View From My Kitchen Window

This is the view from my kitchen window - a 60Ha paddock of Gregory wheat sown on the 8th of May. Farmer Phil and I finished sowing last Monday, and on Tuesday we received 34mm of rain - perfect!!! We've just had a very wet weekend with another 30mm of rain so the crops are just lapping up the moisture and growing nicely.

The Good Life!!

This is how Charlie spends each day - in blissful ignorance!

Video Camera

I've just worked out how to post videos from You Tube to my blog.

Ryan won the video camera at the NSW State Waterski Titles in April at Stoney Park and it has come in very handy for videoing the kids skiing and singing etc. This is a video of Ryan jumping. He only started to jump in November last year and has progressed very well.

YAHS Performance Night

YAHS had their Performance Night last night and Emma did two solo performances. There were students playing the flute, clarinet, violin, electric guitar and drums. There was also poetry reading, public speaking, a percussion group, the choir and of course the famous drum corp. Not bad for an "agricultural" high school!

YAHS Performance Night

New Guidance System

We've had Adam from Intersales Temora out to install a base station and equipment for us to use RTK (Real Time Kinematic) Guidance System for our seeding, spraying and harvesting operations.

We've been using the Trimble EZ-Guide 500 system with EZ-Steer for a few years but we decided to upgrade to an even more precise system.

Using the 2.5cm RTK automated steering system will increase our accuracy, efficiency and productivity, or so the experts tell us!

Home Improvements

The builders have just packed up their tools and left after building our new patio area over the past 4 days. It was built by Lifestyle Patios from Wagga and we couldn't be happier with the job they've done.

We still need to construct a deck for the entire area, so hopefully when we've finished cropping Farmer Phil and I can get stuck into finishing it off. We also need to pave around the pool. The pavers have been sitting waiting to be used for about 6 months now!

Building a new house in a paddock is a huge job and there seems to be a never-ending list of things to do! We've been here almost 9 years, so a few extra months to get most things completed won't kill me I guess!!!

2010 Cropping

Farmer Phil stayed home from Port Macquarie so that he could get organised for this year's cropping. He started sowing canola on Monday 26th April - we always aim to start around ANZAC Day each year.

So far we've sown 1200ac of canola and about 300ac of wheat which means we're about a third of the way through. We had 7mm of rain last night so we're waiting to get back into the swing of things again tomorrow.

State Titles @ Stoney Park

Ryan and Emma in the slalom course.

We had a very enjoyable weekend at Stoney Park near Port Macquarie for the NSW State Waterski Titles. It's a fantastic waterski site, but the company we had over the 5 days was what made it so much fun.

Ryan won the Most Improved Slalom Skier for the Malibu Waterski Series. For his efforts he won a Samsung C10 Flashcam video camera thanks to GRE Marine.