Life during the pandemic

 12.8.2020

 

Monday and Tuesday were dry, and I got the washing done whilst Edd and Stevo did the lay out for the concrete base for the new shed.  Then it rained hard again over night and the outdoor work became miserable again.  This is the first winter we have had enough milk to make cheese every second day.  Luckily the hard cheese is actually very nice and keeps well. I have also started marinating the feta, but I have not tested it yet.

 

Soon everything will change when the goats stat kidding in just over a week.  We managed to get the milking machine reconditioned and Edd has brought two new small gates for the kidding pens.  We had gates for them last year but have used them up elsewhere.  In the dry weather we moved the gate on the old drive so that we can put the ram in there again.  The original gate position was before the chook pen gate, and neither Edd nor I were happy to walk past the ram with a bucket of food for the chooks every day.  I doubt we would have made it to the pen.  Now we can get to the chooks without danger and the ram can keep the weeds and grass under control along the rest of the old drive.

 

The next move is to get the concrete truck down the old drive to pour the shed floor. After that we can move the ram.  Then we can redo the buck pen. This will allow us to move the buck out of the stock yards and then we can get the sheep in for crutching and prepare them for sale.  The market is still closed but we might be able to sell them privately once the lock down is over.  Our aim is to be ready if an opportunity arrives.

 

This assumes that the lock down will be over and there is no real evidence that this will be possible yet.  It has been months now and life as we used to live it seems a far, off dream. The death toll in Victoria continues to rise with nursing homes having the heaviest losses.

 I am expecting a food delivery today, but the supermarket has just sent a note to say that about half my order is unavailable.  It hardly seems worth the effort for them to drive out this far.  Getting anything done needs a lot of patience.

 

My mail order of masks has arrived so we have an alternative to adapted socks for when we can get out further afield again.  I have not gone anywhere for ages, so I have not had to wear a mask myself yet.  Edd gets cabin fever if he is stuck on the farm so he is doing all the essential things like collecting mail and animal food.  The bottling machine at the brewery is waiting for a new part from America so there is no barley available for us to pick up this week.

 

We have moved the horses back to the old vineyard paddock where there is more grass and let the goats back down the gulley. The goats can deal with any remaining blackberries and eat up fallen leaves. We just have to try and keep the animals looked after as best we can until the spring growth starts.

I have got a lot of spinning and knitting done this winter