A note from the Cook

I finally have a day off and I am having a do not too much day. I am waiting for Ted the man who delivers the wood to arrive and then it will be back to work unloading and stacking. If he gets here late enough the boys will be home to help. The oven is roaring and biscuits are finally being made, with hopefully a cake or two. I'm sure that was a part of the order. It will probably be pizza to night (and not the bought one) as the wood oven is on. Bread rolls for the boys tomorrow also part of the order.

The boys start skiing again next term ‘my at least a month of hell’, getting them there. Ben does 4 days over 4 weeks and Harry is having 8 weeks - both on different days. Hopefully I can jig it all with work. We went to the high school ski sale on the weekend and stocked upon clothes because of 2 growing boys. Not too many toboggans, and they were nabbed pretty quickly. I'll have to try at the end of the season at the ski shops. I won a National Park pass for a year, so we will have to go to the snow this year and make good use of it. The boys are keen to show off their skiing prowess and really keen to toboggan down the hills wildly while I hold my breath. They are growing quickly.

The pigs are selling thick and fast and soon we wont have too many big ones which will likely cause problems on the selling side. It is either a flood or a drought. The first pigs went to slaughter on Monday and are off to Sydney to the Everleigh markets. We have negotiated with a lady who is taking our pigs to sell and we just have to get them to the abattoir - she does the rest. At least it will start moving them and we can gain a little more control over the stocking rates. Hopefully put up a few more fences and spread them out.

The temperature is looking abit low these days and we had some snow a week or so ago. As cold as it was it was also very pretty. First real snow for ‘Valley View’ since we have been here.
Life has just been too fast for me to catch up. Today has been a great day. Work is hell at the moment, incredibly busy, so many really sick kids not enough staff. The winter has really hit with a bang and we are in bronchilitis/RSV land. Last year wasn't this bad. Then there is always a swine flu scare to throw in some more chaos. All fun. I better go and pick the kids up.

So what doesn’t she say – The poor old Cook has been bitten twice by a pig in the last week, the second time right on the end of the thumb - drawing quite a lot of blood. I noticed the chain on the gate had blood all over it and took a walk around the pigs trying to find one with an injury. I eventually gave up and went inside, I mentioned the blood to the Cook and – well, you can guess the rest. She spends every evening wrapped around the column heater next to the fire and by 10pm is sound asleep.

Boy; I'm going to cop it this time!