The view of Croagh Patrick across Clew Bay from The Mulranny Park Hotel
I’ve been painting quite a lot recently. I’ve put 3 new paintings in my online portfolio. There’s the one above, one of Trudi and one of the view from the shore in front of our house. Mounted prints of the picture above will go on sale at the Mulranny Park Hotel in the next few weeks. The original painting is quite large. Full sized digital prints on canvas (Edit: I originally typed ‘giclée prints’ here. It’s the same thing but giclée sounds too pretentious) will also be available for sale there. I’m quite excited about the whole thing.
I do still have things to say about RTÉ.ie and alcohol advertising. I just don’t know where to start! I was happy to get a response but I’m left feeling quite deflated and annoyed by it. Will have a go soon.
Meanwhile, we’re trying to get the house as watertight as possible for the winter. The days are really starting to shorten now. The chickens are doing well. Of this year’s chicks, it’s clear now that Bruno is definitely a boy and that Janet probably is also. Hopefully Latoya and Tito are girls. It’s early days for Tito still.
We have huge changes to the site coming soon. List item numbering will be ‘rolled out’ (as Al would say) across the site soon. Numbering will mean that items can be inserted into a particular place in a list. You’ll also be able to make list items (or just selected text), bold or italic or ‘tada’…. a link!
The picture above was taken on one of our last summery days (Note: Trudi’s head).
We’ve been leaving the hens in the run recently as little Tito is too small to be roaming free outside even with his mother. There was sunshine today and who knows when we’ll have some more? The weather was nice enough for me to sit out on scarecrow duty so I opened up the run. Tito has now had his first trip out. He didn’t venture very far, but it’s a start. As you can see; Janet and La Toya are growing up fast and Trudi is still fascinated. I still don’t have a clue what sex any of these birds are!
She could sit there all day among the chickens. She thinks they can’t see her if she doesn’t move and so she stays, just swiveling her eyeballs, ready to pounce. Thankfully, she never does.
We’ve another 3 chicks living in the kitchen now. One is about a month old and the other 2 are just 1 and 2 days old.
Meanwhile the 3 pictured below are living with the big birds now. They seem to have acclimatised OK and are fitting in well with the flock. Only time will tell whether they are boys or girls.
We’ve had friends with children staying here for the last 10 days. The chicks and Trudi got plenty of attention. It was great to have our visitors around but the weather has been so bad recently, it’s embarrassing. Currane is not the best place to be in bad weather when you are 10 years old or under.
Our chicks are growing fast. I’ve started taking them outside during the day for a run and so that they can acclimatise, flap their wings and get some grass beneath their feet. Al has made a little pen for them because otherwise they’ll get lost in the long grass. The last time we allowed a little chick some freedom outside with it’s mother, a crow took it. They still need protection but need to get used to life outside. It was raining the other day and so Al set then up with an umbrella!
Trudi can’t take her eyes of them. She’s obsessed. She sits, as stiff as a board, staring at them. In the morning all she wants to do is go into the kitchen to check they are still there, cheeping away.
Friday was such a sunny day I decided to take some video around and about the place. This first clip starts on the Currane Road and goes up our drive towards the house. I’m afraid it’s very wobbly and quite poor quality. Also it would seem that the sunshine was a little too bright- not normally a problem here!
