Grateful for Safe Spaces

Today, once again, I found myself feeling grateful for the "safe spaces" that have been made accessible to our family over the course of this COVID-19 pandemic.  Over the past year, various spaces - from forest acreages to backyard swimming pools to a country cottage - have been made available to us through the goodwill of family, friends, and neighbours.  

Today we experienced this generosity once more from a neighbourhood family who offered us unlimited access to their very large outdoor ice skating rink.  After homeschooling, the boys and I walked over to the rink and they skated gleefully for the better part of an hour.  They especially enjoyed shovelling off the rink (rather haphazardly), we made up obstacle courses and they practised tricks like skating on one foot and spins.  We timed our visit for the middle of the afternoon so any other neighbourhood kids would still be in virtual school and we had the huge rink entirely to ourselves.  It was magic.

If you are someone who has granted our family access to a safe space at any time over the course of this pandemic, I wish to reiterate from the bottom of my heart how incredibly grateful I am for your generosity.  While I love our farm, the ability to get outside and experience other places, without needing to worry about everyone wearing masks or keeping the boys socially distant from others (they are absolutely horrendous at this), is truly a godsend.  Thank you.  Thank you.  Thank you.

Exceeding Expectations

I set my expectations very low for today's return to homeschooling but it seems that I was apprehensive for nothing.  The boys got right back into the groove of our school routine with absolutely no fuss.  I fed them well, they each completed three hours of school work, and then they played outside for the afternoon in the snow.  

Seamus learned about wild animals, plurals, and using a period at the end of a statement.  Liam worked on telling time, weighting things, addition and subtraction, and learned about the sense of sight.  Alistair napped obligingly during school time and then played enthusiastically while I made rustic rooster pot pies for supper (and two for the freezer).  

We also baked bread, did the farm chores, and got caught up on laundry.  On the whole, it was a very successful first day back to school.   What a relief!

Whipping Up Some Snow Ice Cream

After a joyous two weeks of holidays, the boys' Christmas vacation has finally come to a close.  We celebrated their last day off from school work with banana waffles, snow ice cream, and the annual "feed the Christmas tree to the goats" event.

Looks pretty fancy, eh?  Homemade waffle batter, our own maple syrup, sliced bananas, and real whipped cream.  They were a hit!

To use up the rest of the whipped cream from breakfast, we added a drizzle of maple syrup, a splash of vanilla extract, and four cups of fresh fallen snow!  A little mix and voila!  Snow ice cream.  The kids devoured it.

In the afternoon Ian and I un-decorated the tree while the boys were having quiet time and it got the boot out into the goat paddock.

Martha ate so much bark she ruined her appetite for supper and I had a heck of a time enticing her up on the milking stand at dusk.  I eventually gave up and manually hoisted her rotund goat body up onto the stand so she could be milked.  Maybe we will get to make pine-flavoured milk shakes tomorrow? lol.

Sharing the Sunset

After a busy morning shovelling out after last night's snowfall, all three boys needed an afternoon nap.

Liam was so tired, he was close to just taking his nap in Charlie's paddock!

A three-way concurrent nap is a rare but very welcome occurrence around here.  As a result, I had a wonderfully relaxing afternoon reading a novel and even taking a short snooze of my own.

Post-nap, Liam and Papa headed out for an evening fish.  Seamus, Alistair and I stayed home to put the animals to bed and warm up the lovely pot of cabbage roll soup that Grandma delivered to us yesterday.  Thank you Grandma!

Molly is trying out a new "wool style"...frosted tips!

So, it was one sunset as seen in two places tonight; we were a few km apart from each other but, as always, we were together in spirit.  And the winter sunset was peaceful and pleasing in both places.

The sunset at our farm.

The same sunset at Ian's top secret fishing spot.

Pancakes & Pizza with a Side of Fresh Fish

We started off the new year with a delightful pancake breakfast and finished it up with delicious homemade pizza for dinner.  In between we went ice fishing.  The boys had a blast skating on the perfectly smooth ice of the biggest skating rink they had ever seen.  Quite a change from our tiny backyard pond rink!  We are grateful to be able to enjoy this beautiful Canadian winter day.  Happy January 1st!

Liam: "No time for photos - WE GOT A FISH!!!"

Wishing You Just Enough Floof

It has been one heck of a year, hasn't it?  

I will remember 2020 as being the year of the family.  I have never in my entire life, spent more uninterrupted time with my immediate family.  It all started back in February with Ian taking paternity leave  (which seems like 11 years ago instead of 11 months ago!), then the big boys transitioned to home schooling after March Break, with social isolation orders, and the annulment of all our extracurriculars - the rest is history.  For almost all of 2020, the five of us have been stuck to each other all of the time in a way I would never have imagined possible.

Upon reflection, Ian has decided to remember 2020 as a "fishtravaganza".  He boasts to have done more fishing this past year than ever before in his life.  Ian, Alistair and I did a bunch of ice fishing together during his paternity leave, then he fished a bunch over the summer with Liam and Seamus, and now we have come full circle and Ian is back to ice fishing.  With our calendar cleared of all social events, it seems to have left Ian with much more time for getting his line in the lake.

I acknowledge that we are very privileged to be concluding the year with positive takeaways.  I know that there are many who have had a heartbreaking year.  My thoughts are with those who lost their health, loved ones, relationships, employment, housing, and/or financial security in 2020.  

With that, we here on Gael Glen Farm are glad to see you slide through the finish line of 2020, more or less in one piece.  We wish you all a Happy New Year!  

May 2021 bring you health, happiness, stability, and just enough floof to keep things exciting.  Pecky Becky has got it going on in the floof department.

No, no, no...Don't Let it Snow!

"Maaammm turn off da wind!"
"Maaam make de snows go away!"
"Maaaaaaaaammm I don't want de snows touching ma footies!"
"Mammm I wanna go play, make it warm up!"

Needless to say, the goaties are not impressed with the snow.

Thanks to Ried Vallee Ranch for the translation.