The playpen

 

Here are my little charges at the moment in the play pen! All three are being bottle fed 4 times a day with milk. Bubbles (left ) is a guest while his owners are away . Amelia ( middle)  was an orphan that Greg saved by emergency C section. Sadly her siblings did not survive. And Peanut ( right) came to us on Friday after being found by Greg near death , huddled all on his own. He was out alone and hungry the night before when we had some horrible weather. He may have lost this mother or was an orphan too. We are very lucky to have him as he was so ill and cold. He spent a night by the fire and was tube fed the next day by Greg. Thankfully he survived but is still quite frail and wobbly on his feet. Each one of our lambs has a personality and uniqueness of their own. The really are such a joy to have around.

Edna the mummy!

Thank you to everyone who visits and share with us what they enjoy in our blog. We are delighted to share our simple way of life with all of you. As promised , here is more of the family at Mystic Hills. Edna our hen is now mom to 3 little chicks and what a great mom she is too!!We have yet to name the wee chicks yet but suggestions are always welcomed...We hope you enjoy the pictures.

Greg and I also write for an online Homestead magazine under the Poetry , Stories and art column.
www.homesteadernews.com.

Weaving

 

I have had an interest in traditional crafts for a long time. Perhaps it is the nostalgic romantic perceptions of a slower time or the fact that many implements of such crafts - spinning wheels , weaving looms etc were beautiful and functional objects in themselves. Several years ago on a holiday trip , I eagerly purchased a weaving loom . It was a simple Ashford rigid heddle loom . It was placed into my arms all neatly boxed up  and I was delighted. I ignored the comments of others on my holiday, who suggested the notion of "white elephant" .I was instead enthralled with the prospect of lovely rough textures hand woven fabric. I anticipated the wonderful clicking sounds that a working loom makes. It was to be a long time before that loom could be unpacked and set up . But it was the start of a life long love for the loom. I have since bought several others from simple frame looms . to the rigid heddle loom and to the wonderful 4 shaft loom. I still have my eye out for an affordable floor loom with foot pedals.

I have not had the benefit of practical teachers but I have gleaned what I know from books and online weaving friends who always amaze me with their gentle willingness to teach and explain what must be for them the most simple of things. These ladies weave wonderful things on their looms of varying sizes. They are able to design wonderful patterns and create expanses of unique cloth from the work of their own hands. I simply love this notion. To take and create something truly wonderful.

I am moving towards using only my own home spun yarn - created on my spinning wheel- to use in my weaving but for the moment I am working on using up my stash of yarn scraps .I learn very much through trial and error. At the moment I am weaving a colourful runner with a pattern called hop scotch . This involves a doubling of weft thread across the warp threads. It creates a lovely closed even weave. I am enjoying seeing how this unfolds.

I still have so much to learn - but the wonderful resource books I have will lead me through this process. I have promised Greg one day an lovely handwoven cloak . Homespun yarn dyed from native bush dyes and hand woven with love.

For those of you interested- my loom in the pictures is a Teko Teko loom - made in New Zealand. This small and study loom made in beautiful native Rimu also converts into a 4 shaft and inkle loom. It is set up as a rigid heddle a the moment.

I hope you enjoy seeing what I am working on.

Lifes little Teachers.

We've been docking these past weeks. That very busy time where we muster all the new lambs and their mums off the hills and dock tails, castrate, vaccinate, treat for fly and count how successful lambing has been. Its a fun time even though the actual task is somewhat messy and unpleasant. Fun because we do it together, the whole family and anyone else who happens to be around and unoccupied. Fun because the whole success or failure of the farming year hinges on the number of lambs that survive to form the trading base of our operation. I always look forward to knowing the results of our decisions and management practices of the past few months. Of course some things are beyond our control and if the weather has been particularly unkind docking can be more like a disaster assesment. This year we had unseasonal snow and cold heavy rain that left a trail of dead lambs in its wake. Although unfortunate that is the challenge of farming. Doing your best and then doing your best again should things not work according to plan.
It was not however the fortunes, good or bad, of lambing that caught my attention the other day on the hill. It was something rather more attitudinal you might say.
Mustering young lambs can be a challenge at the best of times and things can easily go horribly wrong especially when approaching gateways. The combination of mis-mothered panic stricken lambs and exhuberant excitable young dogs in an ever decreasing space means the smallest of misjudgements can be the difference between a clean muster or several hours wasted regathering the escapees.
We have had our share of misjudgements by both shepherd and dogs this week, but we have had some satifiying successes too. It was while approaching just such a pressure point on a muster that had gone exceedingly well up to that point that I learnt a major lesson in life from watching what happened next.
A largish mob of ewes with triplet lambs (alot of lambs) was approaching the gate to the yards. Two shepherds with  four dogs between us had the mob in hand and our partners and another dog were holding a potential escape route around the head of a gully. Everyone was well postioned and the sheep were moving pleasingly forward. Suddenly one old ewe broke away down hill with a determined look in her eye. Everybody tensed and shifted slightly to cover the escape, and the only dog left out of the action broke free of its tie and came to 'help', running through the gateway in front of the mob. The whole mob spun around and suddenly we were faced with several hundred lambs and their nervous mothers intent on breaking the ring of dogs and people that surrounded them. Now disorientated as to the direction of the gate, our preferred escape for them, they were ready to charge at any percieved weakness. A vital moment. For perhaps five long seconds or more nobody moved a muscle. Nobody.
And this was the lesson. Nobody moved because everybody was in the right place and if you are in the right place then moving is the wrong thing to do no matter what you are faced with. Many people, myself included are fooled into rushing around trying to placate or plug the gaps or 'do' something to make life better. We do this because we are either in the wrong place, space or mind set, or we believe that we are in the wrong place, space or mindset because someone has turned life around on us.
The truth is standing still, holding your ground can be the best solution. Waiting, in the right position, although difficult, can achieve far more positive results than panic actions based on fear or insecurity, whether yours or others.
Those lambs danced on their toes and mock charged us all. But faced with unmoving opponents they turned and flowed through the gate like magic.

As we breathed or thanks and patted our dogs I reflected on how even lambs can teach us valuable lessons about living successfully. All it takes to learn is a moments stillness.

Simple Pleasures

The last few days here have seen a return of the icy cold weather, rain and snow in some parts of the country . Still I must admit I enjoyed it thoroughly.  Time to light the wood fire , snuggle under blankets with hot Milos and read. Time to just listen to the rain and the wonderful sound it makes against the roof of our little home. It is very much for me a soul time. A time when my inner self slows down and talks to the rest of me. Recently I have been thinking more than ever of the old fashioned crafts women had. The sewing , spinning , weaving and such. Hours spent pouring over an embroidery or knitting a pattern that would warm a loved one. I wonder where it all has gone. Why we have chosen to give up such soothing pursuits in return for the store bought items that fill our cupboards?. The other evening  . with the rain pattering against our windows- I pulled out my little sewing basket and took out a pair of old trousers that Greg needed to have mended. I used my old darning mushroom - a wooden creation essential to old sewing baskets everywhere to patch and mend and darn.  I love darning socks as well. A thorough waste of time I have been told when one can nip into any shop and pick up a new pair for next to nothing. Still it cant replace the satisfaction I feel as I patch and mend and darn our clothes that  are tested by our farm work.

I have given time over the last few years to the collecting of old needlework tools. Darning mushrooms, rug hooks, old buttons and the like. I love peering into someone's sewing basket - sadly often seen in auctions- to discover a collection of well worn and loved tools. Tools that have served women as they mended clothes and fixed missing buttons. I read that there was seldom an empty basket of mending - as clothes always needed to be restored , saved, altered and stretched for yet another season. We could look at such a task as the result of poverty or lack or choose instead to view them as the simple need to make do with less and keep what they had for more essential things. These little work baskets would be pulled out after dinner - by the fire as the mending began. Young girls would learn to sew and mend and embroider at a young age.Often their skills today would astound many of us as we look at our own up coming generation of young girls obsessed with the latest cell phone or trendy outfit. How far removed these two worlds are now. And how sad. I feel so much that there will come a time when such material things though wonderful playthings will never fill a heart or nourish a soul.

This  week I have given focus to my little work basket of sewing. Run my fingers across the worn tools - inherited or bought. Celebrated the skills I have and the desire to learn more. Tidied up needles and spoons of thread, sorted and tidied. It is a task that I enjoy and centers me. It is a joy to be celebrated and enjoyed.

Baby Chicks are here!!

 

Well the long wait is over and our little baby chicks hatched yesterday. All four eggs hatched safely and we have four new additions to the Mystic Hills family. There are two yellow ones , a little black ones and a yellow one with racing strips down its back!! They are tiny!Coming from little bantam hens - our chicks are about 5cm big. We are waiting for two more eggs to hatch next week. We hope you enjoy the pictures.

Of those before me.

The first flush of a warm spring has faded into the more normal cold wet crappy weather that plagues attempts to complete any outdoor task. As I sit researching an article for my column in Homesteadernews, my feet cold and rain running down the window panes I am reminded of the privations of those who were here before us. (By the way if anyone knows anything about NZ roadmen please contact me, gwilson@no8wireless.co.nz and please visit homesteadernews.com) There were of course many early pre-European peoples of whom I do not pretend to know much about and so will not guess at how they lived here if indeed they ever did. It is with the early European settlers that I empathise. The backbreaking work of felling the forests for timber and pasture production. Cutting roads from the rock with only shovels and picks. All in the legendary cold wet of the NZ bushclad mountains. There was no high tech clothing to wick away the moisture, no specialist rainwear such as I use to keep me dry in all weather. Just coarse homespun woven wollen garments that must have steamed and chafed when wet and probably dispelled little water after the fisrt hour or so. What they endured when several days or even weeks of rain had passed makes me shiver. There were few  finished houses such as mine in those days. Most of the early settlers in these parts would've lived in rough bush constructions that leaked badly and had dirt floors (the building pictured would have been one of the better examples in later years of settlement). Certainly huddling by the fire on a day such as this would have been some comfort but damp bedding and mimimal space try even the most stoic of us. I've camped like that before and the trials of wet firewood, endless damp and cramped conditions had me considering acts of madness by the end of a week let alone months as have been recorded in some instances.
I guess I am somewhat in awe of those folks. Filled with a dream and hope and little else they had often sailed halfway around the world to carve out a place of their own. They had no option to return, it was do or die. Many died. Quite a number were beaten by the harsh environment or economic hardship or a combination of both. Some however perservered and succeeeded. It is these I owe such a debt of gratidude to. They fill me with optimism when the weather and the global financial crises combine. Their example of unrelenting perseverance in the face of what can only be described as soul breaking challenges humbles me and imparts a courage from beyond myself. The fruit of thier labour has set the stage for the life I now enjoy and though many complain of what they did wrong, sitting here on such a cold wet day I cannot find it within me to judge what I cannot know except from the comfort of its success.