Catching Up

Time for a catch-up.

The days just seem to bowl on faster and faster at a rate faster inversely proportional to your age.

This post will sample a few events up until the end of 2015.

After planting some spuds at the end of October we treated ourselves to a visit to youngest daughter's husband's place of work on a dairy farm near Inangahua Junction.

We were lucky with the weather as the place has a reputation for fairly high rainfall and many overcast days.

In December I paid a visit to Fiji where my son resides. Visited a vessel trialing the 24-hour surveillance system  instigated by the steering committee I attended in Rome last year. The trial systems are funded by UNFAO.

Three cameras watch over the hatch to the fish hold, the sea door where the fish are brought aboard and the stern where, on a long liner, the line is set into the water. 

 By mid-December the garden was taking off and we were already enjoying fresh peas picked from the vine. There's nothing better.

Hay making was in full swing in the neighbours' paddocks.

 By the end of December the cattle were enjoying plenty of fresh grass, which was to continue right through into June, when frosts cut grass growth right back to almost nothing.

In mid December I bought a second-hand wood lathe, and the house soon started filling up with all manner of strange objects. Pictured is an early attempt in elm. Those that know say that you need 7 years' experience to be any good. Only 6 and a half years to go....

To finish off for 2015, a few more bits of wood.

 Elm

 Elm, and on the right an old totara post.

 Elm

Macrocarpa