BLESSED SPEEDY

Well here it is two days before Christmas and its 4 am in the morning – and I am finally getting around to writing my Christmas letter.  This is typical of the year that we have had this year – lots done. but where has the time gone and constantly chasing our tails! Farmwise things are now going well – we had a huge setback earlier in the year when our autumn calving cows and heifers were on agistment and were not being looked after properly and ended up with salmonella – this meant bring them back here to the farm early and spending a lot of $ to get them back in good condition – however Praise God they are now healthy and well.  We have employed a worker 3 days a week to help out and this has eased the burden a bit. Gary continues to enjoy being a dairy farmer with all the joys and challenges it brings and has recently been helping our builder reroof our home – it looks great!  He promises to take me fishing in our “spare time” which hasn’t quite happened yet! I (Dianne) seem

Things have been moving along here on the farm - we now dont have sick cows -we have sick calves :( So... lots of long long days feeding each calf very carefully with the best colustrum milk we have (freshly calved cows milk) and also giving them antibiotics etc and lots of love etc - sadly we have lost 6 heifer calves and 3 bull calves - hopefully no more though! BUT on a positive note - we had lovely visitors at easter time (see below!) Mia and Maddison and their parents Aimee and Jason came - its lovely to have kids around and to watch their joy at just being on the farm - things that were sad to us, seen in different eyes have given us a new perspective - and they give pretty good hugs too! I also managed to get a little quilting done - this cute little wallhanging was a kit I was given from my secret pal who lives somewhere overseas (I think America) and she send me a giftie each month - its a part of the Dear Jane group of which Im part of - I send gifts to someone el

I've been hesitant to post this but feel that others might gain from it - so here I go! At the moment life here on the farm is in short terrible. We have had a real  set back and its hard to see an easy or a quick solution. We had agisted our cows that are due to calve in autumn (in the next few weeks) with someone who had done it for us the past several years.  We had been very happy in the past with how our cattle were fed and looked after and we probably became complacent. Anyway the downside is that when Gary went to collect the cows due to calve soonish he was confronted with a disaster - our cattle were in terrible condition and didnt appear to have been fed much at all.  This photo is one of the worst cows - and when I saw her I just cried. We love and care about our cattle and for this to happen is just heart breaking. We face many challenges now - these cattle will be hard to get back to being well and looking good and its certainly not going to happen before they cal

Its hard to believe that two years have passed since Maddison Dorothy Rivett joined our family. She is growing into a gorgeous girl - has her own mind and is definately going to go places! A very happy birthday to you Maddison and we look forward to celebrating many more to come with you!

Ive just finally finished this quilt - and I must say Im really pleased with how it has turned out.  It was a lot of cutting (and HUGE amount of cutting - although I did cut too much fabric and have heaps left over), lots of sewing and then I stippled it myself on my domestic sewing machine.  I had to piece the back so thought I would use up more of the left over strips to join them together - I think it makes it look like it was meant to be. And the black and white fabric used in the binding was an afterthought and it think it fits in really well with the brightness and freshness of the quilt.

Wednesday night I did something I never really thought I would do - I got to wear robes and graduated! Through the National Centre of Dairy Education I have now successfully completed an Advanced Diploma in Agribusiness Management as well as a Diploma in Agriculture. It was a lot of work - and yes I did get some recognition for prior learning but it was still hard work! Dont ask what Im going to do with this qualification - its just nice to be finished and a bonus to have a nice night out with my lovely husband Gary at the Moama Bowling Club

I've had a busy time cleaning up my now much smaller sewing area.  Before we renovated I had a much bigger space but due to having to move a large kitchen hutch into our sun room, my sewing area is now a lot smaller - although I have gained extra storage!Once I decided to clean though it wasnt too bad - and I found things I had forgotten (as you do!) even chocolate - but it was off so serve me right. In the process I refound several plastic baggies of leftover fabric from various things I had made - so Im determined to use them up or if not move them on to someone who will use them.  First two efforts are shown here - the lap size quilt is made up of leftover tumbler blocks from a large bed quilt I gifted to Mia last year and the table runner is from leftover Egyptian fabric I had from a queen sized quilt I made Aimee probably 6 years ago - but now all used up and two (yes two!!!) empty plastic baggies. Its a good feeling.

I dont know about anyone else but I have HEAPS and HEAPS of crafty things that are just sitting around waiting to be done.  As part of a challenge to myself I am on a quest to use up my oldest yarn first - this yarn pictured is was an oldest unused yarn, I bought it over 4 years ago.  The pattern is this  one  which is was also one of the oldest in my queue on ravelry. Im quite pleased with how they turned out and have gifted them to a fellow raveller for a swap with the them "owls" as I thought they were an owly colour. Next finish - and next oldest yarn to use up was this lovely to knit with cleckheaton bamboo yarn, I made two fairly but effective dishcloths from it and I think they turned out quite well. The other challenge to myself is to go "cold sheep" = so no buying of yarn for at least til the end of January - so far so good - but oh its hard. Stay tuned to find out if I made it!

I've just finished the most gorgeous (but challenging) pair of socks I've ever knitted Ravelry linky  here . They were a test knit for a fellow member of ravelry and I started out knitting them in a gorgeous deep pink coloured yarn - unfortunately I didnt have enough yarn to make the pair so knitted a second and third sock from some handdyed yarn I had on hand - and I'm very pleased with how they turned out.  As I said before, a very challenging knit as every row is different so you have to watch what you are doing all the time. Also a finish at the same time was the audiobook version of Jane Austen's Mansfield Park - Audible linky  here .  I have found that I really like "listening" to classic novels as opposed to reading them - sometimes they are a bit hard going!

Well as its the new year - of course I had to have a bit of a declutter and reassess of my crafting activities. I dug out the kit for a BOM that I had (craftsy 2013 block of the month) and had a go at doing the first block - difficulties from the word go, not the block or the sewing but having to download dvds and instructions on the internet and of course it was a day when our internet connection was not that good was terrible.  After doing the first months block I had a good hard look at the whole quilt and realised that I really didnt like it! I do however like the fabrics.  Was brave and decided that there is no point carrying on making something I dont like as chances are it will never get finished.....and thankfully the patterns were free so nothing lost there. Hunted out a great pattern  giant scrappy dresden  and Im going to use my fabrics to make it Spent most of this afternoon cutting out and was oh so amazed how much easier it is to cut fabric when you replace your rotary

Well 2013 has come and gone and here we are in 2014 already SO much happened last year - some good and some not so good, some I want to remember and some I'd much rather forget Did I achieve all I wanted to? Of course not! So as for resolutions this year I'm just going with this -