There Was a Crooked House...House Flit ...Visitors

My brother and his wife and their 2 boys, Aidan and Conor are coming tomorrow for the weekend. Vlad and I have bought camp beds and sleeping bags and intend to camp out, so to speak, on the farm. We thought of under the stars but the weather has been rainy so maybe it will be indoors in the old farm house. We may have to bring Dick and Páidi to waylay the mice and rats though...(joking, I think ; ))

We have painted and washed and cleaned like maniacs - a long, overdue cleaning job...we are so looking forward to a rest this weekend and just hanging out - a barbeque, some walking, a few beers, nice food, friends visiting and catching up with Neil, my bro and his wife, Karen. Please let the very odd-for-this-time-of-year rain stay away and please let the crooked and tumledown farm house not give way and come crashing down about our sleeping-bagged ears (oh and a whispering plea for rats not to put in an appearance!)! ; )

Birthday Photos

Candles Holding Out to Valley Breeze



Sun-Chair Presents with Matching Broom!;)



Two Birthday Girls

More photos up at Flickr

Good Friday...Spring Equinox...Many Happy Returns

It's my birthday tomorrow and it's weird it being on a Good Friday - a day of abstinence. The only place that one used to be able to have a drink on Good Friday
in Ireland was on a train - I remember my friends and I being young and foolish enough to board an East to West train just to do that!

I've been so busy with painting, cleaning, carrying and general intensive house-workey stuff that I had put all birthday plans out of my head - luckily others were more on the ball and as it turns out, we're going to have a picnic on the farm with some friends during the day and a Japanese restaurant at night. I have 2 English friends here who have the same birthday date - it's weird the way we all ended up living here and our circumstances are pretty similar too.The picnic will be a sort of launching day - unfortunately housework drove us to drink the plonky champagne we had saved to smash against the farm entrance : ) We'll have to make do with an empty bottle!

The moon is just beautiful tonight and tomorrow it should be full - love having a birthday on a full moon. And that must fare so well for the Spring Equinox too.

Out of the Briars, Into the Brambles

We've cleared away a lot of the briars and brambles from around our favourite tree.
Páidi and I take a break to celebrate. : )

Heart in Hands (Some Kitsch Photos)

The wonderful world of weirdness on the farm. : )

Pics and Stories from Working the Farm

Páidi, running free


Dick and Me : )


Monstrous Bonfire


Uncovered Vine


Dick and Páid and the Midday Sun

** We are going at it, hell-for-leather, I didn't think we had it in us to chip away at the work which is to be done and at last, 3 weeks later, we are beginning to see the place being tidied up a bit.

The added plus is that Páidi gets to roam around - he is loving all the hiding places. The only thing he is, we have discovered he has a weakness for dried-up-rat-carcass and I've had at least two struggles with him to get such delights off him. You should see his face when he sees me whirl his 'tasty bite' to the top of the bonfire. I am an old meanie, I am : )

Dick is another matter, we have to keep him on a long lead as he goes off wandering and doesn't come back for hours - much to the probable consternation of neighbours who he is visiting!

Talking of bonfires, it is getting to be a totally beanstalky-bonfire - next stop- Heaven. And bonfire night isn't until June 24th ....gosh - as the song says: the only way is up!

I have spotted an area that I want to nourish as my outdoor writing area - complete with wooden hut. An enormous vine was hidden underneath a heap of briars and dead tree branches. I have spent the last two days digging around it and it is a beauty of a vine -it looks real old. Have now to get a wooden structure set up to hold it. Hope it survives. Cement towers that had been there had also fallen on it. It was in a totally bad way.

This afternoon we are going to water the orange trees and give them 'rainbow food'- it is the equivalent to the human version of putting hair on one's chest to strengthen them. : )

Tagged

I've been tagged by Nic so here goes:

How to play:
1. Pick up the nearest book (of at least 123 pages).
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people.

1.Call Me the Breeze by Patrick Mc Cabe
2.Page 123 it is.
3.'I think it's coming.I think the bad times will soon be behind us. What...´
4.'...with the ceasefire and everything, people at last getting sense into
their heads! The days of the killing and bombing and young men being sent out
to die will soon be a thing of the past. Would you say so, Joseph?'
5. I tag whoever is reading this and would like to do it. : )

Kitsch on the Farm

It's a whole wonky and strange world right there : )