This week - Gabrielle visits

Gosh what a week and where to start?

When I wrote my previous post, we knew an ex-tropical cyclone was heading for New Zealand, and in spite of hopes that it might veer off the country, at, apparently over 600kms wide, we knew it was sure to hit.

Master Odie turned three last week and YD changed his birthday party to Saturday instead of Sunday.

We all headed home and that was it as far as getting out and about and socialising was concerned.

Cyclone Gabrielle hit Northland that Saturday night, heavy rain and then more rain. High winds and then more wind.

Trees down, flooding, power outages. Communication outages. Everywhere.

Gabrielle carried on down the country and has caused havoc over large areas of the North Island; although many areas have been severely affected, all eyes and hearts are currently centred on Hawkes Bay on the East Coast which has been particularly severely hammered. There are still a lot of people completely cut off and not yet contacted/contactable.

Although it's been a tough week, thankfully we suffered minimal damage. The farm flooded, trees came down and we were without power for much of the time. We had to dump four milkings worth of milk because we were flooded in and the tanker couldn't get to us, but on the whole we got through it ok.

We did have time to prepare and we were able to make sure all our stock were on high ground, and we had enough feed ahead of the cows to keep them happy.

Our generators were fuelled up and ready to go.

Any trees that toppled (or branches that broke) fell away from powerlines and buildings. 

The floodwaters over the pastures drained away reasonably quickly, and on the whole, the damage from the flood wasn't too bad....we've had higher floods and more fence damage over the years.

Here is the generator on the back of the tractor running the cowshed. Now that our power is back on, the generator is at a friend's place milking his cows -  a lot of people in the region are still without power.

Below you can see that parts of the farm are well above the flood levels. The cows are walking past the house area to a fresh (although sodden) paddock —

By Tuesday afternoon the winds had died down for us and the rain had stopped. There was even a touch of blue sky in that area that night.

This family came over for a walk - they told their mum they wanted to 'see the bridge' - good luck with that! This was actually the first time any of us had gone out walking - often when it rains we all quite enjoy putting on wet weather gear and going exploring. Not this time; it was very scary, and dangerous!

And now we have the clean up.  Yesterday the MOML was able to get to the massive Totara tree that had been uprooted and was resting on the bridge —

Yep, he's over the bridge (that's the worst the sides have been damaged in the 19 years since we built the bridge) and off to see the damage on the other side.

These two thought they were 'helping'; too slippery, sticky and soggy!

So, as you can see, a bit of an unsettling week. 

Take care everyone,

'til next time,

happy stitches,

February so far....

February is usually a month of sneaky sewing for me (well, it starts earlier than February but this is when the pressure goes on!) as we prepare for the launch of our new projects for The Country Yard, where I work. Which means I usually have little to share here.

I committed to a couple of projects to make at home. Hmmm, maybe I can show a few sneaky peaks —

I also brought home this binding to sew —

And these petals to prep —

(Using the iron-on applique papers and the glue pen)

While I have been sewing up a storm I have been doing a bit of leader and ender sewing and have accumulated a nice pile of 4-patches —

Which are becoming bigger blocks —

Yes, I have jumped on the Quiltville (Bonnie Hunter) Leader-Ender challenge called Triple Treat. As I have a lot of 2" squares left over from my Smidgeon project, I am making my blocks using those. Bonnie's used 1 ½" squares, so my blocks end up bigger but I hoping the end result will be just as effective as hers.

I called in to ED's yesterday after work. She has got a garden she is, justifiably, proud of, and the two smalls picked me a bunch of Dahlias and Zinnias to bring home. Beautiful!

And I've started up my daily walks/ hill climbs again, which I am enjoying a lot. YD's two 4-legged boys had a sleepover last night so I took them and Emma out with me this morning.

It was a lovely start to the day —

The top of the back hill —

On the way back down again there was a traffic jam. Luckily the boys waited patiently for the cow to cross the bridge —

But then another appeared! Whoops! Everyone behaved.

Ok, must carry on....

'til next time,

happy stitches,

Family Time

Before I get on with the rest of my news, I'll share a couple of sewing photos, then you can skip the rest of the blogpost if you're not interested!

These two pillowcases are the only real finishes I have for January. I had pulled the fabric and had it was sitting out for nearly a year waiting for some sewing time!

So even though it was January (and not December) it was time to sew them up and get them onto a different pile!

Cute Christmas fabric - I'm not even sure how it came to be in my stash, but it's out of it now —

You may remember that last month I declared my Boxer floor cushion finished. Of course it was - except that it had no inner. I have now made an inner and yaay the cushion is now properly done. It's perhaps a little over full but I think it will squash down with use —

Here is a line up of other cushions I've made over the years —

The Boxer is a decent size; it really was like making another quilt —

I haven't counted up this month's blocks just yet so will need to do that asap, before I forget.

On to other news. Today marks 10 years since Dad died. To commemorate it we arranged a family weekend down at Taupo.

We drove south through heavy rain on Friday. Little did we realise that there was a trail of destruction behind us - flooding, slips, accidents. It wasn't until later that night that we learnt of the horrific wet events unfolding in Auckland and surrounds.

It was wet (but not as wet) in Taupo too but we all managed to have a great weekend. There is a lot of geothermal activity in Taupo so the swimming pools at the resort were delightfully warm and well used by most family members. Indoor activities out and about were frequented too. 

For the most part, umbrellas were the order of the day —

Visiting Huka Falls with the MOML and YD —

Hard to see from my photos that the falls are quite impressive! The colour was beautiful, too.

This was not impressive! We paid to go for a wee bush walk to see the geothermal activity. Considering Taupo produces about 20% of NZ power by geothermal power, we were expecting more than this!

Sunday was our 'official day'. We all went through to my hometown (Tokoroa) and visited Dad.

My siblings, Mum, and I (You can possibly see that Tokoroa has a very colourful cemetery. Bright flowers/colours Everywhere) —

We went to a local park where there is a plaqued parkbench and a grove of Hazelnut trees planted in his memory. As you can see it was getting wetter then. The planned picnic was canned but we did take over a coffee shop for lunch!

Quick visit to Pinetree Man - Dad was a driving force behind this (and a supplier of the shed space for it's construction!) —

 That evening we had a private buffet dinner in the resort, which was a lovely way to end the weekend. 

Nephew getting hounded by his (second) cousins!

It was amazing that most of our family was able to attend, aside from my brother-in-law who spent the weekend pumping water out of his orchard, and my brother's US family stayed home awaiting a new arrival - any day now.

And we all had so much hanging out time, just chatting and catching up with each other. Just fabulous and a great way to commemorate Dad.

It was a long holiday weekend in the Waikato, Auckland and Northland so none of us had to leave until Monday. Us Northlanders were a little concerned about the road closures and detours on the way home so we all took off pretty smartly in the morning. But everyone got home safely and without too many dramas.

Another wave of this atmospheric river is due to hit the northern part of the country tonight and a State of Emergency has been declared for Northland in preparation for anticipated rain overnight. [I have just heard that we will not be getting quite as much rain as they feared.] Here on the farm the river is already well up and our pastures are very sodden so it will be interesting to see what sort of flood we have tomorrow.

'til next time,

happy stitches,