Home is where the coo is

So here I am sitting in a cabin aboard the ferry bound for Wellington. Bear with me as I have only had four hours sleep; had to get up at 3.30am to get to Picton for boarding. So far (other than a slight mishap mistaking hair fudge for moisturiser) (this is nothing in comparison to the hair removal cream incident!) our travels have been faultless, however the day is young and I am travelling with Mal!

So why are we on the ferry?....well I have been crazy busy making artworks (off the grid studio in future post) for an exhibition in Hamilton (which opens on Thursday evening) so we are heading over to attend, we also figured while we were up North why not visit Mal's old stomping ground (Tauranga) and also picking up a horse float from Napier. We decided to get one built as we had searched everywhere for a decent safe second hand float and what was available in our price range needed work, so we figured for an extra two thousand it makes more economic sense to buy new and not worry about things breaking or the safety of our animals. We researched the company and communicated with a wonderful man named Derry's at APEX Horse floats. We are getting just a basic model with removable middle thingy (can’t remember the name) as not only will this tow horses (horses future post), but I plan to take our calves to the shows. Have no idea on showing cattle and the thought did cross my mind that perhaps I will need to seriously groom the coos (god help me) (all I see when I think of that is dags, then I am thinking do I shave their bums? or spend hours cutting the dags off? are there special clippers? or do I use Mal's (he will never notice) is there a special shampoo I use? oh dear...washing them surely not?!

The animals are such a joy to us and we have left them in good hands (along with a four page essay of instructions) kinda looking forward to seeing what the animals have install for their baby sitters. I am sure one nut and toe rag will put on a good performance. This is what we encountered trying to feed the coos...one nut jumped on the back and helped...sort of

Mal and one-nut

So what’s been happening at Plum Tree Farm I hear you ask?!!

Well where  do I start!!

Oh yes!! Our three fuzzy wuzzy gorgeous Highland calves arrived from Wellington. They are the most adorable, affectionate babies. I am absolutely besotted with them. So introducing William Wallis, Taylor-rose and Maggie of Plum Tree Farm.

from back

Taylor-rose, Maggie and William's head

The big baby, William

You know when you do something and things happen that just makes you stop and think? Well the breeders named these calves, they had no idea what our children's names were, so you can imagine when they emailed introducing Taylor-rose I was gobsmacked! As that's number 3 child's name. I believe things happen for a reason and have taken it as a sign that we have done the right thing, and these babies were meant to be with us. (they have baby horns!!! so cute!!!). These babies have been halter trained and are highly social, they love to be with us and we are certainly enjoying being with them too!

William will be our breeding bull; he will be ready for business in around 12 months. I really hope he ‘man’s up’ soon as those girls are running rings around him. They love cow nuts will pretty much do anything for them, however (you would think I have learnt by now) DON'T over feed them!! I say no more....

Oh. And if you want to see a 500/600kilo Highland cow (with very big horns) run, cow nuts (or even carrying the bowl I normally feed them the nuts in) I got one hell of a fright when I got this amazing idea (no it wasn’t that, that surprised me) I thought it was genius to herd the cattle into the hill paddocks (as I have struggled to get them up there) by using cow nuts. So I filled the bowl, and stack a couple of slabs of hay under my arm and began walking toward the paddocks. (I probably should have kept an eye on what was going on behind me) as I heard this thundering sound, and the thought did cross my mind that perhaps Loretta is running toward me, but shrugged it off as she’s pretty lazy. The noise got louder and then Ruby over took me running and jumping (so cute) I thought perhaps I should turn around….Tourette’s returned, followed by the bowl of nuts and hay flying up in the air…as Loretta was right behind me in full charge (not attack charge) (I want the cow nuts charge) It gave me one hell of a fright, but didn’t scare me (if that makes sense), I recon I could get her to do pretty much anything for cow nuts! Bloody funny. I have to be pretty smart when it comes to feeding the cattle. As Loretta has a bit of a food addiction problem.

Anyhoo back to our trip to Tauranga. I guess you figured we made it...It got a bit close to us returning to Nelson as we both feel asleep on the ferry and had to be woken up...twice...I ended up racing down stairs, hair all over the place, eye makeup smeared everywhere and Mal standing next to me grinning from ear to ear. He thinks it's funny to not mention these things. Like the time we went to the supermarket and Mal went to grab a trolley, I thought he was behind me with the trolley (as I was in a rush) and began throwing things in (Mal was there but standing further back pissing himself laughing) then this old quietly spoken frail voice said “excuse me" I paused and went white then the silence was broken with this roar of laughter, grrrr

I didn’t speak to him for a couple of days.

We booked into the most stunning motel right on the water front. The room feels like it is sitting on the water. We went to sleep last night with the blinds open and awoke to this...

Tauranga on the Waterfront, simply stunning.

But I miss the coos

Back to the farm we have some other new members of misfits, Lulu one of the puppies we fostered for the SPCA, she is trouble with a capital T, full of mischief and loves Mal's jandels, well only one from each pair. To funny!! Snoop has also taken it upon himself to teach Lulu some of his traits much to my disgust! How to eat poo, roll in poo and bring poo into the house. And to top it off they now have a variety of poo to choose from; Goat poo, horse poo, coo poo and chicken poo. Dirty little shits (literally).

So getting back to Lulu, I went to animates (Mal has banned me from going there now) to get Lulu a new toy and walked out with an Alexandrine Parrot, I have named him Charlie. He was 10 weeks old when I got him and will eventually talk (fingers x his first words aren’t what I heard the kids trying to teach him)…sigh!

Charlie and Lulu have began a very convenient friendship, well in Lulu’s eyes.

See video..so cute!

 

Now don’t start feeling sorry for Mal with my expenditures, trust me he benefits from this…good ol ‘trigger’ is the proud owner of yet another gun. Yes Quasimodo manages to straighten his back long enough to take aim. (Don’t tell him I said that).

So it’s an hour until the exhibition @ Soul Gallery opens with eight of my artworks. I am really looking forward to this. However we have a very early start tomorrow as we have to leave Hamilton around 4am to get to Napier to collect the Horse float then from there we have to get to Wellington for a 4pm sailing. We get to Picton around 7.30pm and then drive the 2hour journey home.

So far our travels have been pretty faultless other than a small mishap with the GPS on my phone (note to self) make sure phone isn’t upside down when giving directions. We saw a lot of Hamilton.
Here's a picy of the opening. Thank you Lisa and Frank @Soul Gallery xxxx

You know…I have enjoyed this trip, loved the scenery but I can’t help but feel a bit funny about the amount of farms I have seen that has not even a smidgen of shading for the animals. Now I used to not really pay much attention to this, as I always thought they didn’t need or want it. But now I have my own farm it has become evident they actually love the protection and comfort shading and shelter from a tree provides. Surely we care more than this?! Do we?

Well sitting on the ferry returning home from a whirl wind travelling adventure. The horse float collection went smoothly; actually we did such good time we got to Wellington to board an earlier sailing. Here’s a picy of our new truck (thanks to Tony @ Houston Motor's) (this truck came with two roosters and a bantam hen that sleeps in a tree) with signage and our new float destined for signage, such a big blank canvas!!

Now this is impressive, we managed to clock up 1800k’s. No wonder we are so exhausted and looking forward to getting home. You know Home is where the heart is.

It’s True xx

Only been home for an hour.