Its been a while since I last wrote on my blog, but we have been really busy.

We managed to get time away to visit our sons who are both now lving in Toronto.

Some good friends looked after the farm for us, which is no mean feat, as they both work full time.

We took the car as we had a lot of the boys stuff to take with us and we wanted to visit friends in Gananoque (1000 Islands are) Ontario along the way.

It is a 14 hour drive from our home in NB to my friend in Gananoque. We did it in one day taking it in turns to drive.

We stayed a couple of days and as my friend runs a riding school I had a couple of very hard but much needed riding lessons.

Then we headed the 3 and a half hours to Toronto. The best thing we have bought recently was our GPS.

The boys live right downtown in Little Italy and I don't think we would have found it without the help of our Tom Tom.

I have always enjoyed visiting Toronto, but after a year spent in lovely sleepy NB I felt really overwhelmed for the first day.

It just seemed so busy and bustling.

I had to parralel part for the first time since I came to Canada and I got  a parking ticket.

The boys have a nice apartment in a leafy street.

Even though it is a big city, it has a definate neighbourhood feel about it.

We met loads of their friends. Meeting up for coffee or going out for desert.

One of the nice things about Canada is that young people don't always have to be in the pub.

We spent 4 days in Toronto and then headed back to my friends in Gananoque for a couple more days before heading home.

It was quite a road trip for us as we have never driven anywhere further than Bournemouth to Yorkshire in the past.

Our preference in the future will be to fly I think.

Since we came back we have ben very busy on the farm.

We took our meat birds to be dispatched last week.

It acually wasn't that bad. Meat kings are bred just to eat and get big. There is a possibility of their legs breaking under the weight of them if they get too big.

Ours all ended up from 4 to 6lbs.

I don't think we would raise meat kings again, we would prefer next time to go for a more natural slow growing dual purpose bird.

Hark at me sounding like a seasoned chicken farmer!

I have been working with my paint mare as much as time alows.

she is western trained and has just done trails but is still very green.

I however know nothing about western riding (although I really want to learn) and she knows nothing about being ridden english.

My first attempt tp lunge her was a failure. so I had to get a helper to lead her for me for a few sessions. She has now picked it up and is going nicely.

When I first rode her she went around with her head in the air, afraid of the bit. so I changed bits from a french link to a straight bar nylon bit. She loves it and is now going forward into a contact quite happily.

I havn't schooled a horse for over 15 years so I am a little rusty, but she is a really nice and genuine mare and I think she will make a very nice horse.

We opened the ice cream last Saturday but the weather has been indeifferent this week so we are not that busy.

We are also converting our basement into a self catering holiday apartment.

Now its just the two of us here we hardly ever use downstairs.

It is a nice big room with two bedrooms. We are making a bathroom and putting in a small kitchen.

We are also putting in a wood stove to make it cosy, plus we have 5 acres of woods so we have plenty of fuel for it.

Its a walk out basement so its nice and light and we are going to make a deck outside too.

We are just outside Riverview (moncton) and on the road to Fundy Park. So I hope it will appeal to those who want to be well placed to explore the area.

Today is really miserable and rainy, thats why I have had time to update my blog.

There is no point in opening the ice cream and its too wet to do anything with the ponies so we have lit the log burner and we are gong to cook one of our chickens for friends tonight.