01 March 2017

February 2017

Today is the first day of autumn and I am struggling to remember what I did for the last month of summer. Here in Wellington we have finally had good weather. Sometime in February the cicadas came out, now they are so loud and they begin before the sun comes up. We haven't done any more work around the house yet, for various reasons, but our up-top neighbour gave us a trailer load of top soil so next weekend we're going to edge our path and carpad, and then spread out the soil and plant grass. We also have a green-waste wheelie bin on the way, so we can finally start keeping up with the yard work (but it's not a yard, it's a couple of slopes that really like growing weeds and scrub). And I have started the rather large task of planting all the empty spaces. I had a nursery voucher - it doesn't really go that far but I got a bunch of native groundcovers and we'll see what grows in the clay.


The hens are still growing. It's time to make them some nesting boxes so they can get used to them before they start laying. They get to free-range when we are home, and go from one side of the house to the other by sneaking underneath it. One of them caught a cricket the other day, the others chased her around. Another day I saw a grey tabby cat outside near the house, and the hens saw it too. They stalked towards it as a gang and chased it down the hill.They're not very good at eating leftovers yet, but they know that I'm the feeder, and they cluck outside the door when they are getting hungry. When they really decide it's time for dinner they come right up to the front door, and then inside if we're not careful. The dog doesn't help, the chooks aren't scared of her. In fact, they're not really scared of us either, if we want them to get back outside we pretty much have to push them. A squirt of water is most effective, I'm using it to train them away from my plants.


We've also been exploring our new suburb. Haven't gone far yet, but we finally went to the local pool (it's an outdoor pool so not surprising that we hadn't gone yet, considering the weather). It's really awesome though, it's only open in summer and there is a hydroslide. It starts up the hill amongst the trees, it has an open top and you go really fast, so it's like you're flying beneath the trees. It has a lot of twists so you sort of get bashed around a bit, and at the bottom you get thrown into a pool and sort of rolled under the water. It's the best hydroslide I've been on in ages. I definitely will be making use of that pool for many summers to come!

Nothing else much is happening I'm sure. Here are some more pictures of our amazing view:




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