Wintertime

When people told me winter in bulgaria was extremely cold, i'm not sure what I expected. January is freezing and some areas are having awful conditions. We are being very lucky so far. The horses are safe and warm in their stables and the chickens have been moved indoors. But so far apart from our food freezing we have had no major problems and lots of time to ski.
Our thoughts are with the families in the flooded area of bulgaria and hope they recieve aid soon

Snow!!

 No riding to be done at the momment because the ground is too slippery, but the dogs are having a fantastic time. they have been out destrying snowmen and chasing snowballs. Shadow is very keen on tunnelling through piles of snow. All construction on the stables has stopped for the week and were having lots of fun sledging and skiing.

naughty youngsters and lovely neighbours

Yesterday was a very trying day. Lolly decided that he didn't want to work on his cart. He helpfully stood while i connected his cart to the harness then kicked the cart till it came off again. After an hour and seven goes at kicking off the cart! I was getting really fed up, until two of our lovely neighbours came to the rescue and helped me get him attached and moving before he started again. We spent a couple ofhours taking him over the common ground near the stables before letting him have a well deserved rest. Without my knights in shining armour I think i would have been there all day. So thanks, you know who you are.

Mud glorious Mud!

I can't believe how much rain we've had in the last coule of days. That plus the melting snow has turned the yard into a muddy swamp. The horses closely resemble the creatures from the black lagoon, but their having fun rolling around.
DIY this week is all for my daughter Cat's benefit. It's her birthday on friday and as a present she wants some chickens. But as with all pets belonging to her a normal home will not do. So now we're converting the old grain store into chicken palace; to be painted yellow, with a rainbow and flowers. The chickens will have a house each, a dust bath and a climbing frame, because we don't want them to get bored when they can't go out.
Following that i need to build a en for the dogs when there outside because our collie gem keeps trying to round up the horses and their going to kick him eventually.