So another month goes by, and another year. We finished last December’s blog with So good riddance indeed to a horrid 12 months. 2021 must surely be a brighter, less turbulent year. Not really. A year of more lock downs, a total lack of movement as regards our new house, and a general feeling that it’ll probably get worse before it gets better. We are back in a ‘state of calamity’ and there are yet more restrictions on eating inside restaurants.

The weather in 2021 has been good overall. Once the summer got going it was cooler for us than normal, lower temperatures meant there were no major fire incidences which is always positive, and the autumn and winter (so far) have been bright and sunny. And it has meant we have been able to eat outside a lot too, not only in the our courtyard or garden but also when we’ve gone to restaurants, nearly all the meals we’ve had have been al fresco. This is certainly something that has kept us going.

Today was another marvellous day for walking, something else we have been doing even more of. The countryside around us is lovely, with loads of documented walking tracks for us to explore. And we have yet to meet a single person on any of the trails we have taken.

We take Betty for a long walk every morning still, Jussi a much shorter one. She is doing fabulously considering she had a major operation in January, in fact it is Betty who is more reluctant to get off the sofa in the morning let alone give us her customary bark to get us up.

Skittle is now three and a half and continues to be a more reliable alarm clock. Sadly, we said goodbye to two of the hens, the two youngest which is annoying, but the others seem fine. We have just four now. Hatty, the biggest one in the foreground will be five next spring, but we still get a few eggs every day which is all we need. Having said that today we passed a farm selling free range duck eggs (the ducks were out and about with turkeys, hens, guinea fowl, geese and goats) and we bought a dozen for €2.50. We will start the New Year with those poached on homemade muffins and smoked salmon.

Richard dispatched all of the recent batch of roasties. We were a bit disappointed there too: having decided they were big enough not to be taken by a sparrowhawk and could be let out to enjoy the grass, a mongoose got one of them and we found its headless body in the corner of the field. I hate not being able to let them out so some serious work on the fencing is job number one for January. They seemed fairly happy together in the sun in the safety of the cage though. And we must do some more bird watching, January is such a great time to spot things. This redwing and great spotted woodpecker were on our old walnut tree earlier in the month.

We’ve had a bit of rain recently, not unwelcomed. One particularly sunny / rainy afternoon we saw the most amazing rainbow, the whole arc was visible. glowing against the grey sky .

Perhaps a sign of good fortune for the year ahead, we all need it. So wishing all our readers the very best for the New Year and 2022. Let’s hope it’s a good one this time.