot was aimed at a young kid, and he promptly dropped as it went through liver, lungs and spine. I did take another shot at the billy when he was 100m or so up a scree slope, hoping that if the shot connected, he would come tumbling down, he dropped, but didn't come down the slope. I tried getting up there, but it wasn't too safe so I chickened out.
Speaking of chicken, we've got chicken for tea. Now this is a rariety, we don't eat chicken because of the crap that is feed to chooks for the supermarket, but the hens we bought a few months ago, 3 of the 4 have turned into roosters, which means they turn into chicken roasts...and I culled one this afternoon, so we've got him for tea.
Anyway, thats enough for now..
I'll update this as soon as I know more about the other place.
On the other things front, Connor is now 1, his birthday was last Monday, we didn't do anything as we are going to celebrate it on Saturday 31st as Amy will be back from Japan, and celebrate we are..we're putting a hogget on a spit for the occasion, we figured with my family, Steph's family, friends, and antenatal people, there would be a few to feed, and the easiest way to feed the masses is a spit roast, we've already got the hogget lined up.
Oh, Connor's still not walking, and we're in no hurry for it either!
This week I had off due to being over stressed, so on Friday, I decided to go for a hunt down in the ranges, only a day hike, but I went 5.2kms up a stream bed, and when I finally sat down for lunch, I instantly saw a herd of goats!, I took a shot at the buck as he had good horns and a fantastic hide, missed, tried again, and again, at which point the rifle during the recoil hit my head with the scope..nice little cut above my eye. The forth shot was aimed at a young kid, and he promptly dropped as it went through liver, lungs and spine. I did take another shot at the billy when he was 100m or so up a scree slope, hoping that if the shot connected, he would come tumbling down, he dropped, but didn't come down the slope. I tried getting up there, but it wasn't too safe so I chickened out.
Speaking of chicken, we've got chicken for tea. Now this is a rariety, we don't eat chicken because of the crap that is feed to chooks for the supermarket, but the hens we bought a few months ago, 3 of the 4 have turned into roosters, which means they turn into chicken roasts...and I culled one this afternoon, so we've got him for tea.
Anyway, thats enough for now..
I'll update this as soon as I know more about the other place.
Friday, May 02, 2008
Sutff
Well, yesterday we got rid of the two pigs, they had become escape artists, jumping gates, lifting gates off hinges, barging through backs of sheds etc....and they were rooting up the lawn. Not a good look when trying to sell the house.
The house is now on the net ready for selling .
We've gone and seen a builder company regarding building a house, and hopefully next Friday we get our first ballpark figure before we start getting down to the nitty gritty design. It's quite exciting, but still, this place needs to sell, and there are many other things to consider.
The house is now on the net ready for selling .
We've gone and seen a builder company regarding building a house, and hopefully next Friday we get our first ballpark figure before we start getting down to the nitty gritty design. It's quite exciting, but still, this place needs to sell, and there are many other things to consider.
Sunday, April 27, 2008
Owl
A bit of research on the net shows it to be the "Little brown owl", we'll still mention it to DOC tomorrow, very cool..
Oh on the farm front, the Pahiatua place few through as we walked away after they would meet us with the offer, so we're now considering other options...
Oh on the farm front, the Pahiatua place few through as we walked away after they would meet us with the offer, so we're now considering other options...
Owls in the garden
I know I haven't blogged for a while, but this couldn't be not blogged. This owl has been in our garden now 2 days in a row, we think it might be a morepork, but the call is wrong, so I'll talk to DOC tomorrow about it.
This photo was taken about 3m from the house, and the owl was about another 5m away.
This photo was taken about 3m from the house, and the owl was about another 5m away.
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
The "Farm" is up for sale
Well, Steph and I have decided it's time for a change, the first of which is the farm, it's going on the market probably at the end of the week once we've done some tidying etc. There are other changes in the pipeline, but they might take several months to come to fruition (and no, we're not trying for another baby!).
It will be a shame to say "bye" to Littlebush, but we've outgrown it and are wanting a new challenge.
Watch this space.
It will be a shame to say "bye" to Littlebush, but we've outgrown it and are wanting a new challenge.
Watch this space.
Monday, April 14, 2008
Connor Roaring
It is a common way to entice male deer at this time of the year to "roar" them in, here is a short vid of me practicing, and then Connor joining in. The will be more news and photos soon.
Saturday, March 29, 2008
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Ah, an early easter and a nice long weekend.
What a pleasant weekend, what with Friday and Monday, 4 days off work...yee-hah. So what did Steph, Connor and I get up to in our four days off. Well, on Friday, Amy and Nigel came up from Wellington for the day, and the original plan was to head out to a beach, but due to the train being delayed, we didn't really have time, so instead we took the dogs and Connor down to the river to play, and then in the afternoon, whilst Connor was asleep (as was Steph), Amy, Nigel and I just sat around chatting and drinking coffee/tea. In the evening, Steph and I had our first night out since just before he was born, this time we went to Tulloch lodge in Masterton, good food, good service, and reasonable price. In all we had a very nice relaxing evening, and it just so happened that Connor was falling asleep as we pulled into the driveway. The car prompted a chorus of Gandalf and Strider barking, which promptly woke Connor up! Oh well.
Saturday morning we were up early so as to get Amy and Nigel back to the train in time, and then Steph and I fixed a fence that the strainer post had rotated on. That was really tiring, and after that, we decided that cleaning up the back lawn seemed like a good idea...anyway, that's all now tidier.
As for Sunday, the first mission of the day was to find 10kg of salt, basically impossible on Easter Sunday, in the end we bought it from a bakers, they were a bit surprised by the request, but thankfully managed to fullfill it. The reason we needed so much salt was that I wanted to do the next stage of the tanning of the deer hide (it needs to sit in a brine acid pickle for at least 3 days.
Apart from that, can't really remember what else we did!
On Monday, Andy and I went for a goat hunt at Tora (a beach about 1 hours drive away), it was a lovely day, lots of walking, and for our troubles we scored two goats (with two shots).
We did hear a stag roaring which was pretty cool, but after the .308 roared at the goats, not much else was heard in the basin.
Saturday morning we were up early so as to get Amy and Nigel back to the train in time, and then Steph and I fixed a fence that the strainer post had rotated on. That was really tiring, and after that, we decided that cleaning up the back lawn seemed like a good idea...anyway, that's all now tidier.
As for Sunday, the first mission of the day was to find 10kg of salt, basically impossible on Easter Sunday, in the end we bought it from a bakers, they were a bit surprised by the request, but thankfully managed to fullfill it. The reason we needed so much salt was that I wanted to do the next stage of the tanning of the deer hide (it needs to sit in a brine acid pickle for at least 3 days.
Apart from that, can't really remember what else we did!
On Monday, Andy and I went for a goat hunt at Tora (a beach about 1 hours drive away), it was a lovely day, lots of walking, and for our troubles we scored two goats (with two shots).
We did hear a stag roaring which was pretty cool, but after the .308 roared at the goats, not much else was heard in the basin.
Sunday, March 16, 2008
Some photos and a few words
Another weekend, and this time, there's actually a blog entry to go with. On Saturday morning I cleaned up a rose bush that was creeping into the driveway, and then after that, I sprayed out a paddock (only 150L of weedspray!). In the afternoon (after getting back from town), we planted out the vege garden. Also on Saturday evening, I made some venison pate, very yummy!
On Sunday we had a lazy day (Steph played with Markissa, whilst I looked after Connor and did the housework), and in the afternoon we went round to a neighbors place.
As you can see, not much, but this post is more about the photos, so here goes.
On Sunday we had a lazy day (Steph played with Markissa, whilst I looked after Connor and did the housework), and in the afternoon we went round to a neighbors place.
As you can see, not much, but this post is more about the photos, so here goes.
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
My First Solo deer
Went out looking for deer this evening, and finally got one, a young (this year's fawn) spiker. The wind was totally against me, and I had almost given up, and decided to shelter in a rocky outcrop for a few minutes, at which point I saw the deer, and it was frolicking around in the dip below me, after waiting for a good shot (side on), I aimed, took a breath and let the rifle do it's job. The shot went straight across the top of the heart, causing the deer to run about 50m, and then drop. I quickly went over and administered the coup de grace (which hurt my ears!). Here's some photos.
Photo of heart
Photo of heart
Friday, March 07, 2008
Deer
On Tuesday evening I headed back up to the bush to try and claim that stag, whilst up there I did not see 1 deer, but 4, 3 hinds and the stag, I took the shot and missed. So last night I went up with the video camera instead..here's the result.
Tuesday, March 04, 2008
Sleep, what's that
Well for a few days now, Connor hasn't been sleeping very well (infact for about 3 weeks), he's been waking around midnight for his feed, and then not going back down, as you can imagine, both Steph and I are a bit like zombies at the moment! He's got a cold still, and his teeth are still cutting, once he gets over all this he's being weened from his midnight feed so we might start to get some full night's sleep (fingers crossed).
This weekend was a bit hectic, Saturday morning I managed to cull 2 does and a mutton, and then in the afternoon I started cleaning up the driveway 'cause it was a mess.
On Sunday morning, I went for a bunny hunt, didn't see anything, but I decided to go for a walk through a small block of bush on the farm, and whilst stalking through, I heard a strange noise so I stopped, and about 20m in front of me walked a stag, probably a few years old, still in velvet. What an awesome sight, the sun was playing on his coat, making it a bright red, head held high. Didn't shoot it as I didn't have permission, just watched it for a while. When I got back home I phoned the farmer and told him about it, and he then gave me permission to shoot it! So that evening I was back up, didn't find it though, just some poo!
On Sunday afternoon we went to a BBQ with the antenatal group, it was planned that we would do some water skiing but the river was in flood, so we just played on the jet boat until the intake got choked with leaves etc from the river. Bloody good fun all the same!
Hopefully this weekend I'll get back up to the bush and have another look for that stag! But the list of jobs around this place is starting to increase again, we've got shearing coming up soon for the goats, some fences need repairing, the lawns (esp the back one) needs a lot of work done on it, and the vege bed isn't finished yet either. Nor is the dog deck fixed from when we emptied the septic tank. We'll get there..just slowly, problem at the moment is any free time, we're both soo knackered we don't really want to do anything.
Oh well, that's life..at least I've only got 1 mutton, and 2 kids left to cull (and maybe 1 hogget).
Till later.
This weekend was a bit hectic, Saturday morning I managed to cull 2 does and a mutton, and then in the afternoon I started cleaning up the driveway 'cause it was a mess.
On Sunday morning, I went for a bunny hunt, didn't see anything, but I decided to go for a walk through a small block of bush on the farm, and whilst stalking through, I heard a strange noise so I stopped, and about 20m in front of me walked a stag, probably a few years old, still in velvet. What an awesome sight, the sun was playing on his coat, making it a bright red, head held high. Didn't shoot it as I didn't have permission, just watched it for a while. When I got back home I phoned the farmer and told him about it, and he then gave me permission to shoot it! So that evening I was back up, didn't find it though, just some poo!
On Sunday afternoon we went to a BBQ with the antenatal group, it was planned that we would do some water skiing but the river was in flood, so we just played on the jet boat until the intake got choked with leaves etc from the river. Bloody good fun all the same!
Hopefully this weekend I'll get back up to the bush and have another look for that stag! But the list of jobs around this place is starting to increase again, we've got shearing coming up soon for the goats, some fences need repairing, the lawns (esp the back one) needs a lot of work done on it, and the vege bed isn't finished yet either. Nor is the dog deck fixed from when we emptied the septic tank. We'll get there..just slowly, problem at the moment is any free time, we're both soo knackered we don't really want to do anything.
Oh well, that's life..at least I've only got 1 mutton, and 2 kids left to cull (and maybe 1 hogget).
Till later.
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