Our day, as usual, started early with milking and feeding all the animals. However, milking on Xmas day does involve a little more alcohol than usual and here is David enjoying a healthy breakfast of Bucks Fizz and Russian Honey Cake. Just what you need at 5.30am on Xmas morning.
Note Bucks Fizz elegantly served in mugs!
Yummy Russian Honey Cake from Wye Market
After milking we moved Navajo back in with the other boys and then David helped me chop all the boxes of fruit that Francesca had brought over yesterday evening. We ended up with 3 huge buckets full of banana, melon, apple, pears and apricots which we shared out and it was all gone in less than a couple of minutes. As you see, everyone was very eager for their Xmas treats:
Over to feed the youngsters in the other barn and then home to start getting lunch ready. Just David and myself and Marmite cat. Nice lunch - not turkey! - and then we loaded the doggies into the truck and drove over to see the Gracie Moos. We confused them by entering the field via a different gate to usual and we managed to get all the way across the field and put food into their troughs before they realised that it was us! Then we were spotted and they all came galloping across:
Nell and Ben are not so keen on travelling in the truck, but they are very happy once they are out of it:
Then it was time to go and see the youngsters again and fill their hay racks. Back to the farm and milking and feeding all over again!
Evening milking at Xmas is similar to morning milking in that it also involves alcohol. As we had to do a bit of driving about during the afternoon, we didn't really drink at lunchtime and saved most of our very nice bottle of 2007 Barolo for the evening. Seems that David may have had a little too much of it though as he seemed not to be entirely in control of his milking clusters .. Note the cross-over.
Best Xmas card of the season - received from Jane (Cheesemakers of Canterbury):
And the best Xmas text message received this morning from Carla at Winterdale Cheesemakers; 'Thank you for making Xmas morning so believable. The reindeer s**t worked a treat!'.
Explanation ... they have two young children (4 and 6) and, like many parents, set up their lounge as if Father Xmas had been to visit during the night. I supplied a small bag of fresh goat poo (the nice dry pellet variety) which they sprinkled liberally around their new lounge carpet to simulate reindeer poo. Obviously worked well!! Maybe I've found a gap in the market - we could start bagging it up and selling it for next year.
Back to normal tomorrow as I am off to spend the day making cheese.
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