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Sweden – week 4

Monday 23rd March

Flo and Christina go off to visit the “reining lady” with Sonny and Knighty.  So after we’ve done the stable chores, me, Daz and Ion I continue with the circular saw.  We have discovered that if I run the saw whilst people are in the house using the cooker etc that we keep blowing fuses.  So far in about 4 sawing sessions we’ve blown about 15 fuses in total so now I only run the saw if no-one’s in the house.  I do about 2.5 hours of sawing which is hard work – lifting the large logs up into the saw but my original pile is slowly decreasing in size so it’s rather satisfying.  Meanwhile Daz is building a table so it’s quite difficult to get him to do anything else.  He’s googled it and found a model to copy and he’s very excited about it all.

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In the afternoon we tidy the shed next door to our cabin – it’s where we store the wood for our wood burner but apart from a small stack of wood there’s barely any spare room.  As we empty it we discover that most of it is old cardboard boxes and horse feed bags kept to start fires.  There’s so much that we have a small fire to get rid of it all and actually the majority of the other stuff is consigned to the rubbish tip.  We’re going to do a “tip” run on Thursday I think.

 

Tuesday 24th March

Today I do some planting with Christina – we plant sunflowers, salad leaves, peppers and cucumber seeds.  I’m looking forward to the results and replanting them in the greenhouse.

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Work on the greenhouse continues – now that the foundations are done Ion is busy finding wood and cutting it to size and making the roof A frame.  Mucking out today is a bit of a disaster – we’ve kept several horses in  because we’re expecting the “hoof” man at 11am.

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He’s going to trim the hooves of 5 of the horses – Christina can do it and has done the ponies and several mares but she says the “boys” will take too much of her time.  Christina and Flo have got 2 horses ready to ride – Suaga and Wichita but then realise that in the front paddock there’s a ‘real fight’ between Knighty and Lucky.  There’s often some rather robust horse play amongst the stallions but this is something else.  Lucky is practically on his knees with Knighty on top.  It looks really nasty and Christina manages to separate them and brings Lucky into the stables.  The poor lad is covered in bites and Knighty has drawn blood in a large number of places.  Christina puts on some ointment.  Knighty was having his hooves done and Lucky was in Knighty’s stall waiting his turn for the “hoof man” and there were several mares around the stable too, Wichita, Suaga and Peanut.  The proximity to the mares got Knighty a bit “hot under the collar” and so when they were returned to the field Knighty was overexcited and took out his ‘hormonal exuberance’ on poor Lucky.  As a result Lucky is kept in the stables for the remainder of the day and won’t be returned to the “boys” field until he’s healed and Christina can check how Knighty acts on his return.

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In the afternoon I spread chalk on the lawn.  It’s supposed to stop the moss growing.

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In the evening Flo leaves, she’s catching the 6pm train from Floby back to Gotenburg.  We’re hoping to see her again either in Gotenburg or here at the farm if she comes for the weekend.

During the evening Daz is lying on the sofa and kicks our Notebook off the arm of the sofa.  It hits the floor and when we check we discover the screen has many cracks and it only has limited functionality.

 

Wednesday 25th March

Christina is going to work today.  After we’ve done the stables I return to the wood pile task, Ion continues with preparation of the greenhouse frame and Daz with the table making.

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We send the Notebook with Christina so she can find out if the screen can be replaced but apparently it’ll be stupidly expensive and cheaper to replace.  Daz is initially repentant but soon is overcome with the joy of the opportunity of spending money on something new.

 

Thusday 26th March

Today it’s really wet with a cold wind.  We won’t be doing much work outside today.  We take the horses out and do our normal stable chores and then we all end up indoors.  The rain just gets heavier and heavier.  In the afternoon Christina picks up a new volunteer from Floby. She’s Heather from New Zealand and she’s studying Environmental Science for a semester in Sweden.

 

Friday 27th March

I go with Christina to the ‘reining lady’.  Today she rides Sunny but also rides Knighty and he does really well for his first time.  Back at the farm we discover that a chicken has been killed – Ion thinks it was killed by a rooster or the other chickens but Christina says she has never heard of such a thing and thinks it was killed by weasel.  In the afternoon I saw some more wood, Daz sands his table and fixes one of the bikes and Ion continues work on his greenhouse frame.  Then I help Heather with Wichita and Suaga so she and Christina can ride when Christina gets back from Falkoping.

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Saturday 28th March

Today we go to Skovde to purchase a new Notebook.  First we put the horses out and then Christina is going to give us a lift to Floby so we can get the train but then she realises that she doesn’t need the car today so she lends it to us.  So we drive to Skovde and visit a couple of shopping malls. Daz is so happy – things for sale.  He buys a new Notebook, a kettle and some herbs.  He’s one happy chappy.  Then we visit the town centre and have Thai for lunch.  It’s a lovely day and great to be out and about.  We sit in a bar overlooking the town square – Daz playing with his new purchases whilst I read my Kindle.  We get back to the farm at 7pm.  Christina,  Ion and Heather have only just come back from riding.

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Sunday 29th March

Today we miss the clocks going forward and don’t get up until 10am and the horses are already out.  I stay in bed reading my book and leave Daz to do the work.  Then we have a lazy day

2 replies on “Sweden – week 4”

Daz & Hels,
Really enjoying reading your blog and Lark and I are dead jealous. I submitted NTT in Jan and will be out on 31 Dec and then we will be embarking on our own RTW trip. Not even considered resettlement yet as we are currently in Brussels but the days are flying by like you wouldn’t believe and I will be a civvie before you know it (and can’t wait!,) As I’m not intending to work no real pressure to get a job so am intending to do a cycle maintain course. Which one did you do? Where, how long and how much? Anyway, hope you are having fun (certainly sounds like you are) and keep up the good work. Phil & Lark

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