Peter has been working overtime one one job. A brand new system for an accountancy firm in Te Awamutu, this included working one weekend (fortunately it was wet so he couldn’t have worked in the garden).
Whilst on her two week holiday, Ann managed to make some lemonade from our own lemons – yummy. Her culinary skills now extend to Vegetarian chilli, scones, zucchini bread, carrot cake, pumpkin soup and home made lemonade.
At the monthly market in the village Ann found a local cheese – Cloudy Mountain Cheeses are from Pirongia and do some very nice cheeses. She also found some handmade chocolates from Huntly.
The trees along our driveway have come down – all 27 of them. The two lads (about 17 and 13 years old) managed to get all the trees down, branches trimmed and logs piled in half a day. Mind you they also managed to allow next door’s horse escape into the field beyond. So Ann spent the next hour trying to get it back into its paddock. Since Ann’s equine experience is limited (she touched a horse once on a school trip to a farm) her efforts were unsuccessful. Luckily the two lads were able to chase the animal back and fix the fence before the owner came home!
We now need to collect up all of the roots and branches from the paddock and get the soil levelled before Ann can start planting her bush walk.
Peter now has a big pile of firewood to cut up!
Whilst coming back up the drive one wet morning we saw a couple of Kingfishers in our Feijoa tree.
Living in the country also means living with field mice and the occasional rat. We watched a falcon with interest one morning trying (and failing) to lift off with a dead rat in its claws. It must have just killed it but the rat was too heavy for it to fly away with its catch. Once it had finally given up Peter had to go out and dispose of the rat before Jaz and Maxie found it.
One weekend we saw a rabbit in the garden two days running. Maxie just sat patiently watching it whilst Jaz got very excited – running around in circles, batting at the window and whining. The trouble is she’s such a wuss that if we’d let her go into the garden the rabbit would only have had to look at her and she’d have been at the door begging to come back in!
The start of the month saw the continuing cold mornings but the last couple of weeks have been very, very, very wet! We’ve had three major storms in 10 days and New Zealand is preparing for storm number four after the week-end.
We’ve only managed to do about two days work in the garden this month, and walking the dogs has proved a challenge. Even just getting down the drive has meant gumboots as the flooding has been several inches deep.
News from Home
Ann’s Dad is currently in the USA (enjoying some warm, dry weather) visiting Allison, John and the kids whilst Peter’s Mom & Dad have managed to get out and do some gardening.
Ann & Dave had a BBQ – thankfully the weather was a little drier than over here!
Catherine has graduated, and is now looking for her first teaching post – well done Cath!
