Welcome to autumn. It's been six months today since we moved into this house. That time has gone by so fast.
The garden here is huge and tending to it is a constant job. It was an overgrown mess when we arrived. We've put in more flowers around the house and built a decent vegetable garden below the driveway. But there are still parts we have hardly touched. We harvested our potatoes and ended up with a huge box full of them. We have delicious sugar snap peas, cape gooseberries, silverbeet, a tiny blueberry plant, cucumbers, strawberries, carrots, some grapes, and some wild blackberries taking over the abandoned pool surround. And probably more things I'm forgetting. Soon we'll be planting things for the winter. And we built an enclosed shed for our chooks in case the winter is as bad as predicted.
We did go up to Christchurch last month as planned. It was the longest drive I've done (nearly three times as much driving as I've ever done in one day before and full of new experiences as I got closer to the city) but totally worth it because Skuggi managed to get two clear rounds, winning third place both times. For a dog who couldn't manage more than one clear round a year when we were in Australia, to get two in one weekend was really exciting. Especially since that now makes it three consecutive competitions he's gotten clear rounds at - all of his NZ championship trials. I'm already planning another road trip for another weekend of agility, which hopefully will happen. If people could just have a bit of common sense we wouldn't keep going into lockdowns.
We went to the dog training club in Timaru last week to practice agility and had a great time. When Skuggi was a baby, we were part of an obedience club in Australia just to help Skuggi's socialization and learning how to focus on me with other dogs around. It went well and we enjoyed it, up until we graduated up to the next class, which had a couple of aggressive dogs in it that were trying to fight each other every week. It became too stressful for Skuggi, so we didn't go back after the summer break. At the club last week there were only three other dogs in our class but already a little scuffle happened between two of them while we were having our turn on the equipment. But Skuggi handled it well, coming back to focus on me quickly and play with his toy without getting too worried. So anyway, all going well, we'll be going there most weeks to train. With so little room at home for equipment, we really need this opportunity!
Besides that, not much has been happening. I applied for a job and I didn't get it. We took care of our neighbours' pet calves for a while after they moved away, just until they were able to move the calves to their new place. Which has been done now. I miss them already. We also got to work with the landlord's young cattle a little bit last week too. It made me remember how much I enjoy working with cattle. And especially how much I miss my Logan.
