Firstly, a big sorry for having not updated this for ages. It is the kiss of death for getting a good readership to leave a blog without an update for more than a few weeks. So here is hoping that you have not forgotten about us.
Winter is here with a vengeance, with lots and lots of rain. We even had lightning this week and strong winds. It was just over a year ago that we had extensive flooding in Kaitaia and other parts of Northland. It was as a result of a very heavy spell of rain on top of weeks of wet weather that had left the ground saturated. Strange that just a few 1000 km to the West there is desert land in Australia that goes years without any rain. What a strange planet we live on.
All in all it has not been the best time for getting out there in the outdoors.
A couple of weeks ago Paddy had his birthday. He is 9 now and growing about 12 inches a week, or so it seems. He had some of his school friends over for the day. In between Lego games, they set off bottle rockets, played tag and had a shooting competition. He had requested chicken and chips for lunch and then they all had icecreams.
There has been a lot of illness around in the community. Kids at school and our own have been limping on until the end of term. The bugs that have been getting people are tricky to shift, coughs that sit for weeks and viruses that come and go making you feel hot and achey for a few days every week.
All in all we are glad to have made it to the high ground of a holiday. We can have a more relaxed routine for 2 weeks. Lots of lie ins and late nights, afternoon siestas. A bit of time to catch up with farming jobs, in between the showers. The sheep are expanding outwards hopefully with lots of lambs. My big jobs are to finally get the race finished and at the same time to fence off the orchard so that the trees can grow without being browsed.
