9, 17, 2, and nearly a splash

How many piggies arrived?

Nine! They are now nearly two weeks old, and running around their pen like hooligans.



 

Their noses are mucky because they are investigating the delights of digging. They have battles which involved hanging on to each other's ears and tails. The males (3) are already barging into the flanks of the females, just like their dad does. They are starting to find their voices, but not much. They are a total delight!

Meanwhile, seventeen lambs were the final number born. All black, or black or white.

You have met Twoey already,  and here is her brother Benjie...

Twoey has two white blobs on her forehead, Benjie has a white triangle. Both have little mops of white fur between their ears. Both have to be bottle fed because their mum, who had three lambs, gave up with these two. They are pals. But they do not have such joyfulness of spirit as do the lambs still being fed by their mums. I have not seen them prance about, nor race with the wind, nor even have play-battles. Yesterday the last lamb was born. It was very tiny. I think the mum must have taken one look at it and decided it was not bothering about because it was left to fend for itself. All the day long I watched it out in the field with the others, hoping that the mum would feel some sort of pull of her heartstrings. She didn't.  Did not even know who it's mum was. No one showed an interest. So in it came with the rest of the flock in the evening. Needed to be fed. Died during the night. In a way I am glad it died. Having seen how not having a mum has affected Twoey and Benjie, it would have not been a good life for that little one. At least the brother and sister have each other, but that little one would have been truly an orphan. So I glad that nature intervened, even if it was sad to see the little lifeless body in the morning.

But.....we have two ceilings now finished:



What will be the Dining Room eventually

And by golly gosh what a humungous state the house has got into, and what a humungous state me and Hubs have also got into. During the previous renovation work we had caravans to return to so we were out of the way of the messiness of the building work. But now we are in the house all the time, we could not escape the building zones, nor could we escape the desert storm of dust which frequently flew around the house. But.....two ceilings now up, and rooms reasonably cleaned up. I spent all weekend vacuuming through the house. Foolish me. Should have waited, as now I will have to go over it all again.  It's no good using a duster. I have to use the vacuum cleaner. This is not house dust as such. It is wood and brick dust, which is a completely different type of dust. And we are exhausted. I do not remember being so tired during other phases of the renovation, but this time we are wobbling with tiredness. Might be because of the recent extremely cold weather, or it being the explosion of young animals all of which were not expected, or it could be because it is the changing seasons...not to worry, though, two ceiling done! Whooppeeee!!!

....aaaaannnnddddd......the bathroom is only waiting for the tiles to be put on the walls, the plumber to come in and finish the plumbing, and for the electrician to complete his part as well. And then we can  have a splash about in the shower. And go to a proper loo with running water instead of using a watering can. Whooppeeee again!



It is also a strangeness that now the electrician wants to know where I want the kitchen plugs to go. And that we are now talking about getting the walls of the dining room started now it has its ceiling on. Never thought we would get this far in just under four years.

And the proper mains electric in to the house is being sorted out....



....the trolley at bottom right is the electrical unit we have been running on, and what a delicate piece of equipment it is too. Put too many electrical appliances on at the same time and it switches off. Was a bit of a fright for Hubs as the hole in the wall was made for the electrical box to sit in. He thought the house would fall down. He is very sensitive about stones being taken out of the wall, after having spent a large amount of money having the walls repaired.

Not to worry though, the cracks still left in the walls do not seem to have got any bigger.

And off I now go to feed those two lambs, and then have a check on the piglets, so saying bye for now......