The 10 week school summer holiday began on Friday.
Isaac, Josh and Harriet went to collect their exam results on Friday morning and came away with excellent reports and $$$$ in prize money.
Isaac won Metal fabrication, English and Principle's merit awards totalling $75
Josh won 2 math prizes, Reading, Science and joint top grades average totalling $125
Harriet is still in middle school and won a Laker Pride trip out and class leader = $25
We were really surprised none of them offered to take us out anywhere for all the years of love and support we've given them!!!!
After lots of setbacks the new pig fence was finally finished yesterday so some of them are enjoying rooting up all the grass. We collected another lot of pork from the butchers so we have a very full freezer again. We are enjoying having to eat our way through it all!
Josh is doing his drivers ed this week, Isaac is working at the cranberry bog and Harriet is cleaning my house from top to bottom and doing a spot of babysitting!
All our visitors are already in the USA enjoying a holiday before they get to work at our place next week and the week after!
The sun is shining, mosquitos are biting, it must be summer.
Sunday 23 June 2013
Sunday 16 June 2013
June so far
The eggs that were hatching the first weekend in June happened to fall on the most humid day of the year so far, we had fans on the incubator trying to bring the humidity down to 65% from 85-90%. 4 chicks managed to hatch but it was just too much for the rest so we now have a total of 15 new chicks to add to our flock, knowing our hatching ratio most of them will be roosters!
We had an early morning call the other week when our neighbour heard cars honking their horns on the main road we live on at 5.45am. She looked out of her window to see our pigs running on the road! oops. All the rain had caused the wood on their shed door to swell so when one of them bashed against it the screws holding it shut gave way and 22 big piglets found freedom. They ran round our back yard for some time rooting on the compost pile and then found that instead of there being a fence down the side of the house the truck was parked there as we'd been unloading hay the night before and had forgotten to move it to put the fence back. Bingo they ran all round the front garden, my veggie plots and the neighbour's house before running for freedom down the road. Thankfully they come when called and bribed by food so within 15 minutes they were all back safe and sound with minor losses to our neighbour's lilys and my seedlings trampled.
Some friends from church gave us some Jerusalem Artichokes to plant, we read up on them and found pigs love them so we chose a spot at the far end of the pig field and put an electric fence round it. We've planted sugar beet, turnips, swede, mangles, kale and other goodies for us and the pigs to eat in it. Last week we came home to a couple of piglets running round this fenced off area, on later inspection we found they hadn't touched anything in the field that was growing except every single artichoke was rooted up and eaten! Looks like we'll need more next year.
My chickens are also in the bad books they run through their electric fence to get to my veggie plots and have eaten all my brassicas except about 15 plants which they've had a good go at eating every leaf on. I gave up on that plot and instead planted a sack of seed potatoes I was given last week. The chickens are cross because they are locked in their smaller run until the potatoes are big enough to withstand the pecking and I've located where the fence is shorting out.
We delivered our first commercial order to a restaurant in town this week. Usually when we collect our pork from the abattoir it's cut and wrapped ready to go in the freezer. This was an order for a full pig simply cut in half. We don't have a refrigerated trailer to transport whole pigs yet so we had to hatch an ingenious plan how to deliver it cold and professional on the main street in Fredericton. After much thought we hired a Uhaul box trailer and put 2 chest freezers inside. We got very strange looks at the abattoir when we went to pick it up and put half a pig in each freezer. Because it wasn't wrapped at all we then had to drive round town finding David a white lab coat so he looked the part for delivering meat. We ended up with a white chefs top as the next best thing! Anyway the delivery was a success and we should be doing the second delivery in a couple of weeks time.
Isaac and Josh had their exams last week and have now finished school for the summer, they have to go in on Friday morning for their results. Harriet finishes school on Friday lunchtime.
We are looking forward to Steve and Jan arriving in 2 weeks and Mum and Dad arriving in 2 1/2 weeks. Both David and I have some days off while they are here.
We had an early morning call the other week when our neighbour heard cars honking their horns on the main road we live on at 5.45am. She looked out of her window to see our pigs running on the road! oops. All the rain had caused the wood on their shed door to swell so when one of them bashed against it the screws holding it shut gave way and 22 big piglets found freedom. They ran round our back yard for some time rooting on the compost pile and then found that instead of there being a fence down the side of the house the truck was parked there as we'd been unloading hay the night before and had forgotten to move it to put the fence back. Bingo they ran all round the front garden, my veggie plots and the neighbour's house before running for freedom down the road. Thankfully they come when called and bribed by food so within 15 minutes they were all back safe and sound with minor losses to our neighbour's lilys and my seedlings trampled.
Some friends from church gave us some Jerusalem Artichokes to plant, we read up on them and found pigs love them so we chose a spot at the far end of the pig field and put an electric fence round it. We've planted sugar beet, turnips, swede, mangles, kale and other goodies for us and the pigs to eat in it. Last week we came home to a couple of piglets running round this fenced off area, on later inspection we found they hadn't touched anything in the field that was growing except every single artichoke was rooted up and eaten! Looks like we'll need more next year.
My chickens are also in the bad books they run through their electric fence to get to my veggie plots and have eaten all my brassicas except about 15 plants which they've had a good go at eating every leaf on. I gave up on that plot and instead planted a sack of seed potatoes I was given last week. The chickens are cross because they are locked in their smaller run until the potatoes are big enough to withstand the pecking and I've located where the fence is shorting out.
We delivered our first commercial order to a restaurant in town this week. Usually when we collect our pork from the abattoir it's cut and wrapped ready to go in the freezer. This was an order for a full pig simply cut in half. We don't have a refrigerated trailer to transport whole pigs yet so we had to hatch an ingenious plan how to deliver it cold and professional on the main street in Fredericton. After much thought we hired a Uhaul box trailer and put 2 chest freezers inside. We got very strange looks at the abattoir when we went to pick it up and put half a pig in each freezer. Because it wasn't wrapped at all we then had to drive round town finding David a white lab coat so he looked the part for delivering meat. We ended up with a white chefs top as the next best thing! Anyway the delivery was a success and we should be doing the second delivery in a couple of weeks time.
Isaac and Josh had their exams last week and have now finished school for the summer, they have to go in on Friday morning for their results. Harriet finishes school on Friday lunchtime.
We are looking forward to Steve and Jan arriving in 2 weeks and Mum and Dad arriving in 2 1/2 weeks. Both David and I have some days off while they are here.
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