One man and his Chickens...

Christmas already!?

2011-11-19T14:00:00.000Z

...not quite, but it will be on us in the blink of an eye!

Life is a changin', I have just finished my 4th week at my new job and I'm absolutely loving it!

I am now a cutler. I work for Pooley Sword who provide swords for the Ministry of Defence and other military establishments.

It turns out that we also made Prince William's sword for his wedding to Kate Middleton!

You can see the Prince's left hand resting on the bottom of the guard in the above picture.

We have also refurbished Prince Phillip's swords amongst other. Just finished a sword to be presented to Bernie Ecclestone too!

So, work is amazingly interesting and different every single day. I am in charge of stock and logistics and have already implemented a couple of ideas to make things work a little more smoothly, whilst I have also found ways of saving money too.

All the family is well, and we are looking forward to Christmas!

See you all soon!

:D

New Chickens on the block!

2011-07-10T10:51:00.001+01:00

We've had a bit of a weird week, so we thought we'd get out the house for a while.
Putting on our shoes Jo, Kane and I jumped in the car and went to St Martin's Wood to have a look at some chickens and buy some feed. It's a nice drive, only about 20 minutes, but it's enough of a change to clear the head and see some beautiful countryside - sometimes that's all you need!
Jo had found their Facebook page and discovered that there was a discount, offered by the new owners, for this weekend only. The only way to secure this discount was to mention the new addition to their family, which was an Alsatian puppy called Indy. It all seemed a bit cloak and dagger if you ask me - walking up to the owner and saying in hushed tones;

"You have an Alsatian puppy called Indy"

I half expected him to say something back like "the larks fly at night"! It was a bit weird!

Anyway, we looked around and chatted about what sort of chickens we liked and the gentleman showed us what stock he had in. There were a lot of lovely looking chickens there, and it took a few minutes of looking at each other and debating to find out that we were actually going to buy some then and there.

Jo started to look around and pick chickens while the man tried to corner them and catch them - he said he could catch them first time, but seemed to have more than a bit of trouble catching the ones Jo and Kane wanted. Admittedly they were running around like Usain Bolt!

The chickens were put in a large box with plenty of holes, and then put in the back of the car with Kane keeping a good eye on them. Two bags of feed followed the box into the back of the car. I paid for the lot and also a large water dispenser which I will pick up next weekend as they were out of stock at the time - but we got the 10% discount which was really worth it in the end!

So, to the bit you've been looking forward to - the unveiling of my new 'ladies'.

So there you go - the gentle integration of our 4 new ladies into the family. I put them in with Star and two Isa Reds as Star is the youngest and fittest cockerel and will outlive Rhydian - sounds harsh, but it's how life goes I guess.

Thanks to Jo for those photos, below are the close up pics I took whilst inside the run. We have two Red Rock and two Blue Haze chickens.

Our Blue Haze ladies.

Checking out their new home.

A close up of one of the Red Rocks.

An unsure Star looks on.

I kept an eye on them most of the afternoon, and they kept themselves to themselves mostly, the new ladies taking over the coop, while Star, Queenie and Minnie decided the corner of the run was the best place to watch the new girls. Star tried several times to be amorous, but the new girls weren't having any of it - apart from once. We only have one name so far - as one of the Blue Haze birds has the lightest colouring, but is also heavy - so I thought of calling her Stone to start with (cos of the weight and colour) but Jo came up with Joss - as in Joss Stone. I'm happy with that!

Then in the evening Kane and I spent the second night in a tent in our garden - next post I expect!

Lewes Boccia club update

2011-07-06T09:37:00.000+01:00

Since I started Lewes Boccia there have been some changes.

I always envisaged the club to be open to everyone without limitations, but to start with I had to narrow the field down for what was specifically needed at the time which was a club tailored to my son Zak's needs.

Since running the taster sessions and the multisports sessions at Wave Leisure centre, the club has at last totally opened up to all ages and all disabilities.

On the 11th June, Zak and I (and Jo and Kane!) went to Northease Manor school, which isn't far from where we live, to promote Lewes Boccia. We arrived to find two long tables placed for us, and we set about putting our information out - plus our balloon bunting!

We had photographs of our sessions, information packs, Lewes Boccia stickers, tee shirts and various equipment to show people what Boccia is all about.

Here we are behind our promotion table. I thought of taking our big garden umbrella and stand as it looked like rain - good job we did as it threw it down for about 10 minutes!

It's not a particularly big fete, but it was our first time of promoting our club. We met a surprising amount of people when they visited our stall to see what Lewes Boccia was, and we were able to give out our information packs and a LOAD of stickers!

It was great to meet everyone that day, and we even met one lad who came from Zak's school! Overall it was a good day, and is something we shall definitely do again when we get the chance!

Back to basics

2011-04-13T11:57:00.000+01:00

You may have noticed my lack of regular blog over the last year, this is because I have been concentrating on my other projects.

The first one is the Kingston News, a village newsletter that goes out every month. It was failing as far as funding goes, and the treasurer was starting to get concerned over costs and longevity of the paper. When I took over, the previous editor didn't like asking for money for submissions, and after only two months I had implemented a pricing tariff for articles and adverts. Now, after almost a full year, the Kingston News is thriving, with people sending me the correct money, and happy to do so as they realise I have the villages best interests in mind.

I have also turned it around so much that I we are able to sponsor a literacy award to Keystage 1 and 2 at my youngest son's school in the village. We are providing two wooden, engraved trophies for the kids - better than a book token I feel, as they get to keep them forever.

I have also created a website for the paper, www.kingston-news.co.uk which I keep updated with stories and photographs from the village.

The other thing that has been taking my time up this year is Lewes Boccia. You can read more about this on my other post, but briefly, my son couldn't find anywhere to play the paralympic sport Boccia, so we created a club ourselves!

It was the 14th January that was the defining moment of the club, it was after a meeting with the local leisure centre manager that I realised I had to start the club. Up to then it was just an idea floating around.

We have helped the leisure centre run some multisport activities involving Boccia for young disabled kids, and also run two taster sessions for our own club. Our first proper club session was last week and it went very well indeed, with all participants enjoying themselves.

I also created the website for Lewes Boccia, www.lewesboccia.co.uk and it will evolve and be updated as much as it needs to.

I have been busy with Zak as well. We have been making ramps for him and the club, going into the shed for hours at a time on the weekends!

Our last time in the shed was spent designing and cutting to size materials for a table type raised bed.

The raised bed I made previously in our vegetable patch wasn't high enough for Zak, so the only other solution was to build something off the floor. Most of the parts are ready to put together, and we should be able to finish it this coming weekend.

In between everything else, it's the Easter holidays, Kane is home for two weeks. We've spent some of the nicer days playing outside throwing his frisbee and firing rockets up to 400ft up in the air with his stompy air toy.

We've had some real laughs outside as the frisbee and rockets sometimes go in some strange places and hit bits of the body we'd rather not mention!

Kane has also been sitting on my lap driving 'The Rig' (my ride on lawn mower) around the garden, flattening the mole runs and helping me cut and move some low hanging branches.

The soil for the raised beds arrived this morning, dropped off by an old work colleague from a firm I used to work for, which means I have more work to do!

A numerical wonder!

2011-03-05T12:00:00.000Z

WOOHOO!

This blog just hit the 3000 pageview mark!

(although the counter was put on here way after I started)

Thanks all for reading!

:D

Lewes Boccia club is here!

2011-02-26T09:14:00.000Z

A couple of months ago, Zak asked me to find somewhere for him to play Boccia. For those of you who don't know what Boccia is, it's a paralympic sport, created for athletes with cerebral palsy, and other impairments. You have to play it sitting in a chair, and it's similar to bowls - you have a white 'jack' ball, and you have to get your own coloured balls nearest to it to win.

After a few weeks of looking for a Boccia club in our county, I found that most of the 'clubs' available were either within schools or residential places. I did find one locally, but it was for people 60+! That was in a residential home anyway.

Unable to find anywhere for Zak to play, I threw a flippant remark at him, saying maybe we should start up our own club, since there was nothing about. Zak agreed, in fact he seemed really impressed by the idea.

As I'd never done anything like this before it was difficult to know where to start, but I phoned the governing body of Boccia in the UK, and they thought it was a great idea. They in turn gave my email address to a couple of people. One person who called was a trustee of the local leisure centre group, and someone who knew about Boccia - what a result! She put me in touch with the manager of our local centre, and a meeting was booked for the 14th January.

It all seemed to happen so fast after that. I had the meeting with the manager and a young man who's title was Disability Co-ordinator, it is a new post there, but it basically means it's his job to get the disabled into the centre. It was only after that meeting that the club was officially formed. What happened next was a blur in my eyes.

Within three weeks, I had a club name, a bank account, flyers, posters, designs for pin badges and stickers, and a website. I had also designed banners (4' x 2' for promotion purposes), tee shirts, not to mention I was able to take part in a official Boccia England training course!

Part of the meeting at the leisure centre was to do with what they were already setting up for disabled young people. They were putting on some multisport activities, such as wheelchair basketball, or table cricket, wall climbing and other such sports. I was asked if I would be able to an introduction to Boccia on their taster days, so I jumped at the chance. I decided the best option was to be able to take Zak, so Friday evenings 5pm - 6pm were organised. The first one is on March 4th.

The next logical action was to book my own taster days and so Jo accompanied me to the centre and I booked a month of Sundays to see if this idea/club would be viable. Paul the manager was so keen to get our club there, he gave us two hours in the sports hall free to use as our own taster sessions to introduce people to Boccia and our club.

Now we have a website, email address and are even on Facebook!

All the contact details are on our website with information on our taster sessions;

www.lewesboccia.co.uk

Find us on Facebook

Zak is very pleased, as he has the membership number 001. He has his own laminated membership photo ID and a cool lanyard we bought him from Barcelona this week.

I also received a message from Boccia England asking me to contact a woman about 30 miles away, which I did straight away. It turns out that she used to play on the national Boccia team, and has been looking for such a club for years! I was pleased to be able to tell her all about the club, show her our website and facebook page, and she seemed very excited.

It proved to me that this club is exactly what some wheelchair users have been waiting for - they start to play the game within their schools or placements, and then once they leave, there is nowhere for them to go to play. More importantly, it somewhere for people who have been or still are wrapped up in their 'bubble' to get out, and meet new people in a similar situation.

There is a sad lack of social occasions for wheelchair users in this area, but hopefully that is about to change.

Fingers crossed all will go well on our taster days, and we start to form a regular membership!

Has it really been THAT long!? (updated - photo added)

2011-02-19T18:22:00.002Z

WOW! Doesn't time fly by quick!

It's a whole new year and this is my first post!

A lot happened the end of last year - at least, this was the last thing on my mind if I'm being honest.

I hope to get back into regular posting, as there is so much going on now.

Kane is now 8 years old! It doesn't seem that long ago that I was holding him after he had just been born. He looked up to me with one eye as if to say "you'll do" then closed it again.

My wife has started running arty crafty courses, Kane is doing really well at school, Zak is adjusting to
semi-independent life and has a new interest which he is sharing with me, called Boccia. I'll do another post detailing exactly what has been going on there, but what started as a flippant remark to Zak, has turned into something far more - Lewes Boccia club!

My Birthday was on the 16th Feb, and I had a lovely day - got some nice presents, and some cash to pay for a private Soo Bahk Do lesson!

Jo and I celebrated Valentines Day by giving each other cards and then having lunch at the restaurant we went to for our first meal together. The Chef there has worked at a few restaurants including the Fat Duck owned by Heston Bloomenthal, and produced some very nice food indeed.

Also we lost three of the chicks we originally hatched, losing the silkie with smooth feathers quite recently. The good news is that the first one to hatch has turned into a very handsome cockerel called Star. You can see the silkie in him though with the 'brillo pad' on his head instead of a vertical comb. It's nice to see him climb the pecking order too - it will be nice to see him up the top some day! You can see a photo of him at the top of the post.

There is more news, but I'll write about those after they've happened (obviously!).

If you're reading this I'd like to say Happy New Year to you, as I missed doing it on the 1st Jan, and I wish you all the best for the coming year!

Santa visits Kingston Pre-school!

2010-12-20T17:47:00.000Z

You'd never guess who came to town on Friday...

...only Santa!

Admittedly, I had some insight seeing as it was ME!

Last year I was asked if I was able to be Santa for the local Pre-school. It was something I jumped at, as I love kids and the pre-school is a fantastic place, in which Kane had a great few years at.

The problem was, that last year it snowed very heavily, so much in fact the pre-school was closed and my services were no longer needed, so instead of getting dressed up and seeing the kids... I dressed up and walked about in the snow in our garden and fed the chickens!

There are some photos of last years outfit here.

I said goodbye to Jo after getting changed, and off I set to the pre-school.

Santa de-icing the windows.

A surprised looking Santa!

One can only blame the mince pies!

When I arrived I gently knocked on the door and Claire, the lady in charge, gave me one minute while she got the kids sitting down and quiet - then it was my grand entrance. I rang a set of sleigh bells outside the door and Claire asked the children if they could here anything - I was amazed at how many kids shouted out;

"SANTA'S SLEIGH BELLS!"

So with the door now open I walked in and did my "HO HO HO!". Claire guided me to a chair and the kids sat in front, looking up at me with excited eyes, and big grins.

Luckily, I happen to know some of the kids as their older siblings go to Kane's school - and it was amazing to see their little faces light up when I spoke to them by name and gave them a present wrapped and given by their parents to the pre-school previously.

One of the highlights was a little tiny speck of a girl who came up to me and said;

"I put a carrot out for your reindeer last year"

to which I replied;

"yes I know, and it gave my reindeer extra power so I was able to put all the children's' presents under the trees"

She went away grinning from ear to ear!

It was time to go once I had given out all the presents, and I was thanked by one parent who was holding a tiny baby dressed in red, with a Santa hat on - so cute! (I did remember to ask him if he'd been a good boy this year!)

It was a great experience, and you know what was the icing on the cake?

..... I've already been booked in for next years event as well!!

Movember has finished!

2010-12-06T13:26:00.000Z

I am almost sorry to lose the 'tache', but Movember is now officially over!

Our team - Team Chuck - raised over £400.00 for The Prostate Cancer Charity UK.

Here is a photo of some of the group - next to me is our Master Instructor Andy Scriven, from Scriven Soo Bahk Do, then there is Bob Andy's dad, the Nick - another student from the club.

We have a member of the club who has literally just finished his course of chemotherapy, his own personal fight with Prostate Cancer - we all wish him the very best, and hope that the money we raised goes a little way to helping others.

Quick update

2010-11-17T17:02:00.000Z

Well, the 'Mo' is going reasonably well - partly down to shaving approx 12 hours after the rest of my team!

Here we are as of yesterday!

Scary eh!?

Movember!

2010-11-02T11:04:00.001Z

Hi all,
yesterday I did something that I have only done about 4-5 times since I was 19...

...I had a wet shave!

Now this may not sound very interesting, but maybe when I tell you that it's in aid of the Prostate Cancer Charity, things may seem a little more clear.

You can read all about Movember, and how it helps by going to this link.

Here is a photo of my lovely (!?) smooth face - a lot of people are saying how young I look!

All through November I shall be growing a moustache. My Soo Bahk Do Master Instructor has made a team called Team Chuck, and any donations can either be made directly to the team, or to me personally here.

Hopefully we will raise some much needed cash for this important charity. I have a friend from Soo Bahk Do that has recently had Prostate cancer, in fact he's going for his last hit of chemotherapy soon, plus the fact that I know a lot of people who have had cancer makes this effort all the more worthwhile!

If you can donate - even a small amount to our team or to me, I would be eternally grateful, if not, then hopefully I have raised awareness a little bit, and helped the fight against this form of cancer!

A horrible find today!

2010-09-22T09:24:00.001+01:00

Today on one of my visits to check the chicks I found something really awful.

One of the chicks - the smallest one of the batch - had died.

She had no marks on her, she wasn't malnourished, so I'm not quite sure WHY she died.

From seeing the chicks when they were just hatched to seeing this little bundle of white feathers lying so unusually still.

There's nothing else to say really.

So sad.

Chicks move into their new home!

2010-09-14T14:22:00.000+01:00

I thought it about time the chicks went outside and started to realise what the big, bad world is all about, so I put them out in their new coop, with their little run.

Now the run isn't as big as I would have liked, but it's enough for the little chicks to scratch around, and for mum to get some fresh air.

We have 3 types of chick. Their father is the same - Rhydian, but their mothers vary. Two brown eggs hatched, then two of the white Silky eggs hatched.

From the brown eggs came the brown chick with the striking markings it's a typical brown Isa I think, with tan legs and skin and brown feathers.

From the other brown egg came the white chick. This chick has the same type of feathers like the brown Isas except they are white, but has black skin like the other Silkies.

The youngest two are definitely Silkies - typical scruffy feathers, big black eyes and black skin.

While I was taking photos, mum wanted to get in on the fun too!

Queenie is looking a little tired and bedraggled, but hopefully once they are all integrated she will fluff back up!

Chicks get new home.

2010-09-08T18:46:00.000+01:00

Well, I decided in the last few days that I ought to make some kind of dwelling for the chicks and Queenie, so they can get used to being outside and running about in the grass.It won't have a massive run, but should give them a little sense of adventure, while also letting the other ladies and Rhydian get used to them.

The coop isn't finished - I felted the roof today but haven't started felting the outside walls yet. I also started on their run - hopefully tomorrow I shall be able to felt some more and finish the run.

The run is approx 3' x 3' and is 17" high. There is no bottom to the run, as I'm making it for day release only, and they will be securely locked up in the little coop at night.

I must admit, I was quite pleased with it, my favourite bit being the little door that flaps down to reveal a little ladder board for the chicks to get back inside.

Usually when I make things, I make them so they do the job at hand - I'm not particularly great at finishing off, but this time I thought I'd spend a little extra time making sure this coop would last and look nice (must be my age!). I love the pitched roof, as the half that comes off is now hinged to the coop by means of being stuck to the felt - it won't be lifted up that often, so I'm happy with that.

Hopefully the chicks and Queenie will like it - it's not to last them forever - just until they are bigger and are more integrated with the flock.

I will post once it's finished and in place.

Chicks take over the coop!

2010-09-05T09:29:00.000+01:00

It's true - mother hen Queenie is no longer queen of the roost.

The four chicks have been seen trampling all over mum, even to the point she has one sitting on her back!

The above chick could be called Stella after Jo's mum, but we a little undecided whether to call the white one Stella instead. One thing is for sure, her feathers and the the little black stripe on her head are beautiful and hopefully she'll keep some of that detail later on in life.

The older chicks are growing their feathers very nicely, but with the smaller two looking quite tatty, as their feathers aren't growing as nicely as the others - is this a problem - I have no idea. Maybe they'll grow normally in a while, but I don't know - hopefully they will.

I replaced the floor in the old coop and made sure all the holes were covered in the door and back wall. Hopefully it's a lot warmer and safer now! At least they have a nice little area to run around in.

Queenie has been teaching the chicks to scratch recently, so every time I go in to check the water cups, I have to clean the bedding straw and sawdust out.

I have picked them up a few times now, and I like holding the coffee lid of water as they drink, because they can get used to my hands, and when they drink they tip their heads back and look straight at me - which is very cute (sorry to be a bit soppy there!)

The next stage is for me to make a little coop for mum and the chicks to go in actually outside the large coop, with a little run so they can start getting used to grass and all the other things they will hopefully take for granted when they're older.

Friday chick update.

2010-08-20T13:47:00.000+01:00

Well, despite all my fears and worries, things seem to be going ok in the brooder.

Queenie is showing she's a devoted mother type, and the chicks are eating their chick crumbs, and drinking their water nicely.

They seem to be growing quite quickly already and fluffing up well.

Here's a little film made this morning of the chicks at the watering hole - the whole family taking a break!

Enjoy!

Chick update No.3

2010-08-16T10:28:00.001+01:00

I say 'chick update No.3' as I put two updates on the bottom of my last post - I didn't want to seem TOO obsessed!

Today's post will comprise of this first bit - then further down at the bottom there will be updated news as it happens (or pretty much anyway!).

Not a lot to report today so far. We still have four chicks, and they are looking cuter than ever!

I had to make sure the remaining eggs were nicely under Queenie, as she seems to occasionally forget they are there - but then again, it's all new to her and she has a lot to cope with right now!

I very carefully lifted Queenie off the remaining eggs, her chicks were peeping out to see what was going on, to put her in front of her food and water. She was very unsteady on her feet, and so would mine be if I'd had been sitting for the amount of time she has - but she managed to eat some, drink some, and leave behind the biggest, stinkiest deposit I have ever seen from a chicken!

...still, you probably didn't want to know that last bit!

;)

Here's what the chicks look like this morning...

And one of the chicks eating her tasty chick crumbs!

Enjoy!

:D

Two chicks have hatched!!

2010-08-15T12:09:00.005+01:00

After all the fretting and worrying about whether or not I had done everything right...

...should I have moved the eggs?

...will the hen sit still on the eggs long enough?

...have I provided a good enough brooder for the hen and the chicks?

...it looks as though I can relax just a little bit today, as yesterday was the day the first two chicks hatched out of their eggs!

I realised this morning, that the broody hen was in fact Queenie. Queenie was one of the chickens we rescued a couple of years back, and was and still is, the only hen to actually stand up to Rhydian. I remember when she came in, Rhydian started to boss her around, when she reared up, with all her neck feathers standing on end - it made her look like a spitting cobra - the effect was so dramatic! She has been the one most friendly towards me - I feel awful I didn't realise it was her.

I went over this morning to let the rest of the ladies (and Rhydian) out to free range as usual, and to check on the broody hen and the eggs. Inside the coop I heard some definite 'cheeps', so excitedly I open the door and looked inside - there was a little tiny, white head peeping out from under Queenie's rear feathers!

I snuck inside a bit further and sat down on the hay next to the brooder, when ANOTHER head popped out. This one was a light brown colour with a dark stripe on it's head, and looked so cute!

While I was there I couldn't help but pick one up and just marvel at the whole aspect of a new life starting. This was totally unexpected - and I've only had a couple of days to adjust to the thought of possibly having chicks hatching - I just hope that I can look after them well enough for them to survive and prosper.

As I was sitting there, I filled up the small 1kg feeder with chick crumbs and the coffee cap with water (washed out thoroughly of course!). I then held both in front of Queenie one at a time so she knew that they were food and drink for her babies. Hopefully she will show the chicks how to eat and drink properly - at least that's the plan!

Here's a photo of them clambering a bit under the watchful eye of Queenie.

I also took a few little movies - they can be seen on my Youtube channel here, as well as this one below.

You can hear their little cheeps, but you can also hear Queenie telling the chicks to behave themselves!

I'll be keeping regular updates on these little things, so keep checking back for the latest news!

UPDATE!

The newest addition to our family!

Awwwwww!

NEW UPDATE!!

We now have FOUR chicks!

:D

Mother hen

2010-08-14T18:55:00.000+01:00

Today I spent a little time making a brooder for the eggs I found.

It's only a bit of 12mm OSB with some old shelf bits for sides, but it will the new home for (hopefully) any chicks that may hatch over the next week or so. I also covered two out of four of the coop roof vents so the end where the brooder sits is in the darker section, which should keep her nice and calm.

Most of the eggs are Silkie eggs, but two are brown and have come from the hybrid layers we rescued from the farm two years ago. Rhydian is our only male, and he is a Silkie so I wonder what will come out of the brown eggs - will they be hybrid brown colour, will they be white, or will they be a strange mix of the two - it remains to be seen.

The weirdest thing about all this happened after I had made a new nest for the broody hen and the eggs. I had just lifted the hen off the eggs and was in the process of moving them ever so carefully, when I heard a cheep and felt the egg I was lifting move!

To be honest, I nearly dropped the egg as I wasn't expecting it to do that!

After the hen had finished drinking and eating from the containers I had put in the old coop, I put her on top of the eggs, and she nuzzled them as she got herself comfortable. The food and water are outside the brooder so she doesn't make it too dirty, and can stretch her legs when she wants something.

The last thing I did was to make sure the door was shut and locked. She is definitely living the dream of having her own secure apartment!

Stiggy loves the chicks!

2010-08-12T16:57:00.000+01:00

A weird thing happened today. I went to collect the eggs as per usual, but in a strange place, there were a number of eggs, so I picked one up. It weighed more than the others so I got my torch and checked them.

8 of the eggs seemed to have chicks inside!

I hope to raised at least a few of the chicks - I'm really hoping they survive!

I am in contact with the man most knowledgeable about these things - Don!

Oh.... and I also have about 8-10 baby stick insects.... seems like our home is growing into a farm!

:D

May Fayre day.

2010-05-21T15:45:00.001+01:00

The local school always puts on a May Fayre, and this year was no different.

It was opened by the Newhaven Marching Band, who played a wide selection of classical and modern tunes to the early visitors.

Around the outside of the playground, there were many stalls for people to peruse.

There was a book stall, plant stall, and white elephant stall (no-not to buy white elephants from!) that sold all sorts of strange and wonderful items - as well as the more normal things like games and video cassettes.

Kane's favourite was the 'Throw a sponge at the Teacher' stand, where we paid £1.00 to throw 3 wet sponges at the teacher - although to start with, Mr Dobell the headmaster took up the challenge of being soaked!

I think Kane threw 9 sponges, and I threw probably the same amount - although after hitting Mr Dobell full in the face with a fully laden wet sponge, I was told to double the distance to throw from. Unfortunately for the headmaster, this only seemed to improve my aim!

Kane then wanted to have a ride on 'Sparkles' the lovely white pony, like he does every year, so up he popped and rode around the playing field.

Up next was the coconut shy, where on my penultimate throw, we won a coconut!!

The bouncy castle was next, but the rain stopped play, so his go was cut a little short.

We met some friends at the Fayre, and bought some cakes to take home to Zak and Jo.

All in all it was an excellent day, and we look forward to going next year as well!

This is the news!

2010-05-01T14:39:00.000+01:00

Well not exactly, but I have taken over the Editor job for our local village newsletter/publication that comes out 9 times a year.

Ok so it's not the Times or anything as grand as that, but I have a lot of plans for improvements and extra sections.

I have already implemented a number of major changes, unfortunately I can't digress any information as the deadline for next months news is the 19th May, and it won't be printed and delivered until the end of the month.

I will post and let you know further details once I've got the first issue out of the way!

Quick Mole update 6-0

2010-04-18T17:43:00.000+01:00

Another unfortunate mole was seen yesterday - or rather it's small mound of earth was, so I set a trap for it.

I say unfortunate, unfortunate for it - it was caught within 24 hours...

...another victory for the Stiggy household!

(Moles score points if I can't get them within the 24 hr period!)

:D

Summer day play.

2010-04-08T19:35:00.002+01:00

Today was a beautiful day.

The sun was shining, the birds singing, a soft, fresh breeze blew over the garden, as the chickens ran free in the paddock.

Kane said he wanted to play outside this afternoon, after going down town this morning for some emergency rations, so he donned his shoes and went outside to explore. He's always a little funny about going out on his own - not like me when I was his age - any excuse to go dig a hole or make a trap for something, but Kane prefers company.

We started off playing soldiers in and around his secret camp I built him, then he decided he wanted to kick a ball about, so we went to the shed and got his football out - it was a little flat, but it didn't stop us having a good ol' kick about.

After he wore me out, I came in and sat at my desk while he continued to play outside - running around after his ball, and then playing on his little slide - going down backwards, sideways and upside down.

Unfortunately his shoe fell off, so I popped outside to put it back on for him, but not before I'd taken a quick shot of the view from my desk!

A day at the Seaside!

2010-04-05T11:26:00.022+01:00

Last Thursday, Jo, Kane and I went to Brighton pier. We haven't been there for a while, so we grabbed some coats, jumped in the car and off we went.
We parked along Madeira Drive, amongst it's fine arches, and walked along the pavement near to the beach towards the pier.

Brighton is a stunning city, but the most stunning of all is the history, and old buildings that lie mostly unseen from the main routes in Brighton. As seasides go, you really can't get better than Brighton!

Brighton's first pier - a chain pier was built in 1823, replaced by a grander pier in 1899, and by 1911 the concert hall had become an attraction in itself. In 1984 the pier was refurbished, and stands as the pier we see today.

Brighton also boasts the worlds oldest railway - the Volk's Railway opened in 1883! The railway even drove through the sea on a large stilted electric train!

We walked around the outside of the pier, taking in the fresh (read freezing!) air, before having a look inside one of the arcade buildings. Kane soon discovered a machine called 'Spider Stompin' which gave out lots of tickets that you can buy prizes with. He went on a couple of times and by the end of the day, he had 27 tickets! Enough to get a little polystyrene plane! (only 18,600 tickets for a Nintendo DS!!!)

Next we went on an 'Air hocky' game, which Kane and I love playing.

He came up the victor in that, and then we started getting peckish, so we went outside and started walking to find somewhere to eat.

Before we left the pier, I thought I'd try to get a photo of the amazing cloud formation over the coast and Brighton - it ended up being 3 that I turned into a panorama.

When we came off the pier, Jo pointed out a Harry Ramsden's so we went inside, and while Jo enjoyed a Cod, chips and mushy peas, Kane and I enjoyed a plateful of sausage and chips!

What a GREAT day out!

Finished!

2010-04-03T09:20:00.001+01:00

Well, yes, I know, it's taken an awful long time to actually state the fact that I have finished the front room units...

...well what can I say - we've been very busy, with life throwing us a few wobblers and googlies, plus my usual laziness, I just haven't got round to blogging the details!

"WHAT!?" You say?

"I don't believe you Stiggy, you're usually SO punctual with your posts!"

Well, what can I say....

The main thing is I've managed to take a photo!

Drum roll please............

Now we haven't finished loading it up with 'stuff' yet, but we have lots of interesting (and some not quite so interesting) books in boxes that we need to rediscover, and some lovely 'things' to put on the shelves, so it's a work in progress still, but at least now there's no construction or fiddling left to do!

...which is great!

....at least in THIS room!

Black belt in Ikea!

2010-03-15T15:02:00.001Z

We've wanted some storage in our house since we moved in - a large wall almost 20' long just crying out for a sprawling area filled with shelves.

I WAS going to make something myself, but after careful consideration and some basic math, decided to buy it in instead, so I carefully planned out what we could fit in the space.

Jo was happy with the aray, so I ordered the lot online, and had it delivered last Saturday morning about 8:45am.

The last day or so I've found myself fixing other things, but here's what I've managed to do so far.

The whole lot needs fixing to the wall, cupboard doors need going on - then handles for the doors, and then lastly the shelves need going in, in a random formation.

Quick mole Update....

2010-02-20T10:05:00.002Z

Stiggy 5 - Moles 0

Beautiful day

2010-02-17T22:20:00.000Z

Well, after my Birthday, I got a chance to pop out into the garden and do a few chores.

First off, further to my adventures with my local mole population, I checked the traps I had set yesterday. I find hunting these little menaces a real challenge, although the challenge is getting less as I find myself being more successful in catching them.

I had set two traps in the main runs leading to the latest molehill, approximately 6"-8" away from the edge of the mound. One had been totally filled in which is unusual for the Dufus trap, but I checked the other one anyway and found it had a mole inside. Strangely, there was an extra tunnel beside the full trap, implying there is still yet another mole roaming free in our garden, so I reset the traps.

After that I spent some time looking at our Snowdrops. Now we are lucky enough to have a lot of Snowdrops in our garden, and I thought I'd take a shot to show.

In the afternoon I took Kane to the local agrigultural machinery and hardware center to see if they had a drive belt for my Westwood ride on mower, so that my grass/leaf collecter unit would work again.

Kane had a great time looking at all the toys they had there, and we both learnt about a machine that picks sweetcorn called a 'Cornjerker'. I was pleased to discover they had a belt in stock, and after the salesman gave me advice on lengthening the use of the belt, Kane and I left the shop and headed for home. The belt will be put in place early next week.

When we got back, we put 'UP' in the DVD player and relaxed while we watched it - we love that film!

All in all it was a very successful and enjoyable day!

Kane's 7th Birthday!

2010-02-10T10:14:00.004Z

I just can't believe how fast the time has gone. It only seems like yesterday I was holding our new born son in my arms in the hospital, right after Jo had given birth to him. I was the first person he ever saw, as he opened one eye, looked at me and closed his eye again, as if to say;

"Hello Dad, you'll do, but now I need some sleep"

So it's amazing that after another blink of an eye, he had his 7th Birthday on the 31st January.

We asked Kane what he wanted to do - Jo gave him some choices, but in the end it was up to us to try to help him choose, as he wanted to do everything we suggested!

Kane decided he wanted to go bowling in Brighton Bowlplex, then go to Pizza Hut afterwards with a few of his friends.

While I designed his Birthday card, Jo started work on a simply AWESOME cake - Kane's into Club Penguin - she made a sponge cake, then set to it making the extra pieces to make it into an Igloo, once they were put on top of the cake, Jo started on carefully putting the icing over the whole thing and working her magic to make it into what you see below - STUNNING is all I can say, and I worked MY magic on the little paper things you see around the cake.

Here is a picture of the front and inside of the card I made.

I took Kane and two of his friends straight from school, and we met another two of his friends at the Bowlplex. The game was great, with all the kids (mostly) behaving themselves and having a great time!

Once the game was finished, we rushed to Pizza Hut which was only about 200M away, to our reserved round booth, and ordered our pizza. Again all the kids were remarkably well behaved considering it was a party, they were given chefs hats to colour in while they waited for their food, and they all wrote really cool things about Kane on them, such as 'Rock Kane' and other phrases - Kane just lapped up the attention!

Talking about lapping - as the kids all went up for seconds with their ice-cream bowls (errrrm yours truely included!), Kane discovered that his spoon was frozen underneath his blob of ice-cream, which he tried to eat in one go!

The waitress then brought out his 'party' Birthday cake, and we all sang Happy Birthday, then myself and my good friend Martin cut the cake up and put it into party bags Jo had all ready sorted out.

After all the kids had been collected or taken home, Kane and I had a chance to sit down and relax - building one of his Bionicles, which, to be honest, I absolutely loved too! It was VERY cool!

I can't think of a better end to Kane's 7th Birthday!

A crazy year so far!

2010-01-17T09:34:00.011Z

I seem to be posting about as often as we have blue moons!

It's one of those things - not intentional, I love blogging, but unfortunately life has been taking far too much time over virtual writings.

We had Christmas - that was very nice, we had Jo's parents over Christmas Eve, my parents round boxing day, and no-one at all round on the actual day itself - WONDERFUL!

Before the Christmas holidays, I was set to be Santa at Kane's old pre-school, but due to everything being closed due to the snow, I wasn't able to do it - nor was I able to do it on the second occasion, due to.... yes, you guessed it SNOW!

I didn't let that major disappointment get me down too much (although I've booked myself in for next year I hope!), because I wanted to see what sort of Santa I would have been - so I dressed up and went walkabout in the snow with Kane to get an idea of what I'd look like.

Even the Chickens got a visit!

Since it WAS snowing, I looked around to buy Kane a sledge, but there were none for sale ANYWHERE! It was one of those occasions when I should have pulled my finger out a LOT sooner, but not wishing to have my lad upset because he couldn't join in with the fun - I decided to make him one!

I'll spare you the technical details, but I would have bent the metal tube runners on my pipe bender I bought, but I didn't have any sand to put inside the tube to keep it round when I bent it - so it folded rather than bent round - still it worked VERY well!

During the snow we had a power cut for 32 hours. We're not on gas, so we had no way of cooking either!

Kane enjoyed sitting round some candles (especially his 'Meerkat shrine!), but Jo and Zak were less than impressed - it gave me the opportunity to become 'Super Stiggy' though, as I drove out and hired a gas heater and bought a little camping gas cooking stove.

Candles just ooze mystical don't they!

And that, as they say, is about it - I'm looking forward to blogging more this year, as I'm sure there are lots of adventures to be had and stories to be told...

..I guess we'll have to wait and see!

;)

HAPPY NEW YEAR to all!

My Gold medal!

2009-11-23T09:10:00.003Z

I thought I'd show you my Gold medal I won for team sparring in Soo Bahk Do, on November 15th 2009.

Moles, moving and medals!

2009-11-17T09:25:00.005Z

It's a bit of an obscure title I know, but that's basically what I've been doing recently!

Moles
First off, the moles. Unfortunately, the molehills started again! I say unfortunately, mainly from the mole's point of view really - unfortunate because this new mole obviously didn't realise he'd picked the wrong garden to explore in.

As soon as the first signs appeared, I rushed online and bought three Dufus mole traps.

The next day they arrived, and I buried them in a mole hill to take away the 'newness'. Two days later, and there were 2 more molehills, and various little places where the mole had popped through the turf, so, grabbing my gardening gloves (moles have an excellent sense of smell) and a trowel, I set to work placing the traps around and between a mound or two.

The first day, nothing happened, but my belief in myself as a mole catcher never faltered once.

The second morning came, and I went to check the traps I had set, and lo and behold SUCCESS!

I have now caught moles on both my last attempts in a day or two - I guess I must be getting the hang of it - especially as I don't know ANYONE who has caught a mole before!

Moving
Last week we hired a Luton van with a tail lift to move the last few remaining large items from our other house, which was not too bad, but it tired me out quite quickly.
Shelving units, armchair, other units - all had to be moved, but luckily I managed to borrow a trolley dolly type thing. It's basically a 1" ply board about 3'x2' with big wheels on the bottom, and it was a godsend to me!

I was able to gain some help from a friend of mine, who helped me move the biggest unit to my in laws house 20 miles away, and take it inside to where they wanted it to be.

I brought my bikes and sidecar home too, which was something I've been wanting to do for a while, but with them both in bits or not working, something I could only do with a van like this one.

My Honda CB750 Chop on the left, and my pre-diversion Yamaha FJ600 on the right.

Medals
I may have mentioned in the past that Kane does a martial art called Soo Bahk Do, well it's something that I also started some time ago after Kane started enjoying it.
I go to lessons in my local Leisure Centre, and am taught by Master Andrew Scriven, of Scriven Martial Arts.

Ever since I started, I've tried my best to embrace the art, and all it's parts, and I have a lot of respect for Master Scriven and all the people in the club. So when I was told of a sparring competition, I jumped at the chance!

A month before the even I was really confident, and keen to have a go and join in...

...the further towards the competition, and my confidence really left me - and by the time the day actually came, I was scared of the unknown, and SO unsure of my own abilities.

However, the competition was in two main parts - sparring (Deh Ryun), and forms (Hyung).

Forms are a vital part of training in the Soo Bahk Do art. Forms are prearranged patterns designed to teach not just technique but art. When a form is performed correctly it is a thing of beauty. There are many hyungs taught in Soo Bahk Do.

Students from around the South East came and performed their own slightly customised forms in groups, which was really interesting, and they had all worked hard to make their performances as interesting as they could.

The second part of the competition was the sparring. Although some people were unable to make it, there were still enough for the Little Ninjas, Juniors and Adults to make it a very enjoyable event.

I was asked to keep time for the Junior sparring, and it's amazing how nervous I was just having to press a single button on the stopwatch! All the kids did so well, and I knew quite a few of them, making it an even more exciting and inspiring occasion.

After the juniors, it was time for the adults, we were placed in 4 teams of three, and given two fights each and the points for each individual were all added together to make a total for the team.

I was placed in Team 1, with two guys from my class - a Black belt called Glen, and a Green belt called Dave.

To cut a long story short, we did very well, Glen and Dave beating opponents, and I also won BOTH my fights - which was blimmin amazing! The first of my fights was against a friend of mine called Martyn, so I was totally out of my comfort zone and so nervous - especially as I didn't want to hit a friend! (Control is the word in sparring, we have to 'pull' our punches).

Team 1 actually WON the competition, and all three of us received Gold medals for our efforts!

It's been a long time since I've been that proud of myself, and I can't wait for the next competition - maybe I'll even get to compete as an individual - something that will REALLY test my nerve!

Fight One!
I start on the right hand side of the screen, and my friend Martyn is on the left.

Fight Two!
I start on the left this time, with a guy called Graig on the right from a different club.

Medals!
Medals are given in reverse order, you'll see me - I'm the baldy, beardy one with glasses at the end!

So I guess this means that Team One are Regional Team Sparring Champions!

Soo Bahk!

Small but beautiful!

2009-10-12T11:18:00.006+01:00

There's always a lot of fuss over large vegetables. Large vegetables get their own tables at their own shows, but how many times do we think of small vegetables, and how great they are!?

We've had a lot of success with our tomatoes this year, they've produced most the year, and show no signs of slowing down.

I wanted to share todays pick of items that I collected this morning.

First we have the tiny tomatoes, probably only about 10mm (or 3/8") in diameter.

Then secondly, I thought I'd show you an egg from one of our Silkies. They are always small and white, but perfectly formed little wonders.

So next time you go shopping, or pick your produce from your garden, spare a thought for the little things!

Learning to weld!

2009-10-04T14:39:00.005+01:00

It's something I've always wanted to do. I think it started when I bought my first motorbike, and has never gone away - the urge to learn to weld.

Last week, we asked Zak's school to fix his tray on his wheelchair, as on one side the weld had broken, and his tray flapped, meaning he wasn't able to use his switches for his pc - a major part of his free time!

We sent Zak in with a message for their engineering department to have a look and fix the tray/chair. Unfortunately, the trained and experienced engineers could figure out that the weld had broken on a certain part, so did pretty much nothing for Zak.

Annoyed by their lack of common sense, I went down to Halfords, and bought myself a welder, and a few welding supplies like electrodes, wire brush and gloves.

Now I have NEVER welded before - not even picked one up, but I was determined to fix Zak's chair - so onto Youtube I went, and began teaching myself how to weld. After about half hour of watching I decided to go and have a little play to see what was what.

After an hour I thought I had picked up the basics and took the part off Zak's chair that needed fixing.

It took me no more than 10 minutes to drill out the plate, push the bar into the hole and weld everything back together.

Now Zak's tray on his chair is fixed, and rock solid I might say - ok it's not the prettiest weld in the world....

...but it works!

I decided today to make Jo a little pressie, so I found some washers and a bolt and got to work.

Everything went well, apart from when it came to welding the support nail - it just MELTED!

I made a blob on the plate, then hurriedly pushed the nail into it while it was still soft - SUCCESS!

The butterfly is quite small - the plate on the bottom is approx 2" long, and the butterfly stands approx 2.5" tall.

Here is Jo's present, it's not pretty, but at least you can tell what I tried to do...

...and remember - this is only my 5th attempt at welding!!

A busy day!

2009-09-23T10:34:00.015+01:00

Yesterday I set about working in our paddock cutting the grass, trimming trees and hedges galore.

Luckily, one of my ladies was there to make the final inspection on my little tractor/mower to make sure everything was safe and in good working order.

Hmmmm.... too many leaves on the footplates...

...the seat seems the right height...

...yep - that's the right height for cutting grass...

...and everything looks ok down here too!

After she was satisfied the everything was to her high standards, she hopped off and let me continue.

Spider engineering

I find Spiders fascinating - horrible - but fascinating. How they spin that brilliant web, with such engineering skill is just so fantastic.

I managed to find a nice one, and took a couple of shots to show both sides of the little thing.

I didn't realise he was having a little snack untill i went to his underside - and couldn't help stay watching him for a while.

Tree tidy

I also cleared some growth around the bottom of this tree, cutting back brambles and removing low branches.

Then I removed a few dead branches, and almost dead branches from this tree. There was a low hanging, long branch on the right of the tree as you look at this photo, which I removed as it wasn't too healthy, and was starting to foul in the nearby apple tree.

Then lastly yesterday, I trimmed approx 60M of hedge, side and top (although I haven't taken a photo of the finished hedge) and so all I need to do now is the part of the hedge on the roadside.

Before...

...and during...

Because the hedge has grown so high (approx 9 or 10 foot) I had to stand on the seat of the tractor - even with my mighty KM90's long reach and bendiness, I just needed that extra length to get to the top of the hedge!

A day to relax!

2009-09-08T19:22:00.004+01:00

Since recently Jo and I have been working hard, what with both kids being on holiday, and working at the other house, I decided this morning that today would be totally different.

I gave Jo three options. to go to Chichester or Arundel, to go to some place of her choosing, or to go to Hobbycraft in Crawley. Jo chose the latter, so once the kids were off at school, and we'd had our cup of tea, we set off to see what the store was like.

The store itself was on two floors - much bigger than any other craft shop I'd seen (not that I'd seen many before) and luckily there was a PC World shop nearby, so I decided after bravely going inside the craft shop that I would prefer to spend my time drooling at wonderful electronic gadgets, software and books!

I managed to find a great mouse for my gaming, which is programmable, and is SO much faster than my other mouse, I almost have trouble keeping up with it - or seeing where my arrow on the screen is!

It is the 'Deathadder' mouse, from Razer, and it is AWESOME!

I also bought a Roxio VHS to DVD set, which will enable me to sort out my old video tapes of things like our wedding, and dating back to some of my old gigs I played.

After spending as much time as I could possibly muster in PC World, I thought I'd better go and see how Jo was getting on - and if she needed a hand with the multiple trolleys of stick on's she was going to buy( only joking Jo - please don't kill me!).

As it turned out she was still on the ground floor - so like the dutiful husband I am, I bravely walked around the shop trying to be as interested in everything as I possibly could!

Once Jo had bought some rather interesting little items, and some presents for some kids, we paid for the stuff and left the shop - after being directed to a 'local' pub by the man behind the desk. (The directions took about 5 minutes to listen too - and I forgot what he said after the second turning to be honest!)

We drove sort of homish, sort of going the way the man had said, until we eventually - and by massive stroke of luck - found the place!

The place in question was the Dukes Head in Crawley.

If you go to the website you can see the sort of things they do, but we were greeted in a very friendly manner by our waitress, who gave us a choice of tables.

I'm afraid I went for the unadventurous burger and chips option, and Jo went for a pasta with spicy sausage meal. They were both delicious, and we certainly would go there again!

Once we had finished, we made our way home to play with what we had bought.

What a great way to relax and enjoy each others company!

We had a delightful lunch, Jo was great company, and we decided to try to go out more - even just for a couple of hours now and then.

Bees, Mushrooms and morning dew.

2009-08-08T18:35:00.006+01:00

This morning we had free, due to the kids both being elsewhere last night, Jo wanted me to take a couple of photos of a mushroom just off the drive, so I thought I'd share them with you.

I love the detail of the underneath of mushrooms - they have incredible architecture!

Since I had my camera in my hands, I thought I'd see what else was out there this morning, and moved to the back garden to explore.

One of the first things that came to mind was the flowerbed by Zak's room, it has some beautiful colours and the flowers are wonderful.

It was while I was deciding which flower to take a shot of, that I noticed a solitary bee hovering from one flower to another, so I took a couple of shots.

The first shot was of a thistle, and the second shot was caught as it was collecting pollen from inside the flower itself.

The last shot I took this morning was of a spiderweb that was covered in the morning dew.

All I could think of when I saw it was, how you could imagine certain parts of it looking like jewelry.

What do you see?

VICTORY!! Stiggy vs Mole update!

2009-08-05T16:20:00.005+01:00

It's been a while since I started an assault on a mole that had been causing me no end of trouble and heartache.

The war started with smoke bombs, to try and push the mole out of our back garden, which worked quite well, making Mr Mole scurry into our paddock area. The main problem with this was that he then had free-reign to dig and burrow for all he was worth. This made it very unstable in the paddock, due to the unbelievable amount of tunnels, which collapsed underfoot and under mower!

Enough is enough I thought, and preceded to buy a couple of mole traps which I didn't have much success with to be quite honest. Mr Mole seemed to delight in back filling the traps until they went off, and then tunnelling around them!

The same thing happened when I used a 'Humane' mole trap. The little wotsit just glued the little tin doors up, and then tunnelled round the trap!

Recently though I thought that Mr Mole had moved on to pastures new - to either the field next door - or to the field across the road - that was until I walked round the chicken run and nearly broke my ankle when I trod on a three way tunnel junction...

...I then realised that the problem hadn't gone away - just out of sight!

I wasn't too optimistic about catching anything, but I thought I'd give it a go before I spent any more money buying a few Dufus mole traps, so off I went into the paddock, armed with two of the traps I'd bought previously.

One of the advantages of a long campaign is that you do actually get to know, or recognise certain signs of mole behaviour.

One of these signs is to find a tunnel just under the surface that ends with a little mound of earth. This is one of his exploration tunnels, which he may or may not come back to and continue on his way.

I roughly tore up the roof of the tunnel about 8" before the mound of earth, and set the trap. The second trap I placed in one of the tunnels I knew the mole was still using. You know Mr Mole is still using the tunnel because you have to flatten all the tunnels in the first place to see if he repairs any - then BINGO, you know where he goes!

I went back to the traps the next day, and didn't think anything of the trap that had gone off - but i took it out and looked into the tunnel...

...low and behold, I saw a little tiny paw sticking into the tunnel - I didn't want to get too excited, just in case I'd actually caught a rat or some other animal...

...slowly i grabbed the little paw...

...pulled it out of the tunnel...

...IT WAS MR MOLE!!!

I pretty much whooped with joy - I know it sounds silly, but no-one I know has had ANY success in catching or killing moles.

I was exalted!

Straight away I brought Mr Mole to the house like the proud hunter I was, and showed Jo who took the photos, and although Kane wasn't too impressed with it, hopefully it will help to harden him up to country life a bit.

One thing I remember is a comment on my first post about the moles (which I deleted), from a professional mole catcher - which pretty much pooh-poohed my attempts at mole catching, suggesting instead I contact a 'proper' mole catcher to do the job, as I was unlikely to get any results, and I was just wasting my money.

Well I hope you're reading this Mr Mole Catcher - because you are totally and utterly WRONG!

ANYONE can catch a mole, and it's even easier I hear with the Dufus traps - you just have to know what you're looking for in the first place in order to set the traps in the correct place!

I feel like I have just come of age!

School Sports Day.

2009-08-01T09:54:00.016+01:00

Since I'm on the subject of summer, nothing symbolises the break up from school for the long, summer holidays than the School Sports Day.

Kane recently had his, and it's always a great day, with a chance to watch the kids having fun, and (sometimes) getting that competitive feeling.

An awful lot of schools, I hear, in the UK have stopped the tradition of sports day because they don't want their pupils to feel in any way inadequate by losing a race!
Personally I have the opinion that in order to survive this wonderful and difficult life, we have no choice but to teach kids the bad with the good - and how to cope with losing occasionally...

...even if it IS losing the 'running with a plastic cone on the head' race!!

Anyway, I digress.

The way the Sports Day works at Kane's school is they have lots of different events placed within the school grounds, each one being run by either a parent or one of the older kids at the school. Last year I ran the 'kick the football at targets on a wall' event, and felt I missed out in a big way from not being able to see Kane compete.

This year was different. This year I decided to drop all responsibility, and to follow Kane round and give him support. Jo and I went together and I decided to take a few snapshots of the day. I wish I could post more than I have here - but to be honest, I actually took 192 photos of the day!

So be prepared for lots of photos here - I'll just put a quick note saying what each one is!

Kane's 1st event of the day - 'balancing 3 tennis balls on a tray race'

Dribbling ball round cones.

Get a score with beanbags.

Standing long jump.

Run to get 1st beanbag and put it in bucket, then 2nd beanbag etc...

...then run carrying bucket to finish line.

Dribble football round cones.

Skipping race (which Kane was WAY in the lead until he got caught up in the rope!)

Famous 'cone on the head and run as fast as you can' race.

Egg and spoon race.

Having a laugh between events!

The sack race.

Get score by throwing balls in baskets.

See how many times you can bounce the ball on the racket event.

Obstacle course race.

Last event - get as many balls through the hoop with 3 balls.

We were so proud of Kane, and the way he handled himself during the day. It was lovely to see how much he had improved at certain events, and just how wonderful he was generally with everything that was given to him to do.

All in all everyone had a really fun day, the kids behaved impeccably (as did most of the parents!) and no one was mortally wounded or put into deep depression by any of the events.

Memories of summer

2009-07-24T14:54:00.005+01:00

I haven't really got time to blog in a regular fashion at the moment, but I thought I'd share with you some fun that happened over the summer, when my Mum and Dad came over and helped to set up our crops in our polytunnel.

I thought I'd give my Dad a bit of a laugh - so decided to take him on a race around our garden on my little tractor with him in the trailer!

As you can see he enjoyed himself rather more than I thought he would!

Then we had to get down to the task of moving some of our wonderful, fantastically broken down compost and chicken manure. Part of the reason our manure is so fine, is that when the ladies free range - they scratch around and turn everything over, leaving us with almost a find sand like texture!

We had some great success with all of our crops - in fact probably TOO much success as we have been unable to eat everything we've grown and had to resort to handing out various vegetables to friends and family!

Well, that's me done for a little while - I hope to be able to write more posts as time allows - but seeing as we have both kids now for 6 weeks summer holiday - who knows!?

Take care,

Stiggy

Apologies

2009-07-14T12:11:00.003+01:00

I apologise for my lack of posts recently, we've been rather busy in life, but hope to return soon as I get enough time!

I hope you'll still check back once in a while!

:D

Another loss today.

2009-06-12T20:44:00.004+01:00

I thought it was sad the other day when Cherie died, but it seems she may not have just 'died' as such.

I was standing in the school playground, chatting to a couple of the dads I know, when my mobile phone rang. Jo was on the phone telling me that a fox had attacked the chickens and one of the hens had been got, so I rushed in to get Kane from school. Luckily it was home time, so I asked Kane's teacher if I could take him right away.

We rushed home to find Jo in the paddock, she told me that she heard some racket, and rushed outside to see what the matter was. Jo saw the fox attacking one of the hybrid hens - the brown ones - and told me that Rhydian had stood up for the girls, clucking and flapping his wings at the fox!

Jo herded the chickens under the big fir tree, and protect them until the fox ran away.

Unfortunately, Jo told me that when she got to the hen that was attacked, she picked her up and she was breathing very fast, then she lay her head on Jo's arm and closed her eyes. Then she was gone.

From now on, I will only let my 'ladies' free range when I'm there to protect them. It's a shame as it's lovely to know they're enjoying themselves without my watchful eye.

I guess it's just the country way.

Overdue update!

2009-06-09T09:15:00.005+01:00

Today I thought I'd put some time aside before I start anything else, to update my blog on a few things.

Recently I laid some turf down for our back lawn, it was the first time I had ever tried doing this job, but it seemed to go quite well.

I have had to go back up to twice a day to water some patches that have dried out, but it seems to have been worth the time spent, as the odd strand of green has been seen poking out of the straw coloured turf.

R.I.P Cherie

Unfortunately we found Cherie dead in the paddock the other day - I had let them out in the morning, as is usual, and when I went to put them away, I found poor Cherie lying down.

It seems she may have had the same thing happen to her as one of our older chickens some time ago - although my medical skills are limited, there were no marks on her, and no feathers littering the grass around her - so she must have gone very quick which is a good thing.

Cherie was one of five rescue chickens we picked up last year, and she was especially endearing as she had a twisted beak, which is why we named her after Cherie Blair!

She was one of the few hens that let me pick her up, more than the others anyway, so it is especially sad that she would be the one to go.

Rest in peace Cherie - we'll always remember you!

Kane rises the ranks!

Kane has been doing really well at Little Ninjas, he seems to have a natural flair for martial arts.

Well the other week he successfully passed the grading to give him his new belt - the yellow belt with a green stripe.

Every training session he goes to he receives a tag on his belt, and every time he gets 8 tags on his belt, he is eligible to do the grading for the next belt. Kane now does 2 sessions a week, and gets 2 tags a week, this has cut down the time he takes to get a new belt - not that it's rushed or anything - the test is quite comprehensive for the next belt.

Here he is in a fighting stance, with his new belt!

What a sod!

2009-05-12T14:57:00.006+01:00

No - I'm not swearing at anyone - I'm just describing what sort of job I did yesterday!

Now, you may remember I worked very hard at lifting the old turf off our back lawn at our old house...

...well yesterday I spent the day lifting sods and carefully placing them in a weird sort of puzzle on the bare ground.

I was told by the nice man who delivered to me from Perfect Turf that I should lay the turf round the edges of the garden and work to them - that way I'd get a nice clean edge along the border, rather than a jagged line where I'd cut them in.

I started nice and quickly, I think it was because it was a new and exciting job that I'd never done before. Either that or someone had secreted a strange chemical into the turf, cos either way it seemed fun!

I decided (all by myself!) that I was going to lay the turfs in a brick formation, this seemed effective and gave me straight lines that I could work to. I hadn't bothered to set out wires or string, mainly because I couldn't be bothered - but mainly because I didn't have any wire or string to set out.

Now then, I was a little stuck for something to cut the turf with, but I found in a kitchen draw a table knife, so with this in hand I set out to trim that turf!

I had a break to go pick Kane up from school, then I went straight back to the matter in hand.

After finishing the job at last, I plugged the hose in and gave the whole lot a lovely long drink, to give it a good start in life.

Job done!

2009-05-08T12:21:00.003+01:00

Ocassionally I find causes that I want to support, and this is one of them. We took some ex batts in last year, and so I feel it's good to give something extra back.

The below rescue is in Norfolk.

The following is what I have been asked to copy and post on this blog;

Little Hen Rescue desperately need homes for the last remaining battery hens of a farm due to shut down. The slaughter man has been booked by the farmer for 29th June, these hens will be slaughtered unless homes are found ASAP. After spending 18 miserable months of their short lives in a hell hole, never seeing daylight or grass, never knowing what the sun feels like on their backs, they will be held by the legs and roughly put into crates, loaded up like rubbish and killed. All for cheap crappy eggs.

Many co-ordination points have and are being set up to accommodate as wide an area for re homing as possible. If you can give a home to some very needy hens, or can help in other ways ie putting up posters or donating, please contact LHR @ http://www.littlehenrescue.co.uk/
If you have been thinking about re homing some ex battery hens but are unsure, please feel free to join the Ex Battery Hens Forum for very friendly and helpful advice http://www.exbatteryhens.com/

If you are a blogger, please pop a post on your blog to help raise awareness.

Please, support LHR and help them to get these hens out.

Many thanks for reading,

Stiggy

To turf or not to turf.

2009-05-01T09:54:00.017+01:00

We're sprucing up the house we've just moved from, so we can put it on the market, one of the jobs that we had designated to a pro was the garden.

Since the grass hadn't been cut since last October, it had grown long, bent over and made clumps all over the lawn. Unfortunately, the areas underneath the clumps had been starved of light, and the grass had died away, leaving random lumps and bumps...

...not to mention the size of the ant hills - which stood like mini volcanoes amongst the grass!

We decided to get some quotes for re turfing the lawn - that is, to take up all the old grass and top layer of soil, and replace it all with lovely new turf. After we had spoken to a few people, we received a quote to do 140m2, which we felt was way over what we expected, so we took the decision for me to do it myself. In the meanwhile, I cut the grass to see how bad the problem was.

The problem was, I found a turf website that could deliver all the turf for the job for 1/10 of the quote - and the machine to do the job was only cheap for 2 days - so onto the phone I went to organise the machine to be delivered.

After the turfing machine had been delivered, it took me a little while to figure out how to use it, adjust it and make it work for me, but luckily it didn't take very long at all! (I seem to have an affinity with anything with a petrol engine!)

I decided to do only the main part of the lawn, as the bank was too difficult to get the machine on, and anyway - it's not a well used area of grass.

It took me two afternoons (6 hours) to take the turf off the areas I wanted to, which I was very pleased about, as I had never used one of these machines before.

After all the turf was taken up, I had to order a skip, then another afternoon was spent moving all the old stuff into the skip.

Once everything had been cleared and raked to get the nasty stones and lumps out the way, I went round with my weed sprayer and attacked any weeds I could find.

The two tons of topsoil came the next day, and I set about wheelbarrowing the soil to the back garden.

The quote we received was for a group of men to work for about 3 days to re turf our garden...

...had I been able to work full days at the house I would have been able to do the job - on my own - in just 3 days!

I still have a small area to put top soil on before I order the actual turf, which I'll do today, but the really back breaking work is done now - so I'm happy!

While I was working, I found quite a few slow-worms. Most were small, but one was quite large.

I love snakes (never felt like owning one though!), and although I would never expect to actually see a snake in the wild over here in the UK, it was nice to at least be able to hold a slow-worm, and see it's little tongue darting in and out - tasting the air around it...

...I wonder what it thought of me!

(Jo caught me resting and having a drink after figuring out the turf machine)

Grass fun!!

2009-04-25T14:44:00.006+01:00

Well, I'm sure not everyone can say that they have had fun with their lawns...

...but I certainly can!!

I have been REALLY busy recently, doing all sorts of jobs and things that have, in all honesty, totally knackered me out!

A few days ago, the weather started to be nice, dry and sunny, so I took the opportunity to get my little tractor out of the shed and cut the back lawn.

In previous attempts, it has only been towards the end of the job that the lines have been reasonably straight and uniform, but today was my lucky day, and almost straight away they were looking good!

As well as cutting the grass, there are some patches of bare earth, which needed to be sown with grass seed. The largest of all these patches was left when a soakaway (basically a big hole in the ground filled with rubble and stones, to let the rainwater drain away properly) was never sorted out.

Jo took some photos of me in the process of sowing the seed rather well I think - you can see how much effort I put in, and how exciting the job was! You've heard of 'extreme sports' well this was 'extreme seeding'!

Once the seed was sown, the ground was in need of a good watering, which again Jo managed to capture rather well!

(Please note the hose on the extreme right of the picture before you think bad of me!)

I then covered the area with bird netting to prevent the little blighters eating all my lovely new grass seed!

This was the start of my outdoor action hero stuff, more to come very soon!

Not so little Ninja!

2009-04-10T09:44:00.008+01:00

Kane has been going to little ninjas for just over a month, and last session he picked up his brand new uniform for it!

Little Ninjas is actually a Korean martial art called Soo Bahk Do, and is taught in our local area by the Scriven family. You can find more information by following their link.

Soo Bahk Do was originally called 'Tang Soo Do', but reverted to it's original native name back in the 80's.

When the children go to Little Ninjas, they do a lot of exercise and practice games with their basic moves, which is a really good way of getting them to perfect each move. So for example, they run around the hall around 4 instructors who are all holding pads to hit, and the kids have to hit the pads with either a palm strike, a punch, a chop or a jump.

Kane loves doing these and you really can see the concentration on his face - it's a joy to behold, especially as some of the kids there are probably made to go by their parents - in fact one parent asked if I was taking Kane to Little Ninjas for the discipline aspect of martial arts, I just laughed because we have no problems at ALL with Kane in that respect, and asked Kane why he wanted to go to L.N, to which he replied;

"I want to learn how to kick butt!"

I think that was all that needed to be said really!

There is a little history in Martial arts in our family - I used to practice 'Wing Chun' before I met Jo and got married.

Wing Chun is the Martial art that Bruce Lee first started when he was around 13, although he took several Martial art styles and blended them into his own made system called Jeet Kune Do - 'Way of the Intercepting Fist'.

Kane and I really enjoy performing the 'Forms', which are a series of moves linked together to create a display of moves that the student has learnt.

For Kane's first belt he will have to perform 2 moves of the first form, something he should easily be able to do as together we have learnt the first 10-12 moves!

He looks forward to every lesson, and receives a tag each lesson. After he has collected 8 tags, he then goes to the grading for the next belt - this system is a wonderful way of keeping the kids interested and focuses on their goal.

Would you mess with this kid!?

Dad's Taxi duties gone mad!

2009-04-07T09:21:00.007+01:00

Most parents realise that at some point, their driving skills will be asked for by their children.

Most parents expect the odd lift into town, or to drive their little precious ones to one of their friends houses...

Most parents probably don't get asked to drive them around their garden though!

I had to go to the garden centre and get some compost and top soil, and rather than carry the whole lot round to the back of the house, I decided to use the trailer I'd bought for my little tractor.

Kane saw me hitching the trailer up, and asked if he could go for a ride, so, being me, I found some old carpet and put it in the back of the trailer for him to sit on.

Although I didn't go as fast as he would have liked, Kane definitely loved the experience.

The whole thing reminded me of when I was younger. My parents used to take us on a lot of holidays in the UK when we were kids, and every day was packed with activities or visits to various places, depending on where we were of course.

One of these visits was to a Shire Horse farm type place, where we were pulled around the farm in a big trailer with benches either side.

So back to Kane - I thought he'd be sitting up straight in the trailer like I told him to, and when I turned round to see if he was ok and not being bumped around too much...

...I saw that he was lounging with his arms behind his head!

It just made me laugh, as that's typical of him to relax like that.

Trimming time again!

2009-04-05T11:38:00.006+01:00

It's one of those things I've been putting off, and with the bad weather it's not been difficult to wait for better weather...

...but today it's absolutely beautiful here. The sun is shining, the birds are singing, and the hedge was screaming for a trim!

One of the reasons I've been putting it off is because I didn't have the equipment to do the job, I mean, I have the hedge trimmer, I have the harness and the head/ear protection and now I have the bollards to put in the road to make people aware that something is going on by the side of the road.

I put the bollards outside the double yellow lines, giving me an extra 2' working space on top of the 2' or 3' that I have on the walkway.

Putting on my safety vest, and hoping I wouldn't blind the oncoming traffic too much, I set about trimming.

Last year I trimmed the inside of the hedge, in our paddock, but I couldn't reach the very top of the hedge - at least the outside of it - so this was, if you like, the completion of a job started last year!

Half way along I realised I was very hot - being a very sunny day and all, and I took off my harness, my safety vest and my padded thermal builders shirt...

...soon as I had done so, I suddenly realised that my T shirt was soaked in sweat and with the breeze it made me totally frozen, so, I waited for all the traffic to go by that had seen me take all my gear off, then hurriedly put it all back on again!
The main problem with this was that my T shirt and my shirt had cooled down in the breeze, making all my stuff wet AND cold...

....NIIIIICE!

I moved the traffic cones up for my next section and carried on with my work, fussing slightly over the odd twig sticking out of the hedge - can't have wispy bits on OUR hedge you know!

Just as I got to the end of the hedge the engine started to run out of petrol, and luckily I just managed to finish the top before the engine cut out completely.

Today we're having a gardening day. Potatoes need to be planted (a little late) and we have several small shrubs to be planted on.

Maybe the rotorvator will come out today - who knows!

;)

I know one thing - we're going to spend as much time outside today as we can, as it really is such a wonderful day!

At the farm

2009-04-02T15:36:00.008+01:00

Jo and I took a short drive up the road to the local farm the other day, this farm has a 'Maize Maze' and lots of animals to look at and learn about, and a lot of local schools go there for a visit so the children can see animals they might not ordinarily see every day.

Just as you drive in there are a few bits of land that hold sheep, pigs and goats. The goats were soaking up the rays on a lovely and warm sunny day!

This one was fast asleep in the sun.

I tried to get some good shots of the sheep that were there but they kept running away or doing rude things!

This photo of one of the pigs doesn't do it justice as far as scale goes - it was MASSIVE!

** EDIT **

Just put the pig photo in it's rightful place - thanks Jo and Ads!

Moles, mowers and Little Ninjas!

2009-02-28T14:17:00.003Z

This week has been quite busy, what with one thing and another, and I haven't had time to do a post a day - I'm sorry!

Mole attacks!

It started off this week, with more attacks from the mole - THIS time the little wotsit had tunnelled alongside of the humane trap I put in his tunnels!!

Down went two Talpex traps, nothing yet, but I have high hopes as I found the main run between the paddock and the back lawn.

We will see how that goes.

First time for everything!

This week I went out on my lil tractor mower thingy, and not only skimmed the grass and made it all uniform length, it also flattened all the molehills that were over there - after I had dug up the molehills of course! ;)

...but the thing that I wanted to mention, was that one of my ladies - I'm pretty sure she is one of the rescue hens, the one that took on Rhydian once. She has a large comb, quite dark pink/red, but she always follows me round.

Some of my ladies let me stroke them when Rhydian isn't looking, but don't usually do more than that.

Today was different - the aforementioned hen jumped up on my leg as I was sitting on the mower!!

It was really nice chatting to her gently and having her up on my leg - it was a brilliant moment - and a first for me!

Little Ninjas!

Kane has wanted to do martial arts for a long time now. We went to look at a class, about a year ago, called 'Little Ninjas' which is taught at our local leisure centre.

It teaches Soo Bahk Do that originated in Korea, and is a martial art that actually evolves rather than sticking to old forms and techniques.

Kane had remembered all the moves he saw on that one visit to watch a class a year ago so well - he jumped straight in the class and looked like he'd been doing it for ages!

I am SO proud of my boy - he did REALLY well!!

One of the tutors gave him a second hand belt for FREE! Kane also got a 'tag' of insulation tape on his belt.

How the tags work is that you get one tag after each lesson, and once you have eight tags you are then able to do a 'grading' or test in front of the tutors, if you pass you go to the next colour belt!

Oh it's all so exciting, and Kane loves it!

I even got offered a months free trial to see if I would like it - I used to do Wing Chun kung Fu quite some years ago, and want to take up something alongside my (starting soon) gym work.

Here's Kane showing us a 'high block'.

Trimming time!

2009-02-22T09:40:00.007Z

The other day we decided collectively that the hedges needed a trim, so out with my KM90 I went to smarten up the high hedges in the front.

I have to say here, that my love for power tools and engines really comes into it's own with jobs like this - I could quite happily work all day long doing anything that involved powertools or engines!!

Anyway - back to reality here - it was the first time that I've done the front heges, so I wasn't quite sure of the actual 'shape' of the things, so I went very carefully, and didn't scalp them too much.

Once the cutting had been done, Kane decided to want to help me pick the trimmings up, so after getting dressed for a cold day, we both ventured out, armed only with a fork, rake, wheelbarrow and tons of enthusiasm!

I obviously had to make sure he was doing the job properly, so I found myself in a supervisory role most of the time (below) - mainly as Kane refused to give me the rake! (see picture above)

Although Kane was really helpful I couldn't help feel sorry for the little chap when it came to using the tools and also moving the wheelbarrow, but he did a valiant job. We went to the shed to get his own wheelbarrow which is about 2 feet long and is much, MUCH lighter - also his trowel and hand fork.

Complete with his own gear, his enthusiasm was renewed, and off we went again - first raking into separate piles, then lifting the trimmings into our respective barrows.

Kane was a great help, and we had a lot of fun do 'extra' raking and clearing, as for some unexplained reason, the trimmings seemed to fly across at each other ...

...I have no idea how that happened at all!?!

;)

Mole Update No.2

2009-02-21T09:25:00.004Z

Well the mole hasn't shown much activity recently apart from 2 mole hills, but the little wotsit is digging furiously around our paddock and garden, 2" under the surface and creating a very unstable ground to walk on!

The other week I was trying to buy some 'Victor©' mole traps - a plunger with spikes on - but unfortunately, although they are one of the most effective mole traps in the world, the UK doesn't like them - so there you go, no dead moles!

I did however manage to find another type of trap, which I am trying out at the moment, called a Talpex trap.

I have set them and they've gone off, but no success at the moment - BUT I recently read that to set these babies properly, you have to literally JUST set the trigger - as fine as you can, and also lay them slightly on their side.

I put both these snippets of information to use yesterday, as I went on a flurry of trap setting!

First I managed to find 2 big runs, main runs, in which I set 2 Talpex traps - then I managed to find the main run going from the paddock, under the path, and into our back lawn. Here I placed a humane mole trap, with the hope that should it get scared by the Talpex's going off - it may run into that one instead!

Mole watch is certainly getting interesting - you start to get to know the 'ways' of the mole you're hunting - it really gets quite personal after a while!

Jo says to get a 'Moleman' in to get rid of our problem, but being a normal, typical man, I just HAVE to sort this out myself!

:D

Be aware of Strokes - act F.A.S.T.!

2009-02-20T07:43:00.003Z

I'm not usually one for this sort of thing, but recently there has been a lot of publicity on Strokes in the UK - no I'm not talking about loving encounters between partners, but the medical condition.

No-one I know has had a stroke, but the symptoms can sometimes be quite small - so I imagine a lot of people have strokes without even knowing that they've had one!

A quote from the NHS (National Health Service in the UK) F.A.S.T. website;

A stroke is caused by a disturbance of blood supply to the brain. Strokes are the leading cause of disability in the UK and the third most common cause of death after cancer and coronary heart disease. There are two main types of stroke, ischaemic and haemorrhagic which require different types of treatment.

What the campaign is saying is the following;

F - Has their face fallen on one side? Can they smile?

A - Can they raise both arms and keep them there?

S - Is their speech slurred?

T - Time to call 999 if you see any single one of these signs.

More from the NHS website;

A stroke is a medical emergency that requires immediate medical attention. So
recognising the signs and calling 999 for an ambulance is crucial. Quick
diagnosis of stroke is important to understanding the cause, the damage done and
what immediate medical treatment is needed. The sooner somebody who has had a
stroke gets the right medical attention the better their chances of a good
recovery. So minutes really do matter.

I thought I'd do a little research into the subject since I have no prior knowledge of strokes, and found a very interesting couple of pages on what Strokes actually feel like, so here's that link too;

http://dailystrength.org/c/Stroke/forum/474410-answer-does

As I get older, things like this stick in my mind, let's be honest - they scare me!

I'd like to say I played a small part in making people aware of this serious, but misunderstood, medical emergency.

If you click on the picture on the right it will take you to the NHS website on this campaign. - please take a moment and visit - it could save you or someone you love!

Visit to the seaside.

2009-02-17T17:15:00.008Z

The other day, very soon after receiving my new lens, Jo and I decided to take a visit to a nearby coastal town.

We dined at the most magnificent MacDonalds, and then took a stroll around, over a bridge and back again to our car.

Every time I drive into this town I always love the boat that greets you as you enter - and since I've had my camera, I always say - every time - I really MUST take a few shots of it!

Well today was perfect, so I thought I'd show you what it looks like.

What I love about this old boat is the ropes. You can see over the years where new ropes have been added and tied together, and the wonderful colour of the rust just adds to the whole feeling of a boat that's been loved for a long time.

This next shot is one of my favourites, if not my favourite shot. I wanted to capture the vivid blue of the old tarpaulins, and the ropes hanging, what with the rust in the foreground, it makes for a great view!

It started to turn really cold - especially with the wind chill, so we decided to make our way back to the car. Walking across the bridge, we noticed the timber moorings and decked area across the other side;

..one thing I said I wanted to do with my new lens, was to catch a bird in flight - this one is an ordinary Seagull, but I was amazed at how good the zoom was on my 55-200mm lens, after I had a closer look at this shot!

All in all it was a great afternoon, I really enjoyed myself - and Jo did too - albeit a little on the chilly side!

;)

It's almost DONE!!

2009-02-16T17:18:00.004Z

I have now combined both of my blogs into this one.

I have tagged all the posts from my other blog with D40 - clicking on this in the 'tag cloud' will show you all the posts, I thought I'd do this to save any confusion.

Hopefully this new and improved blog will entertain the photographers amongst my readers AND my chicken crowd!

I hope you enjoy your stay!

Stiggy

:D

Normal service will be resumed shortly!

2009-02-15T15:27:00.005Z

I would like to apologise to anyone who reads this blog regularly, if the colours or layouts are strange for the next short while.

This is because I have decided to combine my photography blog with my normal blog.

I will also be changing the graphics, colours and fonts in time, not all at once, and that is why I am apologising in advance for the mayhem that may ensue!

Some items are missing like my blog roll and friends etc, but stick with me, and everything will be sorted as soon as I can possibly manage!

Many thanks,

Stiggy

:D

New toy!

2009-02-07T15:22:00.000Z

Today Jo received an interesting package in the post...

...it was my Birthday present which Jo very kindly said I could have early!

It's a 55-200mm VR DX Nikon lens!!!

I was so happy to get this, I tried it out on various things, and soon discovered I loved it!

Here are a couple of my first photos to be taken with it!

Early Birthday Present!!

2009-02-07T14:55:00.003Z

WOOHOO!

Well, this morning came an AWESOME surprise!

Jo had bought me a 55-200mm VR DX Nikon lens!!!!

I've been after one of these for a little while now, so hopefully I should be able to get a lot better and closer shots to the wildlife in our gardens!

Here's one of the first shots I took (through a window!)

I shall have fun with this - I've already thought of loads of ideas!

:D

Snow!

2009-02-02T13:17:00.001Z

I took a walk around the local area this morning, as we had 6" of snow fall, and what a sight - it's amazing at how you want to capture EVERYTHING!

However, I did managed to take over 400 photos, so you'll have to excuse me if they sort of filter onto this blog - there's a lot of sorting out to do.

I haven't touched up these photos, as I'm still unsure of which ones to properly mount and display, but these should give an idea of the wonderful countryside we live in.

The main (ish) road outside our house...

The path walking down to the fishing lakes...

I loved seeing this - the eye wants to follow the path up and past the sign...

This is a box to hold the local fishing information leaflet...

A similar shot to one on an earlier post...

I loved the reflections on the lakes, it's almost like a winter wonderland.

I hope you enjoy these photos!

Snow! Lots of snow!

2009-02-02T12:59:00.010Z

Well what a surprise - I was only reading my friend Don's blog about the snow they've been getting recently, and lo and behold - we get it this morning!

I went out early to take some photos, walking down to the fishing lakes a few hundred meters away - you can see them on my photography blog here.

Both Kane and I made sure we were warmly dressed before venturing out to the garden centre a few doors down to buy Kane some Wellies, which luckily they had in his size!

Once we were TOTALLY prepared, we went to the back garden to have a muck about and make a snowman.

Kane spent a lot of time running around in the snow - it's the most snow he has ever seen!

He also made a couple of 'snow angels', but by the time he was finished, he was caked in snow from head to toe, and with a massive smile on his face.

We usually have a theme when we build our snowmen, you see usually we make them on Jo's car as we don't get that much, so we have to make mini snowmen...

...last year or the year before we made the three monkeys (hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil)...

...and this year we were able to make a big snowman due to the amount of snow we have. In places the snow is 6" deep, and as I write, the snow is falling heavily again, so expect possibly up to another 6" of snow today!

Anyway, getting back to the snowman, this year it sort of evolved into a 'Stiggy snowman' I made the beard and put my hat on - can you tell the difference?

Zak was watching from inside in the warm, and Kane and I decided to give him a snow fight, so we made lots of snowballs and threw them at the patio doors - Zak REALLY enjoyed his part, and loved every snowball that hit the glass.

With all this snow falling, who knows - we may even be able to make an igloo or something else...

...we shall have to wait and see!

;)

(**EDIT**

I just added the photo of the 3 monkeys...I mean snowmen!)

Photos from Kane's Birthday!

2009-02-01T16:44:00.011Z

I forgot to put these on the other post about Kane's Birthday - so here they are!

Kane's Invite to his party!

Kane Skywalker!

Lio and Kane

Serious player!

Fun Stiggy!

Important business at Pizzahut!

OIY!

And Kane's Nintendo DS cake!

Kane's Birthday card from us (made by little old me)

6 already!

2009-02-01T09:51:00.002Z

Our son Kane was 6 yesterday.

I took him Bowlplex and then to Pizzahut with two of his friends, in Brighton Marina.

We took a while to get to the Marina, as the traffic was surprisingly bad on the way, but we made it with a couple of minutes to spare - unfortunately the others were a little late and didn't turn up til just before we were booked to start, but that was ok as the queue at Bowlplex was massive - so we would have had to wait anyway!

Soon as we had our shoes, we made our way to 'Lane 25' which was to be our lane for the evening.

After opening the presents that his friends brought him, we settled down to play a very serious game.

When the scores started to come in, and I had hit my first strike, I decided to make teams up, with me and Kane being 'Team K'.

Luckily we did quite well, and although not bothering the pro's, Kane racked up a very decent score of 96, while I managed to get the top score of 124 - making 'Team K' the winners!

Next to Pizzahut - again it was really busy, with the queue going out the door - but again, SuperDad strikes again, and we had booked a table in advance - one of the circular booths which we could see from the door.

My American friend somehow made his way past everyone to ask a waitress if that was indeed our table - which it was - so we all piled in and took our places.

The boys has an individual pizza, while me and my mate got stuck into a free pizza which had been made wrong but was free!

While Martin and I were tucking into our proper pizza (meat feast of course!) the boys were tucking into their icecream and sweets from the icecream 'base'.

All in all it was a great afternoon/evening, and everyone enjoyed themselves with out too many tears.

In the evening I helped Kane making his lego models, and we relaxed in front of the TV tired out from the earlier excitement.

:D

Noooooo!

2009-02-01T09:46:00.004Z

I can't BELIEVE it!

It's back again - and this time with vengance and furious anger!

The mole has made not one, not two, but THREE mole hills!

I crept out there this morning with spade in hand, ready to bop the lil fella on the head when I saw one hill moving. Crouching not 3 foot away from the animated mole hill, I waited, like a hunter hunting it's prey - spade in hand!

Just as the zenith of mole hill eruption hit, I brought down the spade with all my might, but after having a look - the thing had run off - honestly - how the heck does it move so fast!?!?

I'm going to be out there this afternoon after our special Macdonalds takeaway, putting the next level of trap - the humane mole trap!

Rest here ye weary traveller.

2009-01-30T12:16:00.004Z

Ever since the builders had finished, there was something missing in a little tiny room between the utility room/ Jo's workshop, and the side door and Kitchen.

We keep our empty egg boxes and things there, I did put up a coat hook a little while back, but still something was missing.

Almost every day I have to take my boots off out there and because of the egg boxes and other nic-naks laying about, there is only just enough space for my boots to go, so I decided to make a little bench, so I could sit down and take my boots off in comfort, and also to be able to put my boots underneath nice and neat.

I spent a few hours measuring up, making and varnishing the bench, and personally speaking, I'm very pleased with it - and it's look.

So without further ado, ladies and gentlemen, I give you...

...Stiggy's Bench!

Quick update!

2009-01-27T08:13:00.002Z

Well, that was funny...

...I was just answering the comments on my post about the Barn Owl, when Jo walked into the room and asked if there was any mole hills today, so I told her I had noticed a small fist-sized lump next to an old mole hill and thought nothing of it.

Jo went in to get Zak dressed for the day, when I heard a little squeal, and Jo shouted out that the hill was moving!

So I took a look, and sure enough the molehill WAS moving, so I rushed and got my coat and boots on to go outside.

I picked up a spade from by the shed, and tip toeing round to the hill I braced myself.

When I was within 10 feet of the hill I took a few large steps and...

...WHAM!!!!!

I brought the spade down on the mole hill, and dug frantically to see the mole.

Unfortunately the little wotsit had already gone, but it must have moved incredibly quickly to get away, as the hill was still moving when i was 1 step away from it.

Thinking I'd take action against this little critter, I put a smoke bomb down into the tunnel, and hopefully the coating of castor oil will put him off again for a while!

Barn owl visits us!

2009-01-24T09:52:00.005Z

Last night, just as the Sun was thinking about going to bed, we noticed something circling and swooping the field next door to us.

We looked a bit closer and saw it was an Owl!

I have never seen an Owl in the wild before, so I was very excited, as were the rest of the family.

Unfortunately it isn't my Birthday yet, so I wasn't able to zoom in as much as I'd like to, but still, I managed to capture it sitting on one of the posts on our boundry.

Like the Woodpecker shot, I have provided a zoom pic so you can see a little bit more detail.

Back to it!

2009-01-21T12:05:00.003Z

Well, today I received two packages, one containing smoke bombs, and one containing humane mole traps.

The smoke bombs certainly seemed to do wonders - of course they may have just stunned the moles into submission, but who cares when they aren't pushing up as much soil or breaking peoples ankles on their tunnel network...

...WHICH by the way is totally ridiculous! You'd be amazed at how many tunnels these things can do.

Aparrently they can tunnel 4M in one hour...

...that's just over 13 FEET in ONE hour!!

It's not the fact that the tunnels are only about 2 inches in diameter, it's the fact that there are so MANY tunnels, and sometimes they make a sort of junction under the grass, thus making the tunnel into a small cavern underneath - i've lost my footing more than once in these junctions, I can tell you!

So anyway, I got these things in the post this morning, and I will eagerly use them as soon as there is more evidence of moles again - for at the moment everything is quiet on the front line.

I took my mower/tractor out onto the back lawn, and drove around flattening the tunnels and molehills so I would be able to see any new ones, or signs where the little blighter was living and hunting.

So far no signs of life - which may be a good sign that they've moved on.

Of course, it may be a sign that they've decided to breed like mad, then come at me with a whole army of tunnelling little horrors!

Luckily moles are solo animals apart from at breeding time, and very territorial, so I probably actually only have two moles on our land (well hopefully anyway!).

Let's see what happens over the next few days - I'll keep you informed!

A break in the fight.

2009-01-21T11:57:00.003Z

It's not all doom and gloom at our place, we have a regular visitor that seems to live in our garden - a Green Woodpecker.

It loves to peck on our 'Nothing Tree' - so named by our builder who's family were farmers, and as he walked round telling us what each tree and plant was, on a break from working, he walked past this tree and just said;

"This Tree - oh it's nothing"

So we decided to call it the 'Nothing Tree'!

Anyway, our Woodpecker likes nothing better than to sit on this tree and peck away, probably for food.

It also flies down and gets food from our lawn, and I managed to snap it with my standard lens on my camera. (I'm getting a zoom lens for my Birthday I hope!). It was sitting just outside the window where my PC is.

Here's a close up.

New year walk.

2009-01-18T11:14:00.001Z

I managed to get out with my camera and go for a little walk down the fields next to our house, and found a really nice little path running along the Hedgerow.

I was experimenting with various things, shutter speed, aperture etc and was quite pleased with the results, I WILL get to be off the auto modes... I WILL!!

I've been reading a lot about various techniques and although I'm not ready to try most of them, I thought I'd just go out, play about with the settings, and see what happened.

So here we go...

The bottom of the field next door - I love the shape of trees in Winter, and hedges - gotta love hedges!

I saw this Ivy on a tree and loved the icy leaves, with the flash it really brought the Ivy out from the background.

This is looking towards Lewes, but again, the frostiness of the nettles seemed to grab me when I walked past. I love taking this sort of photo, with the depth of field thing going on!

This next photo was one of my more experimental photographs, I have seen in books wonderful long exposures of waterfalls, rocky coast lines...

...unfortunately all we have round our place is a pipe sticking out the ground with a little stream (although we DO have the fishing lakes at the bottom of the field next door - photos to come one day).

I decided to use the Gorilla tripod I got for Christmas, plus my shutter remote.
I experimented with lots of different settings, a lot of my photos were over exposed, and I soon learnt that I didn't have to have the shutter open for too long to get the effect I wanted. I also experimented with Iso's and aperture sizes.

I like this next photo - it's one of my faves so far. This is one of about 10 or so I took of the same view.

I like the way the eye gets drawn into the photo, it's a very interesting area for shots like this.

As I was walking back home, I quickly snapped this shot - again it relates to how excellent trees look in Winter, and how sometimes they make an excellent frame.

This was one of my last shots before heading back home. The frost on the weeds was amazing - as I trod through them, it flew like dust around my feet.

I found the trees in the background so interesting, I thought I'd combine them with the frosty weeds here.

It's amazing how the frost makes such fantastic crystals and architecture within itself.

I really enjoyed going out on my own to take these photos, I hope you enjoy them. These have been chosen out of about 180 photographs I took that morning in about 1-2 hours.

Memory.

2009-01-17T15:00:00.004Z

I found this photo of Kane and I looking in amazement at the first eggs we ever found...

...you can tell by our faces how excited we are - although I must admit Kane looks more like something smells bad!!

Guerilla warfare begins!

2009-01-14T11:27:00.003Z

Today plans are being drawn up, tactics are being written and equipment made ready for the assault on the moles which are infesting our paddock and back lawn.

This morning smoke bombs arrived - these little babies will be lit and pushed as far down the tunnels as possible, and will coat the inside of the runs with castor oil, which aparrently make the moles move on to pastures new, as it stops the moles from feeding in the treated areas.

I am not looking forward to the next step, which is setting traps for the little things.

First off will be scissor traps, which go in the runs and close onto the furry tunnellers.

The second type of trap is the Dufas trap which is a lot bigger than the scissor trap, but apparently more effective.

I will keep you informed of my progress, but I expect this to be a very drawn out battle, and hopefully... HOPEFULLY I will win the war!

New year chill!

2009-01-14T11:13:00.006Z

The last year has been very busy for us here, not only have we bought a house and had dramatic changes done to it, we've also moved in last October and had Christmas to contend with, so life here has been non-stop, and quite stressful.

Now it seems, life is slowly returning to 'normal' whatever that may be. We still have a stupid amount of stuff at our other house which we need to move, and all this on top of all the new duties given to us by our new home!

One thing that has made things harder has been the really cold weather - not only for us, but for my ladies in the paddock. Their water has been frozen every morning, the ground underfoot has been like steel, and they haven't been able to go for walks too freely thanks to a roaming fox.

All this is about to change though, with the warmer weather (hopefully) coming, changes can be made to house all our ladies more comfortable, and jobs that I couldn't start last year can be started this year.

I had to take a few photos of the girls recently, probably because I never thought they would have frost on their wings - but one or two of the chickens like to roost on top of the old coop instead of inside with the others in their warm coop - which is packed with straw and is really quite warm considering.

I do feel sorry for them though, so this year their entire enclosure will be changed, moved, made bigger and better. Their runs will have interesting things for them to sit on, and hopefully this year I can get my relationship back with them, because of the lack of time I've had with them, hardly any let me touch them any more - which I find quite sad, but understandable.

Although it has been so cold, my ladies still like to get out and about...

...a few of them even went over the other side of the paddock - which is quite a journey for their little legs, and they probably went back telling all the other girls to go their on their next excursion.

Focus

2008-12-06T10:22:00.000Z

I thought I'd have a little play around with my photo editing software this morning...

...taking a self portrait, I blurred the original file so the skin tones and details were much softer, then I took the eye, kept the detail and overlaid it onto the blurred background.

This gives a strange depth of field illusion, one that I really liked doing, and one that has opened up a whole new avenue and excitement for me!

My first photography competition.

2008-12-06T08:39:00.001Z

Recently I sent off one of my photographs, the portrait view of Mount Caburn early in the morning with the mist in the valley, to a competition after Jo suggested I should.

I ONLY WENT AND WON!!

I won first prize, and my photo was put on the monthly E-Newsletter for a garden centre called 'Garden Pride'.

Although there were a lot of entries, I managed to win, and I received a £15.00 voucher to spend in their shops!

I will be sending off more photographs I think!

Free-ranging!

2008-12-04T12:01:00.005Z

, moultingIt's been ok weather really... when you think how bad it could be. I mean, looking at friends blogs round the world, it could be worse.

On the sunny days, my ladies (and Rhydian) like nothing better than to take trips round their estate, and to peck at fineries scattered around as a snack to eat.

Being free-range suits them down to the ground, as it gives them a chance to mill around like teenagers in a park, scratching here, there and everywhere - looking for the tastiest morsel of food they can find - I usually scatter some corn down as an incentive for them to leave the warmth and safety of their coops.

I took a few photos recently, to show the moulting of some of the birds - some of which are over 6 years old aparrently!!

The eggs have all but stopped for us now, although I must admit, we've been getting one or two a day recently.

We had the famous fireworks here in Lewes in November, followed by a bad storm, followed by some idiot of a dog walker letting their dog bark at our ladies through the hedge, thus scaring them everyday!

I'm VERY tempted to put a sonic device over near the chickens to shut the dog up - but would probably get sued or attacked for doing so - you know what todays society is like!

Anyway, the ladies are all happy (if a little bare here and there) and living the high life in their stately home!

Winter time again.

2008-11-20T10:08:00.002Z

Well it certainly feels like Winter here - the air is fresh every morning, carrying on throughout the day, but one thing I've noticed is that our ladies have started to moult.

I didn't really know about chickens moulting - especially in Winter!

I mean, what's the point of losing all your feathers when it gets cold!?

Shouldn't it be more reasonable to expect them to lose their feathers when it's nice and warm?

Well anyway, I find it all rather strange - PLUS the fact that they all stopped laying at the same time - weird huh!?

Jo thinks it's because of the very bad storm we had here a week or so ago - it could have been the fireworks scaring them...

...I have another possible reason - they're all lazy wotsits!!

Parading around like they own the place - eating and drinking for all their worth - I mean, it's like they live the high life and have now decided to stop doing the one job they are MEANT to do!

It's not as though they have a pressing schedule or anything - in fact - because it's been sunny and rather warmish weather for the few hours around lunchtime and to mid afternoon, they've even been having excursions out in the paddock - so I have no idea what is going wrong.

I'm going to try and sneak up and get a photo of the moulting ladies - although they won't be too happy showing their 'undergarments' for the world to see I bet!

:D

Morning glory

2008-10-27T08:35:00.001Z

Here are some photos of views from our new home.

A view looking south.

A view looking East towards a local landmark - Mount Caburn in portrait and a couple in landscape - it's amazing how different the same shot can be.

I ALMOST took my Nikon off Auto for the landscape shot - I'm going to be brave and take the plunge into manual mode soon!

:D

Lasting memories

2008-10-26T11:47:00.004Z

I thought I'd show a few photos that I've taken recently which make me smile, or wonder.

The first is a photo of Kane I took in our Paddock. I love taking photos of the boys as they are both so cheeky!

The second photo is of a view from one of the top rooms first thing in the morning. It shows the mist rolling over the valley, and the local hill to us called Mount Caburn.

Here is another view from our garden first thing in the morning...

...it just makes us all feel so good in the morning.

Compared to our old view of fences 15' from our windows, this truely feels like our own slice of heaven!

Our new place!

2008-10-26T11:03:00.003Z

Well...

...we have been SO busy the last few weeks it's been like working 24 hours a day (or feels like it anyway!).

Over the last week though, we've been moving a lot of our 'stuff' over to the new place - which now is our home!

Last week I rented a Luton van with a tail lift, so I was able to move all the big appliances, like the washing machine, dryer and American fridge freezer easier than in our normal van. All went smoothly until it came to the big fridge/freezer - which went up the ramp i made ok, but didn't like going through any of the doors in the house. This resulted in taking off the door to the house, getting it through into a small lobby - then having to take the doors of the appliance - which was an absolute nightmare! But safe to say - I managed it!!

We spent our first night in our new home without Sky tv, only DVD's and it took a further 4 visits from Sky - all failures - until we decided to go with a NON-Sky tv person to fit our Sky dish. They even got to our place in around an hour which was amazing considering Sky did their usual " can't make it this week" line.

I spent the first morning trimming the doors to the boys bedrooms so they would close over the new carpet, and putting up 3 curtain rails for their bedrooms.

Both boys came home the next day after sleeping over at school and Grandmas, and at last it was definately HOME!

The only problem we've been experiencing has been our Broadband connection, but that seems to have been sorted now I've changed the router back to our old one.

What we are very pleased about is the fact that EVERYTHING is set up for us - it means Zak has access to the entire house (apart from upstairs, in which case I would lift him should he want to go up there). The paved area out back is just great, and Zak has already said he looks forward to driving his chair around their like a bat out of hell! Kane can also ride his bike on it.

This photo shows the back of our home, with the patio, and Kanes room he'll move into in a couple of weeks being the nearest upstairs window to the camera.

The other thing of course which makes things better - for the ladies at least - is that we can let them out every day - although at the moment the weather is so horrible they are staying under their mini extension or staying in their own coops.

Family visits the ladies.

2008-10-11T12:41:00.003+01:00

Recently we went to show the kids how the build was going, and we decided to take them along and see how our ladies were doing.

They were all in good spirits, and looking well. This may be because for the last month or two I have been giving them a supplement in their water. It turns the water a lovely pink colour, and I thought that the girls would love this addition to their run!

:D

Zak and Kane were also in good spirits as this picture shows!

I was really pleased with the detail on this photo!

Kane, cards and insects

2008-10-03T19:00:00.001+01:00

Here is a photo of Kane taken at my mums. He was leaning against a wall so I couldn't take his photo, but I managed to swing it under him and take a snap.

The card was made for my friend Dr Michael Bull, funnily enough, the worlds leading expert in IPods and mobile media! It was his Birthday, and Jo and I created this funny card - can you work out what it is? I treated him to a pint and a fairy cake with a little candle in it too.

The photo of the Bee was great - I was taking some other test photos when I saw him (or her) flying onto these yellow flowers/weeds, and I thought what a cool shot it would make if I could get the camera on macro and take a shot. Luckily, it came out very well, and I must admit it's one of my nature photos I'm most proud of so far - I just love the detail!

To trim or not to trim

2008-10-03T18:08:00.001+01:00

That is the question.

I haven't trimmed any of the photos on here, and to be honest I'm not sure if I should. I would like to try to see the whole picture, and to frame images in a way that pleases me.

I'm sure at some point I'll want to perfect each photo, but for now I'm happy with the whole scene.

:D

A new blog for a new subject

2008-10-02T18:29:00.004+01:00

I've started a new blog for my photography, called 'Stiggy's world'.

It's not going to be a threat to David Bailey, but it's my own account of how me experience with a new camera I bought is going.

I hope to find a better platform to show off my photos at some point, something like a gallery - but I'll sort that out at a later date, since our house move is imminent!

:D

More beginner photos

2008-10-02T18:18:00.001+01:00

Here are some more beginner photos I took when I first got my camera.

The Walnut is from our very own tree in our paddock, the Tayberry from our veggy plot, and the flower was one at my mums.

I took the walnut photo by first focusing on the walnut, then locking the focus, and setting the nut in the corner of my shot. It's a tecnique I really like, and I have done it on some landscape photos as well - it gives that wonderful blurred background effect.

I took them all with the macro setting - when I get more used to the camera I'll start to experiment, but until then I'm afraid it's only the standard settings I'll be using!

:D

My first photo

2008-10-01T11:10:00.002+01:00

I was so excited to get my new camera I ran outside to have a go at some macro photography...

This was my first ever attempt at it, and I was really pleased.

I couldn't believe the detail I was able to pick up!

My photo blog

2008-10-01T10:51:00.000+01:00

I decided that I would like somewhere to show my photos from my new camera, so here we have it....

...Stiggy's world!

I recently bought a Nikon D40 Digital SLR camera. At the moment I use an 18-55mm lens.

I am a TOTAL beginner at photography, so hopefully you will see me improve over the coming decade or so!!

;)

Unexpected visit.

2008-09-18T09:15:00.007+01:00

You know when things happen and you take a while (or ages) before the fact of the matter sinks in?

Well Saturday evening was one of these occasions!

I heard a car drive over the gravel outside our house and wondered who it was (the bane of our life is people turning on our parking area outside who have no connection with us in the slightest!). The car actually drove up to our front door and I was just about to open the front door with a flourish of the hand or a gentle verbal assault when the person driving got out and walked towards me.

It actually turned out to be mine and Zak's friend Paul, who had emigrated to Australia, and whom we never thought we'd see again unless we went on a holiday!!

WOW is all we could say for ages, we were so knocked back that this man had travelled across the world, for whatever reason, and had travelled to see us!

We were overjoyed (can you tell!?).

We all met in an online game called Eve-Online, which is a MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game) set in space, and one we have been playing for about 4 and a half years there abouts. We were in the same corporation together (group of players) and then we made our own corporation and did things together in there - it was great fun!

Unfortunately Paul had to go after and hour or two, but it was great to see him, we still haven't met his other half Kirstin, but I'm sure we will one day!

:D

My new camera.

2008-09-02T20:10:00.004+01:00

I've always wanted an SLR camera, and I was unable to have one until recently.

I bought a Nikon D40 Digital SLR camera, which I'd read a lot of reviews for, and thought it would be nice to be able to take proper pictures, instead of using our little family Digital Camera (which has done us very nicely so far thank you!).

I was so excited, I part charged the battery and went outside to try and do something similar to the ones I had seen on my friend Don's blog, done by his very competent photographer wife Ruth (who also has a blog with spectacular images on.

Now ok - I had it on AUTO and I wasn't about to change that for now - but WOW!!!

What a fantastic thing!

It's not often I get wow'ed by stuff (ok ok! every time i go into an Electronics shop, farm equipment shop, gadget shop, tool shop etc etc) but this was just BRILLIANT!!

I have been really impressed when someone takes a photo of, say, a flower with it all blurred in the background - so I attempted to take my first EVER D-SLR picture - and here it is - it's a little Dandelion clock just outside our back door!

I've been taking quite a few picture of the new place with it, and found a yellow flowery weed growing on a patch of the uncut grass.

After walking to look at it, I noticed there was a bee flying from one flower to the next - so quickly I took the camera lens off and took a few photos of it as it fluttered around.

Here is My first attempt at a wildlife photo!

I am really pleased with these photo's and one day I hope to be able to take it off of AUTO - or the preset settings!!

:D

Almost done it.

2008-09-02T19:51:00.005+01:00

Yes the shed is pretty much done - just a bit more cladding (or siding for others) on the sides and some roof felt on the roof and it's done!

At least now it's pretty watertight and I've managed to get my tractor/mower in there - so I'm now clearing out the main workshop and making plans to store things that at the moment reside in our garage.

Talking of the mower - even though I changed the starter solenoid, it STILL wouldn't start when I turned the key, so using a bit of mechanic know how, I bypassed the solenoid and started the old thing up...

...streaking across the long grass like a rally driver, I managed to cut the grass reasonably quickly, which inspired me to get out my Stihl hedge trimmer.

It's funny how you get carried away - one minute I was smartening up a fir hedge, the next minute I was doing all the hedges... well a few not ALL the hedges - that would just be plum CRAZY! lol!

Still, after about 30-45 minutes of arm juddering fun, I realised I wasn't able to use my left arm very much - it was the arm that supported the trimmer up in the air - OUCHY!

I was happy with the work I'd done though - and it felt good to put some hard labour which made so much difference to the back garden area.

Good afternoon!

2008-08-23T20:16:00.004+01:00

I went back down the new place after lunch, and set about putting some serious effort into the shed.

I'd like to go down there tomorrow to hang the double doors, that is, if it stops raining for a bit!

However it was a glorious sunny day today, and I was able to do quite a bit.

First off I finished fixing the roof sections, then I put some doors on the side of the frame, and managed to find even MORE timber from the rubbish skip out front to fill in the front 2 panels.

Now all that needs to be done is to buy some featheredge board (thin triangular timber) to clad the shed with and hang the doors!

Oh yes, changing the subject somewhat - here is a photo of the lady that lost all her feathers.

Sorry about the photos recently, but I've been using my phone...

...I'm looking forward to my new camera coming through the post early next week - a Nikon D40 Digital SLR!

I shall be going over to my friend Dons wifes' Blog to check out how to REALLY take photographs!

:D

I got it covered.

2008-08-23T12:18:00.004+01:00

WOOHOO!

It's weird how time is recently - I went down the new place to do some work and to let the ladies out only to find NO Builders!!!

After a frantic phone call to report this fact to Jo, I was reliably informed that it was in fact, Saturday!

I had to think about this for a moment before having to accept that it was indeed Saturday.

Weird!

Anyhoo, I had to finish the shed roof this morning, put a tie across the mid rafter and sort out the position and fastening of the electric cable. This afternoon I plan to put some more recycled doors around the frame.

The ladies.

The ladies seem very happy at the moment, maybe it's because I've been giving them some supplements in their water, and have been puffing mite powder all around the coops and in the corners (where they live).

One of the chickens that we rescued looked awful a couple of weeks ago - she is right down the bottom of the pecking order, and she had lost a lot of feathers - probably due to stress of moving house (Jo and I know all about THAT!).

Now she has grown back pretty much all her feathers, and is wonderful light brown colour - much lighter than the other hens.

I'm still alive!

2008-08-21T18:49:00.002+01:00

I wanted to post that I haven't dissapeared or fallen off the edge of the world, but it's been almost impossible to get around to posting any new stuff on here for a while.

What with both kids at home, and the build needing some attention, i just haven't had the inclanation to write about anything.

I have taken some photos so I'll HAVE to put those on soon!

;)

Where does the time go!?

2008-08-07T08:50:00.004+01:00

Blimey!

It seems like 5 minutes since I wrote the last post on here, but it seems it's been a while.

We've been out buying bathrooms and tiles for the floor and walls these last weeks, it takes a lot of looking to find the perfect tile!

As well as floating from showroom to showroom, we've got both lads home for the 6 week summer school holiday, so it's not so easy to just pop out for a few hours - since we'd have to take them both with us. It's not SO bad though, I got to pop down the new place and do a little bit to my infamous shed.

The photo above was taken on my phone - apologies if it's not too clear - it was also taken a few days ago and it's changed a bit since then, but it gives a rough idea.

I have built the frame for the walls, and it's ready for the salvaged doors to be fixed to it. These doors will not only provide shelter from the elements, but also serve to strengthen the frame I've made, so making the whole thing nice and strong.

I started sorting out the roof yesterday, and I just have to measure and make the end piece before the rafters - then the exciting bit of putting the roof sheets on!

Once the shed extention is done, I can move the tractor/mower into it, shelve the main bit, and start bringing the stuff we have in our garage where we live now.

All very exciting - well it IS for ME anyway!

:D

Shed extension and other stories..

2008-07-26T17:40:00.004+01:00

It's been a while since I have any time to go down the new place and actually do any work - the big summer holiday from school has hit us like a freight train and to be honest I'm still in a state of shock trying to adjust to all day every day having the boys around...

...that's not to say, of course, that I have any problem with having the boys at home, it's just it's a little hard leaving Jo on her own with both and going out, so I try to take what time I can when I can!

The shed has been neglected, as far as doing any further work to the mini extension that has been mutually agreed by Jo and I. So the other day, I had a meeting with our project manager on site, and I realised this was my chance to do something constructive.

I've been digging the hole for the base to go onto/into - I say into as the main shed/workshop is on a slope, so I've had to dig into hardcore and MOT stone, which hasn't been too bad but hard work - especially when I'm digging about 15 minutes at a time. It wouldn't be too bad, but every shovel full means 5 minutes using a pickaxe to loosen the stone!

Friday I visited one of the builders merchants I used to work for and bought some timber for the base, made a frame approx 10'x8' and started to noggin it out (noggins are the short bits of wood between the long bits of wood - in case you didn't know!). As you can see from the photo, the noggins are at one end so far - that is the end where the doors will go onto, and therefore the noggins are where the mower/tractors wheels will be going over, they will support the weight nicely.

What I'll be doing next is to continue the alternative noggins across the frame, then put it in situ and place concrete blocks under the frame making the whole thing nice and solid.

Once that has been done, the 3/4" OSB board will go on top to make the floor, then a small frame, then I'm going to use the internal doors that I managed to salvage from the house to make the walls. If it needs weather proofing after I'll get some 6" feather edge timber and clad it.

Anyway - at least it's progressing slowly!

:D

One man and his chickens wins blog award!

2008-07-24T16:47:00.004+01:00

Yes, thanks to Little Veg Patch, both myself and Jo my wife have won an award for our blogs!

The rules state to name 7 other blogs, but since I've only just done something similar, I shall point people to my post below this one and hope to get away with just doing that!

link - Tag I'm it!

(I hope I don't get into any trouble for this!)

:D

R.I.P Polly.

2008-07-20T17:50:00.001+01:00

I'm sorry to announce that Polly has passed on.

Very sad about doing this today.

:(

Tag I'm it!

2008-07-19T19:12:00.005+01:00

I’ve been tagged! My friend Don at A view from the Green Barn tagged me to share six random things about me, and then tag six others.

I probably won't be as good at this as him though...

So Here are my six random things:

1. I learnt to play the drums at 8 when my Dad let me use his set.

2. I have really small hands!

3. Even though I shave my head, my hair has lasted me longer than my Dads hair has lasted him!

4. The thing that made me sit up and notice my wife when I first met her was her beautiful green eyes!

5. I used to help Zak score goals at 'Seagull Specials', which is a football team for kids with special needs, supported and run by Brighton and Hove Albion - our local team.

6. One of my old motorbikes won 'Worst Rat' at a bikers rally- which means it was the worst bike in the entire rally. (think Mad Max type of bike! Matt black and using beer can for air intake)

I’m tagging:

Jo my wife at Jo Blogs - it's amazing how she thinks up all those ideas - and I'm so so proud of her for being asked to have her designs published in international magazines! and she has another blog too - Jo Blogs Outdoors (Love you Jo!)

Connie at Cetta Cheese Chatter - she is my friend in Hawaii who is in Television, also does a lot of crafting - her charms and jewellery is fantastic!

Greta at Little Brown Hens - she says she's a 16 year old stuck in the body of a 50 y/o. She really cares for her ex-battery hens, as you will see when you visit her blog!

LVP at Little Veg Patch is another on my blog list, she has a town garden that she has transformed into a hive of activity, with her ex-battery chickens and vegetable patch.

Angel at Stormdreaming - she has firm opinions and will let you know about them! She loves art and graphics, and takes some cool photos.

Math from Ramblings of a Technomage - he and Angel are online gamer friends, Math writes programs and stuff for his Mac PC including some stuff he develops. Math is also an accomplished cook, and loves to share recipies for cakes!

It's difficult for me to do this, mainly as I don't have time at the moment to go blog surfing, but I hope those that are mentioned here will get a few more readers!

Tag Rules:
Link to the person who tagged you.
Post the rules on the blog.
Write six random things about yourself.
Tag six people at the end of your post.
Let each person know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.
Let the tagger know when your entry is up.