Face paint and the chickens

This is what I woke up to! Two very colourful faces.

They have been playing with face paint, tattoo pens and dress ups a lot at the moment. The drama course seems to have brought out their creative side. No, that's not true, DragonGirl has always loved being colourful. Boo is definitely getting into it too though...

We went to the zoo a few weeks ago when we ducked up to the Big City.

The kids loved seeing all the different animals. Boo hadn't been and DragonGirl was quite small when we went last. By far the best moment was seeing Boo's face as an Asian elephant sauntered past us on the walkway. It's one thing to know they're big, it's another to see it to scale.

As I mentioned in my last post, things have been cooling off. We've lit the fire a couple of times already.

We normally light it from Mother's Day to Father's Day, but we're trying to be a little more conservative this year. It's nothing that a pair of socks won't fix so far. Mind you, 4'c this morning was a little brisk!

These are our new chickens, commonly refered to as The Girls. They are our fertilisers, pest control, soil airators, mulch spreaders, plant pruners, composters and a constant form of entertainment. Well worth the effort of a bucket of veg scraps every day, some grain and fresh water.

They're still in the coup at this stage but we will run them all through the fruit trees out the back. I have been making little wire rings to put around any plants that I don't want them to eat too much of.

Today I am planting out some garlic, 3 feijoa and more lavender (I will almost have commercial quantities if I keep going!)

Surf, Sunrise and Sewing

The weather has been mostly fine but it's definitely cooling off. Our trips to the beach aren't happening as often and you definitely need a wetsuit to enter the water.

Unless you're Corby of course. He is stubborn enough to swim no matter what, just to prove he is impervious to the freezing temperatures.

We find there is more weed on the beaches at this time of year too. I guess because of the storms that role through.

There has been a sighting of the first whales for the season, so we will be spending more picnic dinners at the beach lookout, watching for them. Last year we didn't see very many. The first year that we were down here, there were lots of sightings and a couple of special close-ups. Corby was surfing just a few metres away from a mother and calf without realising it. They were tucked in behind the rock reef.

Sunrise is getting later. At Summer Solstice we had to be at the lookout at 4am. Now it is a sleep-in at 6.



We have been doing a few more inside activities too. Boo is right into puzzles, drawing and lego. DragonGirl has been reading, drawing and trying her hand at sewing. She used the sewing machine for the first time the other day and was so pleased with herself.
She will naturally do more writing as well. I have found that our schedule has become very Seasonal. The fine weather is filled with picnics, science experiments, riding around town, swimming, gardening and building tree houses.

The cooler weather is more about crafting, writing letters, doing projects and nice long novels by the fire.

DragonGirl has just finished a project on the chickens and next she wants to learn about wolves.