Hmmm, got to Tuesday I think.
Lost track of days a bit this week but it has mostly been raining. It is still really cold and windy and there has not been a single day where it has not rained at least once every hour even if just a brief shower. There has been hail pretty much every day and one morning Ady said it briefly snowed first thing. Sigh. If this had been our first year here I honestly think we would have jacked it all in.
Quite a lot of soul searching this week as a result. We lost some more birds – of the four goslings outside two suddenly stopped being able to stand up. We brought them in and have got them both back to fine again but decided to let the other two go with the pack of geese as there was something deficient in their diet in keeping them penned. The first night and day that worked fine and the mother goose settled back in with the other five (we still have one broody goose on a nest) with all six protecting the goslings. The second night we lost one and the remaining one then could not walk so Ady brought that in. That one is still convalescing indoors while the other two are now back to full health and spending their days out with the pack and their night times in the horse box where they are safe. The indoor and outdoor ducklings are doing ok just now. We had a chick (bantam) hatch but it got taken. We have tried so hard this year with penning the broody birds and hatchlings but that has not worked either – some managed to escape, some have been gotten by crows as they are still sitting targets despite best efforts at pens and rats can get into even the best pens as they dig under. The ones we have kept safe from predators have all fallen foul of some sort of diet issue due to being kept on soiled grass and not having access to all they need outside. We’re away in just over 2 weeks and will need to work out how to deal with them all while we’re not here too… It’s incredibly disheartening.
We have all been talking about more time in the caravan and are accepting of another winter I think – lots of planning how to best make that work but no one wants to leave so we’re going to do our best to make that happen and start focussing on what we do love to do here with the cob build happening in the background rather than being our sole focus. Probably need to write more on that really but it’s cold and I need to get to bed so won’t be tonight.
I had two days of a weird buzzing noise in my ears and pressure in my head. It felt like being on a plane and my ears needing to pop. Extensive googling and my own diagnosis suggests it was probably stress related somehow. It left when I had a good evening out celebrating Fliss’ birthday last night and has not returned today, so fingers crossed it was indeed stress related.
Vikki has been back for the weekend for a visit. Nice to see her but she is never cheery company. We need some sunshine!