You should see the other car!

My daughter hasn't had her 'P' plates for very long and last friday she went down to Sydney for a few days for some work related interviews and on the way back she had a car run in the back of her at a set of traffic lights. She was ok just a little shaken and not sure what she had to do. The lady in the other car was pregnant but was ok , just very upset about it all. My daughter kept her cool, she checked to see if the lady was ok and was able to get her details and give hers in return. When all was done she went and had a cool drink to calm her nerves because she had another 31/2 hours drive ahead of her. Thank goodness the lady in the other vehicle was not going that fast but she did manage to break the tow bar on the back of our car and bend our back tail gate. The ladies car has a lot of damage to her bonnet and front guard and maybe more, I have booked my ute into the repair shop for three days to be repaired thank goodness our insurance company gives us a rental car for that time. I tell you what it is nerve racking when your kids start to drive and especially when they want to take long trips from the country to the big smoke.

Jesus, all about life

"Jesus, all about life" is a campaign running in Australia with the use of television and mainstream media to get the community to think and talk about Jesus and seek more information about who he is and what he said. It is going to run for about 6 weeks and you will see the blue logo on banners through NSW and WA. It is a way for churches to deliver the Gospel to the community and reach out to them in a sensitive way. If you want to know who

Jesus is go along to your local church or give them a ring and talk to somebody it could change your life :)

Doggy Mayhem Continues!

Abbey

Ok! I still haven't sorted out this doggy mayhem and not sure how all this will end by here are the three main characters. Above is Abbey she is the middle child and sister of Sarabie. Abbey goes with the flow and does not cause any friction or dramas, she like her belly rubbed and like to play with balls and she always seems to comfort or protect anybody or anything that is under threat. Abbey is a Maltese cross terrier.

Jatzie

This is Jatzie,a pure Maltese, the oldest of the three and has been the boss. She is always marking her territory when outside and barks at visitors when they come. She is protective of everybody and feels it is her duty to know what is going on all the time. She barks and gets aggressive when visitors come and we usually lock her up when they do come.

Sarabie

This is Sarabie, sister of Abbey and a Maltese cross terrier, probably more terrier than Maltese. I suppose you could say she is my dog because she is always with me around the home and in the garden. Sarabie was the one who got her tail caught in the door and is the one fighting with Jatzie. Sarabie is all passive when Jatzie is around then Jatzie growls and if together (which is impossible now) they will fight, aggressively.

This is what I have just bought, 2 muzzles as I don't know what to do with them beside keep them separated. They both had their muzzles on yesterday because I was doing some obedience training with them and they both were at each other for about 5mins. In a fight they have no intentions of stopping until they are pulled apart, even then when I pulled Sarabie away from Jatzie, Jatzie made a flying leap (about 2ft) off the ground to have one more go at Sarabie. I then separated them into different rooms, thank goodness they had these muzzles on otherwise there would have been blood.

Well, If anyone has any advice I would gladly listen, I have even been on The Dog Whispers web site to see if he has any advice. I'm sure it is a pack issue here and there is a imbalance, the dogs are unsettled and our happy home is not so happy in the doggy department at the moment, even the cats run to high ground. So if you can help with any advice I would greatly appreciate it.

Sue

The Shearing Shed

I still have my doggy mayhem going on and we are still trying to sort them out so I will post about our situation in a couple of days. We have a good friend that has been coming and staying with us for the last 3 or 4 months, he has been helping with building furniture and helping with our renovations. At present he is helping with the extension on our shed were we build furniture (photos to come) anyway we try to give him a taste of country life occasionally and yesterday Dave took him down to a neighbours shearing shed. This time of year a lot of the farmers are shearing and nearly every shed is buzzing with sheep and sweaty shearers, this particular neighbours has about 12,000 sheep to be shawn.

They muster the sheep and they await in pens then they are moved up the ramp into the stalls in the shed. The sheep when shawn are pushed down a chute and are penned below the shed like the ones above.

These sheep in the back ground are in stalls awaiting to be shawn. There are lot of helpers called rouseabouts and they help the shearer by picking up the fleece when shawn and keeping there area swept and clean.

The dogs are also there to help muster and move up the sheep into and out of there pens. The farmers mainly use the Australian kelpie as they are a good working dog.

The shearer goes in the stall and grabs a sheep and drags it out with it sitting on its backside and him holding its front legs. See the rouseabout sweeping the floor.

There were three shearers here on this day and it takes about 3mins to shear a sheep. Some shearers can shear upto 200 sheep a day, they usually start about 7.30 and finish about 5pm.

The fleeces are thrown on to a wool classing table and the shed hands remove the seedy, short and inferior pieces of wool from the edges of the fleece (called skirting) and rolls up the fleece ready for classing.

The wool classer which is James in the red shirt, who at present has a broken arm from his quake bike while away on the weekend assesses (classes) the skirted fleece and places it in the appropriate wool bin, see behind his dad in the cap.

The wool presser takes the wool from the wool bin and presses it into wool bales. It takes about 50 skirted fleeces to fill a wool bale. Once pressed each bale must weigh a minimum of 110 kg and a maximum of 204 kg. Most wool bales weigh in the range of 170 to 190 kg that is a lot of wool. Once the shearing has been completed the wool is trucked off and sold at the wool selling centres Sydney, Newcastle and Melbourne


This here is where they treat the sheep for lice, I haven't seen this in action but it looks like interesting. Well I hope you enjoyed the shearing shed because our friend did and he took these great photos for me so that I could show you guys.

Doggy Mayhem

I have doggy mayhem at the moment and I'm hoping we can sort it out this afternoon. I have a pack of five dogs, two are outside dogs and three little ones that come inside and at the moment we have two that have been fighting because one of them had their tail pinched in the door and she yelped in pain then the two started fighting and now we have to keep them separated. I have a dog behaviourist coming out today to try and get the pecking order back in order. I probably should have let them fight and sort it out themselves but I just couldn't do that. I have treats of cooked chicken ready for the session which will start at 4.30, so here is hoping that we can overcome this conflict and get this happy little family back to normal, what ever that is!

Tomorrow I will have photos of the dogs and tell you how we all went as this is going to be a family affair if you know what I mean.

The Veggie Patch!

With a few days off over the long weekend I was able to get into my garden. I have been saving the cardboard toilet rolls for ages now and used them to put my seeds in as my veggie patch is not ready to plant and we are still experiencing a few days of frost. I also used the plastic strawberry containers, I find them good because you just shut the lid and you have an instant miniature glass house.

The guys haven't finished with this ditch yet, it connects the power to the shed and goes right through my patch. They promised it will be finished with the next few weeks and they will close the ditch and put my lovely soil back on top.

These are my leeks and spring onions which are going great, they are a no fuss vegetable and grow really well (and I haven't killed them off yet).

I bought some Russian Sage at a garage sale on the weekend. I don't use sage very much in my cooking but now that I have some growing I will have to start.

In this old water tank I put the Russian Sage, Oregano, Lemon Balm, Peppermint,Thyme, and Chives. I have another tank beside this one which I prepared for what I am not sure yet. I'm not very organized and will plant out my garden as I go. I ask my neighbour/farmer yesterday if he could come up and plough part of a paddock for me as I want to plant a crop of potatoes, corn and pumpkins, so hopefully in the next two weeks after he has finished shearing he will bring up his tractor :)

My cabbages and Broccoli are still growing well considering they were surrounded by weeds which I pulled out. I still have a lot of work and weeds to get through before the patch will be ready for planting out.

Just Grandma!

This grandma is going to be consumed with her grandmotherly duties, she is going to immerse herself in bootees, baby blankets, bonnets, jumpsuits, rattles, doctor check ups and so much more. My first gorgeous grandbaby has just turned five and she will be off to school next year and number two will be arriving early November and number three ( my daughters first) will be arriving in April so there is much to be done. We have a three to four hour road trip to each one of our children's places which is not going to stop this grandma. I've told my daughter that I will be there for her any day or any time and seeing she cannot drive at the moment due to the two fits she had last year I will be around for her when her doctors appointments are getting closer apart and even when she is getting close to the birth.

Grandmother's Talent

A grandmother has a special talent-

She always knows just what to do

To make her grandchildren happy

And to show them that she loves them, too

At family get-togethers

she's the first person to look for,

She can entertain small children for hours

And they always keep asking for more.

You can always tell when a grandmother's teasing

By the twinkling that shines in her eyes-

She an expert at settling problems,

For she's loving, patient and wise.

Her grandchildren always admire her,

Even when they are grown-

They always feel proud and happy

To claim Grandma as their own!

~By Mary Dawson Hughes~