It's hard to believe that another month has already gone since my last post.
We have a few extra dogs at the moment, with Eric's 7 dogs, joining ours to make a total of 14 and 1/2 dogs in our plant at the moment. It's a little hectic as you may imagine and there are a few extra land mines to be aware of. Not to mention going through dog biscuits like there is no tomorrow, but it does make for some cool photos.
Poor ol whitey with hardly any teeth. Im not sure how she eats her dinner lol.
Slim is very clever and obliging jump and back and forth over the grid for me!
I'm very blessed this month in that I've had mum here for 2 weeks of it, which has been wonderful. We took the opportunity to go camping down at the swamp for the night and I got up at sunrise to have a kayak on the water with my camera. I didn't get very many shots, as it was just nice to have a paddle about in the still early morning.
I thought with these clouds, it would be a great opportunity to take a time lapse of. I set up my camera and left to go and do some horse work with Garrett. Meanwhile, Kaka decided to stay behind.
Here she is thinking...
Here she is checking to see that mum's gone....
Here, she already thinks she is hilarious for what she is about to do....
Yeeeep!
From my Phone:
Wow it's actually in the correct order this time. This was our camping trip. Kids were very excited to have noodles in the camp oven. Mum and I opted to have toasted sandwiches in our new jaffle iron.
Breakfast for champions.
Then it was home again and off to check cows. Luckily, this was not problematic as it looks.
G man having his first ride on Cruise. He did so well, even though my heart was in my mouth. The first ride he got a trot and in the second ride he got him to canter. Unfortunately, then he had 2 weeks off and on his first ride back, I think we took him a bit cheaply and Garrett got bucked off (no video unfortunately or fortunately). It was a bit of a shock to everyone and I wasn't sure how to proceed after that, whether I should call it all off. But after talking to Justin, he came down and offered some help to get him back going again which was really great.
Yeeeeh, I'm not too sure who won the battle here. Luckily I have some plastic buckets with lids that I could transfer it back into. I painted the backboard for my under cover clothesline and I was very excited that Justin could help me put that up.
Mum and I took the kids to Aggrow for the day. I left the kids go free with my phone to check up on them regularly. At one point, Garrett saw us and came running up to offer us some of his chips which he proceeded to trip and spill on the ground. I gave him $20 to go and get some more chips. So he and his sister, went straight to the camel guy and took themselves for a camel ride, which I have a full 4 minute video of on my phone. They even got the guy to take some photos of them. I thought that this was pretty cool! The kids thought it was like halloween with all the stall holders giving them loads of goodies and lollies.
Bought myself a new work hat, but I actually liked it better than my town hat, so I swapped them.
Found this little gem. I wish I could remember it when I need it.
We also took the kids to Capella for the gymkhana. Kaka was over the moon as I told her she wouldn't win any ribbons because she refused to canter on Carlos... and... she won her age group and got a tonne of blue ribbons.
I asked for the help of the club to make Kaka's horse look pretty, and she was so excited. He did shine up quite nicely.
G man got 4th in his rider class which was also exciting. He came 4th in his age group which he was also pretty happy about.
I purchased a new bed, much to my husband's displeasure. In hindsight, was a bit selfish of me to buy a bed without him trying it.
Hopefully he will get to like it. The head and legs go up and down and it has a vibrating massage setting, you can also set and alarm for it to vibrate.
In the last week of school, the kids had "cluster" where they go to another families home and see their teachers for the day. We just so happen to have one of the families, living on Great Keppel Island, so a number of us took the opportunity to have a mini family holiday and stay for a couple of nights.
We almost thought that the kids weren't going to make it, as they both got sick and kaka was even vomiting. But they seemed to pull through to go to the island. Only to go downhill again after and they both still have a bad cough, so that makes over 3 weeks now that they have been less than 100%.
Also, a trip to Rockhampton meant that we could take a truck each with some sale cattle... with sick kids and vomit buckets and many tissues. Was a bit of a slow trip, but we made it. Staying the night in a hotel, as with Poppy Eric staying at mum's we didn't want to risk making him unwell.
Next day, Grandma gave us her car and we did some last minute shopping for sunnies before boarding the ferry to travel over to Keppel. I think these suited Kaka so much! I bought myself a pair (which mum hates) haha hahah I like them!
I can't wait to get myself a new phone, my stupid one has a fracture on the front.
I managed to get a number of cocktails in. Thank goodness for happy hour. We also discovered a very tasty ginger beer that they had on tap called Diablo which was so good.
Stace and I.
So funny to have the sun setting over the ocean.
So good for all the boys to be able to hang out together.
And for us mummies to be able to hang out together.
More cocktails.
That which you can see in the distance, is an old underwater observatory. How cool would that have been back in the day. Although I don't know that I would be keen to go down there. Apparently the snorkling is great. Apparently a family used to live there, completely isolated. WOW.
Such a pretty sunrise, worth getting out of bed for that's for sure.
And then, the trip home in the truck with a very exhausted kid. Poor Justin, we dropped off both trucks for a service Wednesday morning and he said to them "don't do it if you don't have time, I don't want to be here Friday lunchtime waiting for a truck and then still have a 5hr drive home"......... 5:30pm on Friday and his truck was finally done, and he could drive home. I think it was 1am, before he finally walking into out bedroom to go to bed.
All the girls. And a couple of big girls that are now at boarding school.
This wench.
Hayley, Sue, Me, Megan and Stace.
This was Kaka and I getting home from Keppel in the truck. I don't know how Justin managed to stay awake, I was exhausted. Let the school holidays begin.
Betty and I building a new garden so that I can grow some zuchinni.
I put dripper hose underneath all the mulch which seems to be working well.
Justin had taken Garrett to Birtley which left me and Kaka at home together. I think she loved having the remote all to herself, however, having to do all the jobs on her own, meant that she missed her brother a lot.
You would hardly believe that it took me a whole day to clean the school room, JUST the school room, not even the whole school house. I always like to change things up each time I clean which makes us all a bit fresh.
While Justin was away our buggy was off being serviced and Justin had the work ute, so that meant that we were a bit house bound, and that the water run meant we were off in the town car.
Holidays also means that we do jobs in our silky Pj's of course.
Having a steady Sunday afternoon to myself with a wine and my own personal nibble platter while watching a movie on my laptop in my new flash vibrating bed.
Last week of school holidays and we got Grandma back again! She's such a wonderful little fairy to have in my house. Folding, washing, cleaning, gardening, gate opening. The list goes on and on. I'm always so deflated when she goes back home again.
It also meant that we could have many soulful cups of tea.
Justin offering some help with G man and cruise. I will say there were a few nervous tears, but they pushed through and he did really well. I was very proud of him.
All the stars aligned and we managed to squeeze in a muster to get the our cattle our of Kellies paddock for sale, as our agistment is coming to an end. We have an agent coming to access them tomorrow and put them up on auctions plus. Bit sad to see the last of the Brangus going, but it is what it is.
Oh yeh Grandma... can't believe you don't love my new shades.
I'm always shocked at how well this brumby comes back from a spell. I honestly can't recall the lat time I rode him.
Surely a colourful bunch
Went to do a water run and I only saw 5 head the whole time. I started to think they had been stolen. Anyhow, I decided to just drive up to where there was an old tank and here they all were sitting there together.
Above is a few snippets from Aggrow, gymkhanas, Garrett horse breaking, chilli eating cow
Hope you all have been having a lovely start to winter. It's been quite mild hasn't it. Still got a bit of a sweat up when working the cows. It doesn't sounds like there is any rain on the horizon for some time now.
I'm reading a story called the "Lucky Sisters" by Rachael Johns. I'm not sure that I would recommend it. It's ok, although I may have snuck a look at the end of the book and I don't think it ends very well.
My song on repeat at the moment is called "Ditch the Crown" by inappropriate jazz. It's a bit weird but I do love it.
Anyhow, that's me signing off.
With Love xx
