I ordered some new cria coats from Alpaca Care (Philip O’Conor) and Homestead (Matthew Timms). Some of ours are very bashed in and have been in a heap for mending for ages. I had the distinct feeling I was never going to get round to it as I am not the world’s best seamstress. Anyway excellent service from both these new websites that sell stuff for alpacas. The cria coats arrived the next day.
I also ordered waterproof gloves for me and Chas from another website. What happens here is that Chas is left handed and I, of course, only have one hand and that is the left one. We find ourselves with loads of very new, undamaged right hand gloves without a left one in sight.
One of our girls Clio turned up in the yard yesterday looking very lacklustre. She wasn’t very interested in eating, refused to let her cria suckle and was a bit thin. The cria was not weaned as it was 26.2 kilos rather than 27 but we decided the best thing for mother and youngster was to wean her. Clio has joined the little gang in the birthing field that includes two young cria and the orphan. They come in at night and are surrounded by food. She weighed in at 52 kilos which isn’t too bad as she is not a big animal, hopefully she will put on weight now the cria is off and cheer up a bit.
I have started Christmas shopping after my request to the boys resulted in some ideas so I have been busy on the internet. I decided to dive into the present drawer to see what was there – oh dear – several presents that were meant for people last year are still in situ. I must have bought them something else. I’ve made a list of all existing presents in an attempt to get this right particularly with small children. There is an item of clothing destined for Chas’s grandson which is now far too small, hell’s bells and buckets of blood.