To you all, we hope you enjoyed yourselves what ever you did. We stayed in and watched various celebrations on the TV, then once the bells went we started to watch the fireworks going off around Peterhead.

New Years Day, we went into the mountains for a day trip we got back home for 4pm, while out i managed to take just one photograph before the batteries went flat and didn't have anymore batteries on me...a shame really because there was loads of brilliant views, the photo below is of the river Dee and the mountains in the distance taken between Bancory and Ballerter....you can still see the snow on the river bank.

 New Years Day wasn't a very good start for the hen's as they only managed 2 eggs and yet again i warned them .....told them it isn't on so we'll see what they do tomorrow.

Well we are into the 2nd week of a New Year, the weather has been ok up until now with the gales arriving yet again, we get blown down the garden when we go and collect the eggs Fudge is in a good place by the garage as it isn't as windy there. Ok so on the 2nd Jan Stevan bought himself a Sat Nav (give's me a rest from reading the maps everytime we go off somewhere), to try it out we had gone up to Fraserburgh to Tesco, the first time the Sat Nav spoke i nearly jumped out of my seat ....soooo funny and a good job i wasn't driving. The rest of the week was spent doing nothing apart from Steve dropping 2 eggs that he had just been to collect....then on  Saturday when Steve had a Dial A Bus job from Fraserburgh to Alford 60 ish mile away so i went along for the drive. We had taken a flask of coffee with us then once in Alford and dropped off the passenger we went to get a sandwich and of course a sticky bun or two for me (bang goes the diet)..and had a picnic in some woods (freezing too) then came home. 8th Jan was baking day Trace made pies, quiche, curry, chilli and fudge and Steve made Ice cream what a busy bee day we had. 9th Jan Steve had an interview at Dial A Bus for a paid driving position, Storm and Sammy had a vets appointment ...Storm for his monthly check up (he weighs 35kg at 10 mth) and little Sammy has a sore leg so she got tablets and a diet sheet yet again.

10th Tracy pulled the kitchen carpet up, so now the plan is to sand the floorboards and varnish it, and maybe in time do the rest of the house, I suppose i can't have a clean house AND have animals so I thought the other day get shut of the carpet and just have easy to clean boards. 12th was cleaning out day for the animals ...new hay in the run for the hens & ducks also clean bedding, cleaned the messy wee Duckie out too AGAIN (a twice a day job really) also fudge had a new clean bed too and a play on the grass while i did it. I have created a new forum called The Duck Shed it replaces the one we had on the site so we shall see how this one does instead.

FRIDAY THE 13th Ooooh no I'm staying in that day...anyhow it's my sisters birthday on the 13th so Happy Birthday Janette have a good one ...also on the 13th is Tinsel's 4th week hatch day ...we can't believe how big and fast Tinsel has grown in such a short time we have even had to make a new home for her although she is still in the house keeping nice and warm ..her feathers are coming now and she loves to have a swim around in the sink then we have to catch her and dry her off so that she doesn't catch cold (updates on the duckling page will arrive soon.....as I'm a bit behind with the site at the minute. 14th was a very busy day for the both of us as we set out to get the garden sorted out (tidy up) we started to plant all of the shrubs that were in various tubs around the garden and like i said just generally do some tidying up around the place. we also had Tinsel out in the garden today which she enjoyed she even had a swim in the pond which she enjoyed even better, then we brought her back into the house and dried her then it was back in the cage for her to get warm again.

30th January, ok since my last instalment in the diary we have been quite busy, on the 15th Steve dug his new veggie patch over ready for the spring, I got all my seeds and seed compost ready for the end of February I also cleaned out the greenhouse's. We sold a lot of ducks eggs this month, we lost another hen so we are now down to 6 laying hens of which at the moment are pleasing themselves when they lay. We have took out the wall in the living room to see where and what the fire situation is as we got told before we moved here that the fire was still there ...but it isn't all there is is a hole and of course the chimney so we are getting someone in to have a look to see what needs to be done so that we can have an open fire. On the 21st we got some paving slabs given by some friends so they have now gone in the yard we are hoping to get more from them soon then those slabs can get put in the run. 22nd I made lots of pies for the freezer also bread and some fudge which didn't last long i can tell you (someone in this house has a very sweet tooth ..Hmm i wonder who!). By the 23rd we had way too many eggs so Trace pickled 2 dozen and like always come the next day someone came to the house wanting to buy eggs but we didn't have any left Oops 3 people to be exact in 2 days came for eggs but the hen's had already decided that it was the right time to be awkward for 3 days we only got 3 eggs out of 6, we are back on track now though. 26th and the new kitchen table and chairs arrived (solid pine but not impressed came flat pack too)  

29th and it's Steve's grandsons 6th birthday so happy birthday Kieran Lee hope you got lost of presents. 30th and it's been a sad ish day because we moved my mate to the shed, It's soooo quiet in here now without the duckling messing around, she's all alone in Steve's shed Arrrrr i must go see how she is doing when I've done this.

The eggs recorded for January are Duck 62, hen 119 that's down on last month by 10 eggs, the ducks have laid 2 a day without fail. It's the lazy hen's that are letting us down. The weather this month hasn't been too bad, I'm still waiting for this so called freezing cold snowy winter we are supposed to be getting.

That's it folks for this month keep a look out for February's diary coming soon