Not sure what it is about early Tuesday mornings, but after watching Curly all day yesterday and finally giving up when the sun went down, at 5:30 this morning, I was greeted with a new lamb...

...and after giving her half an hour -- I was greeted with another lamb!

Here they are later today, both dry and up on their feet and doing well.  This makes 8 lambs so far, 7 commercials and one Shetland -- and, we are now officially halfway through lambing -- 5 ewes left to go...

Danny built this bird house for the sparrows a couple of years ago and we'd about given up because it seemed that the birds weren't interested for whatever reason -- but now it seems that perhaps they just needed time to get used to its existence because we've got several sparrows nesting in it now -- in their own little Sparrowhall!  :)

Chicks are continuing to grow...

Here's Lucky, never passing up the opportunity for a swim...  (Speaking of which, I need to get back in the sea as it's been a couple of weeks now I think!  Yikes!)

Instead of a sunset, today you get my neighbour's barn looking like an alien spaceship...  :)

Yesterday was my birthday, and I was hoping for birthday lambs, but no joy.  However, the cake that Danny made me rather made up for that!  :)

The other day I shared a memory on Facebook about when some sheep got into my garden in Ffairfach and said something along the lines of that not happening here -- I spoke too soon!  I was eating breakfast this morning and I looked out the window and I saw some sheep that were very clearly not mine...  :)

On the Easter front, a friend on the island used some of my eggs for a game -- she says it originates in Cumbria, known as the "egg dump" a bit like conkers, you try to crack your opponent's hard boiled egg with a tap!  Sounds like good fun as long as you've made sure that your eggs are boiled first!  :)

I, of course, made my usual "not cross" buns...  :)

Here's a close up of Dolly's lamb -- a lovely Shetland boy!

The three other ewes who have had lambs thus far -- all crosses -- let their lambs run and play with each other.  Dolly on the other hand -- if another lamb tries to get near her little one, she head butts it away!  She was not happy at all about me holding the lamb to tag and band...!

And I'll leave you with this sunrise for a change -- the photo really does not do it justice -- it looked like the sky was on fire!

6 ewes to go still -- I am losing hope of them all lambing in the first cycle!

After the debacle that was Titchy last year, I am pleased to announced that Dolly (formerly known as No-Name Lamb) had has the first Shetland lamb of the year unassisted!  Woo hoo!  Sadly, it is a boy, so I am now going to be more specific in my request to the universe -- pretty pretty please may I have a purebred Shetland GIRL next?!  :)

And following on from the indignities she had to suffer last year while we tried to teach her that she needs to let her lamb drink -- she seems to have got the hang of it this time round!  :)

She doesn't seem to have grasped why the other ewes go off into the corners to lamb though and so she's had her lamb right out in the middle of the field where all of last year's lambs (who are not in lamb themselves) are taking a keen interest!  :)

Will have better pics of lamb in a couple of days but even from this distance, I can see that he very much takes after his Daddy Raymond colour-wise...

In other news, spring continues to spring...  The plum tree has blossom on it this year, so fingers crossed we will get plums -- we haven't had any since the first year!

The bluebells are out now...

...and my favourites, the whitebells...  :)

The chicks are growing -- they are starting to get proper feathers on their wings now...

And here's another sunset because they've just been so gorgeous lately that I can't resist!

6am this morning, first check in my dressing gown with my waterproofs over that (because of course it's raining!) and I see Greedy with a head out.  I give her half an hour or so while I make myself some coffee and then I go check her again -- nothing happening.  I've no idea how long she's been at it before I got up, so I decide to go in for a look and just as well I did...

No feet forward, so I'm feeling around trying to find a foot -- and what I found was the twin's head and then she was trying to push them both out at the same time.  Tried to push a head back but she wasn't having that, so managed to get one leg of the twin and pulled that one out first, and then I was able to pull the first one.  

Both lambs (and Greedy) up on their feet now and doing well.  Think this must be a rite of passage -- pulling lambs in my dressing gown!  :)

The sheep in the field next door (not mine) were totally being nosy about what Greedy was up to!

3 down, 7 more to go.  Still no sight of any of my purebred Shetland lambs though!

In other news, we went for a walk the other day -- here's Danny gazing out into the abyss...

And some gulls thinking that this might be a nice spot to raise some chicks...

Speaking of laying eggs, we've been having duck eggs most days now since the first one -- but only one egg a day -- until this morning when Danny spotted this "fart egg" (normal duck egg for scale).  So perhaps we will be getting more duck eggs now!

Here's a close up of Black Ewe's twins from last week -- they are not looking their brightest because they have just had their balls banded...  :)

Spotted while feeding the other night (not mine) so that was another task getting somebody else's sheep back where it belonged before it tried to climb into my field!  :)

The strawberries in the poly-tunnel are flowering -- fingers crossed for a bumper strawberry crop this year!

And I'll leave you with this dramatic sunset from the other night -- #nofilter #islandlife

I come home from work at about 5:30 and I check the sheep.  Nothing happening.  Nobody's separated themselves from the flock.  Everybody looks calm.  I make dinner.  We eat dinner.  I go out to feed the sheep, and I see Black Ewe with a lamb...

...but wait, what's that I see?  Is she having another lamb???

Oh yes she is!  I'm sure she appreciated all my words of encouragement from a distance as she did it all by herself...  :)

Here they are, both up and dry and have sucked...

Here's a close-up of the first lamb from the other day:

It has managed to get itself stuck in between these two bits of fence twice already now!

Eight more ewes to go....  :)

 

The news we've all been waiting for -- first lamb of 2025!  Woo hoo!  Shy Ewe spent three days thinking about having it, and finally did just before first light this morning.  At 6am when I went out to check the lamb was already dry and up on its feet -- just the way I like it!

I was surprised to see that it was black given what it's Daddy looks like, but the woman I bought Horatio from says that, "The genetics of Dutch Spotteds are really interesting. Their spots are recessive so you need spots to be passed to the lamb from both parents. But they also carry a dominant black in the spotting gene (simplest way to describe it) so if they pass spots but the ewe passes plain, then the black dominates and ta-dah, a black lamby." -- so this means I may have quite a few black ones this year then!  :)

Still trying to get a reasonable picture of the hen and her four chicks but she is so protective of them that every time I come near with the camera she hustles them away!

Here's Cookie, rolling around in the dirt and living her best life!  :)

In the kitchen this week I got ambitious and made this "Russian fish pie" as the recipe called it -- it's basically fish Wellington!

And look at the little Siamese mushroom!  :)

Two more ewes looking like they're thinking about lambing shortly so watch this space -- hoping they all come quickly now...

Springtime is officially here with the arrival of our first chicks of the year!  Will try to get better photos in the next couple of days, but this morning our favourite Mummy hen showed off these four chicks -- two yellow and two black!  Woo hoo!  The cycle of life begins again....

The ducks have also finally started laying -- that's a hen egg on the left and a duck egg on the right.  Still not sure which of the ducks is laying, but we've had three eggs in the last week from them, so...

Lambing should start momentarily -- official start date is Monday, but a couple of the girls are starting to act like they're about ready today so watch this space...  Here some of them are looking nice and pregnant...

And just so they don't feel left out, here are the boys...

Lovely bit of God light the other morning:

And as Passover begins tonight, here are my homemade macaroons!  They are SO much easier to make than I expected and they are SO much more delicious than shop bought (which I always hated as a kid)...

I want to start by noting that today is the 20th anniversary of this blog.  Yeah, I know, how did that happen?!  :)  Thank you Dad for buying me my first digital camera and telling me that you didn't understand what I was doing with 4.5 acres of land in Wales and that you needed an explanation (accompanied by photos)....  Hope you're still learning something from this 20 years on!  :)

In other news, the weather has been lovely this week and I've had a couple of swims -- running total for the year thus far is now 17.  The sea is still cold (duh) but having the warmth on your skin when you get out and not being desperate to get dry and changed ASAP makes a huge difference...

Yesterday was my bimonthly highlight -- library day!

In slightly less exciting but possibly more important news, we had the septic tank emptied...  Danny has now gone and cleared out all the drains/pipework so fingers crossed the system will work properly now and not require anything in the way of maintenance...

In the kitchen this week:

Trout cakes (adapted from your tuna croquettes Dad!) made with trout that Danny caught in the loch, with homemade aioli from the lovely coloured eggs (thank you chickens!)...

Speaking of trout -- they look not that dissimilar to each other from the outside, but the insides are completely different colours of flesh!  Insights welcome...

Back to the kitchen, in addition to reducing the price of the eggs for sale (which is working), I've also got rid of some of the glut by making a fresh batch of pickled eggs.  The remaining few from last year are in the jar on the right.

...and we also had a yummy wild Greylag goose leg ragu!  TBH, if I didn't know it was goose, you could have told me it was beef and I would have believed you....

AND, lambing starts in 10 days!!!!  Woo hoo!  :)