Holy cow!

It all started with a chicken serviette holder I made,

during a kids class.

We were discussing the potential for Christmas serviette holders

when one of the children said

"Make a holy cow"

We all fell about laughing at the idea

and I could not resist.

The ears aren't right but you get the idea.

I have orders for the chicken, 

and that might turn into a barn yard table setting.

My Christmas ones could have family members names on them.

They could also have coloured baubles to jazz them up.

This is just the beginning.

The elephant was on his way to being a cow but the

clay had other ideas.

I really must look at the Herefords markings.

They are just out in the paddock it shouldn't be hard

In other news...

The new studio has to be complete within 3 weeks

as my mother is selling her house and the Pottery club

would again be homeless. 

We have been most grateful for the generous sharing of her garage. 

Photos of the progress will be posted soon.

 

Vanilla Slice festival

 The Farmers Market relocated to the 

Vanilla Slice festival in Merbein.

Shame it rained all day.

I was surprised at how many folk braved the wet weather. 

 Fiona's Garden made it into the Mildura Living magazine.

Very prestigious!

We picked and packed for a big day...but as

 any market stall holder knows,

it is hard to make any money in the rain, especially outdoors.

This event takes place just once per year

A lot of planning all foiled by the rain

Our plants didn't mind.

I made extra posies...but brought many home.

My worm herb signs have been popular lately

I do need to work out a better way to display them.

The biggest surprise for the day was our southern cousins

who are on holidays and just turned up at the market!

Good to see them, such a long way from home.

Frost and ice

This drip caught my eye on my morning walk.

I knew it was cold but here was some solid proof.

Minus 3 Celsius

Hard to focus, hard to keep still, hard to believe.

I had left out a herb tray, with water. Ready for picking...

 I have never noticed anything like this before.

That's solid ice!

I do love a good shadow portrait.

Stella & Jayne

Last week, the wind was so strong 

the river had white cap waves and it looked like

it was flowing in the other direction.

Wild winds created a raging river.

Nice to see it back to normal, calm, wide and slow.

It might be minus 3 back at the house but it 

would have to be 10 or more down here at the river.

Shelia 2001 - 2014

 

In 2001, whilst walking the dogs,

I came across 2 puppies crawling out of a rabbit burrow.

They must have been dumped, I had to take them home.

Maybe we could keep one?

Shelia was the more quiet of the two, 

not quite as destructive as the male. 

Council has rules about how many dogs can live at one property,

We already had 2 dogs. 

She just kept growing and growing.

A gentle giant.

Great foxer!

Reluctant sheep dog

Great friend

Gone but not forgotten.

Fare thee well my dear friend.

I've been making Angels

I am unsure how angelic they are however, 

 this one is my favourite.

Do angels have to have wings?

I must have misplaced my glasses when I was making this fellow.

The wings have been described as tooth fairy wings.

A Beetles hair do.

These wings were just attached to the garment  and did

put a bit of stress there. 

Is that a crack I can see with the wings falling off?

Not a good look for an angel.

Much more modest wings. 

I will have to do some angel image research.

This has all come about from a phone call, a mother had

just buried her adult son and wanted some angels for the grave.

This is an important challenge I hope I meet. 

Might take a few more tries though.

This was inspired by a young persons creation.

I was impressed that the stars worked 

in perfect harmony with one of our plaster press moulds.

I had to try on too. 

I might become a lid for a candle platform.

I was surprised to see so many lambs all playing together.

They run like a school of fish.

There were about 16 lambs in this group.

Just 3 supervising mothers keeping a close watch.

23 lambs

The yards behind my sister's house (next door neighbour)

is the dry lock up night yard. 

This habit of locking them all up at night

has saved many lambs from the hungry foxes.

It has been a good season so far with many sets of twins.

They are such good fun to watch.

They jump, run, climb.

Explore

They hang out in groups with one mother staying close.

This group was 7 lambs but mum had been calling and they

were having too much fun to be rounded up for the night.

They are a delight, they make me laugh. Sometimes they

just explode like an electric shock has made them 

buck like a rodeo horse. I would love to capture that with the camera

but I think it would have to be a still from a video...very hard to anticipate

like lightning.

Our secret weapon against the fox is a flashing light.

It is a sheep disco. 

The light throws intermittent shadows and this seems to

protect the flock.

We have hooked up a small solar panel that trickle feeds the battery 

I noticed that a couple of the larger lambs are jumping through

the fence...at their peril. 

Safety in numbers. 

The orphaned twins are doing well.

We have made them a small day yard to encourage green feed.

Orphaned twins

I am on my last week of Tertiary Teaching studies and

I have been seriously side tracked with lambing duties.

Locking the sheep up at night to protect them from the foxes

Letting them out again in the morning.

 Sheep seem to like routine and are no trouble to put away.

It's a great purpose for a walk with the dogs, morning and night

We had a white out fog this morning that left many spider webs

highlighted with dew. Beautiful.

Shelia is getting older and slower. 

The sheep catch up and pass her now.

 

On Sunday our fourth set of twin lambs were born.

By Monday morning their mother had died, lamb birth complications.

I brought them home,

 so now I am doing the four hour feeds.

Thankfully they have gotten the idea of drinking from the bottle!

I wore a lot of milk trying to teach them.

Seriously cute, this brother and sister duo seem strong.

I wonder how long I have to feed them milk?

There are many more lambs to come, 

I hope these are the only orphans. 

It will be hard not to get attached to them as 

they climb all over me when they feed.

The boy on the left head butts a lot and 

they both like chewing the buttons on my jumper.