Spring Has Arrived in the Barossa

The grass around the house (loosely referred to as a lawn)  is growing a foot a day; or so it seems now that I've taken over that job. 
The bees are swarming!
The honey flow is happening!
The sheep need shearing! 
The garden pots suddenly need watering!
The vegetables are all ready to eat at once!
How did we ever cope with Spring when I was working at a paid job?

Looking out of the north facing door to the top of our hill in the distance. The self seeded cherry plum trees that shade part of the poultry run is a riot of pale pink. Before we know it, the trees will be in full leaf and there will be small plums falling on the ground for the chooks to gobble up.

The "lawn" needs mowing every week. I've taken over this job since proving to Brian that I wouldn't break his new lawn mower. I didn't know there was such a thing as a key start lawn mower, so none of that "Start ya bastard" stuff is required. Nor have my shoulders dislocated with the .#@&%* pull start rope. I quite enjoy doing it, the chooks love the fresh lawn clippings and the compost heaps get a boost from the clippings too.

Every day is packed full. Poor Brian! At work all week, and flat out farming all weekends and evenings during the week. I try to get him to bring in some help, but he loves doing it all, especially the shearing and crutching. We're lucky he's proficient at it, as shearers are getting very hard to find when they're needed.

It was time for some of my bottle fed babies to fly the coop, and to join our bigger sheep in paddocks on the other side of town. Gavin, Coco, Carrie and Tex joined Big Lambie and all the other lambs and ewes.
Brian backed up to the ramp and moved them out to find the other sheep. I couldn't get out of the car or speak at all. Not from sadness, although the feelings are bitter sweet at this stage of their lives, but if they heard my voice they would have wanted to follow me.

 Our supplies of honey dried up a couple of weeks ago, but now we're in full swing again with honey flowing from the hives.

The farmgate shop is stocked again, and the customers are showing their appreciation by emptying the shelves every couple of days.
Brian and I are both working around the clock to keep up with the demands of  honey and bee keeping supplies.
Our past workshop attendees who are now bee keepers themselves, are now appreciating the amount of energy (work) required to keep a bee hive operating healthily.
As well as being called out daily to collect swarms, we're getting requests for more bee boxes and frames to house the expanding bee hives.
As I sit here at 8pm on a Thursday evening,  I can hear the steady tap tapping sound of Brian making frames out in the shed. It's where he has spent every evening for the past eleven days until 9pm.

Part of today's harvest from the rented bee hives. The people who rented the hives for a year have finally been rewarded.

Only two bottle fed lambs remain, and Poppy the heifer calf is weaning off milk, so there is some excess milk again. If I stockpile milk for the babies over a couple of days, I have an entire ten litre bucket of fresh warm milk to put through the separator every few days. With all this lush green grass in our paddocks at present, her milk is incredibly creamy.

With too many jars of jam open in the fridge, I made some jam macaroon slices to use up some of it. OK... there was another reason! I needed a peace offering, and it had to be good.
Feeling most embarrassed after the sudden realisation that I forgot my hair cut appointment last week, I delivered a small hamper of goodies to my beautiful hairdresser, Rachel.
How did I forget? What was I thinking?
My eight weekly hair cut is my one luxury that I wouldn't miss for Quids! Hmmm... forgot to transfer the date from the appointment card into my diary, didn't I?
Or am I beginning on that slippery slide down to you know where?
Time to learn a new language perhaps... in my spare time!