Bonny Boy

Horsing around

We went through to Hapton - which is about 5 miles from our house - to visit Redwings Horse Sanctuary today, as I've been threatening to do this since we arrived in Long Stratton.   Redwings is only open to the public on a few rare occasions in the year when entry is free.  The Hapton branch is Redwings' headquarters with a horse hospital on site and many other facilities, it spans acres and acres of land - paddocks all over the place.   It is a horse sanctuary for over 1,200 horses, ponies, donkeys and mules and all funded by donations.   Redwings take in abandoned, abused, maltreated horses, ponies etc. even tiny baby foals and after a period of adjustment, hospitalisation and full-time care (in most cases), many of the animals are re-homed.  

Here's some of the photos and a little video of the Redwings girls showing re-habilitated horses, which I have to upload through YouTube as it's not loading through Blogger. 

Walking through from the car park

Stables are to the left, as well as the horse hospital, operating room and recuperation room.  More stables on the right and further in.

 A couple of little Shetland ponies in the rehabilitation area. Some of these animals had been picked up wandering in the road, malnourished and close to death.  One pony, Matty, was quite a celebrity - he was only 49kg's when they picked him up but is now looking very good.  I didn't take a photo of him though as he had his back to all the people.

Each Horse has a nameplate and description of his circumstances, his age etc. on the individual stalls.

This is Prince, he is a Cross-Shire - what a beauty! 

Look at the size of those feet!

Prince in the sunlight - image taken from another source on the Interweb

 And the following pics are of the enormous pedigreed Shire Horse 'Fusilier' - standing just over 18 hands ... what a magnificent animal and so gentle.   His hooves were covered in special bandages, as he has a problem with the dampness in the fields and needs moisturiser on his hooves, to stop them getting swollen and damaged.   He is a wonderful horse and it was worth going to the sanctuary just to see him up close. 

He liked my camera, inspected it a couple of times and at one point, I thought he might take a munch.

Fusilier and companions - this is another Internet sourced image - to show his size.

 Missy all ready to do some grooming.  

We watched this horse being braided and dressed up in his Red Nose and Antlers for the display.

Ewan is still quite sick but he braved the cold and seemed to enjoy himself, despite us having to blow his nose every five minutes.

A lovely young girl who was so kind and helped Faye with the grooming earlier - she featured in the video with this horse, who is still being rehabilitated.

I'll put the video up here as soon as I've got it processed through YouTube.

Our First Anniversary

Yes, today marks the day that we left South Africa exactly one year ago.  What a milestone!  In this year we have achieved a great deal, some of it was very easy to do, somethings took a bit longer and were not as easy but in general, I believe that the move over to the UK was quite painless.

In no particular order, we've sorted out the following (and most of it was done in the first month of arriving here):

• Extended the rental on our home in Alexander Close, met our landlords and are on very good terms with them and the estate agency. 
• Sorted out internet, telephone, tv and broadband (it's worth coming to the UK for that alone!)
• Successfully opened bank accounts with Barclays and all of us have credit cards now. 
• Purchased three family cars and all (so far) seem to be running well, arranged servicing and updated M.O.T.’s and license/registration. 
• Secured a place in school for Ewan in a school that is literally three blocks away from our house. 
• Secured a place in good school for Faye – her school is round the corner from Ewan’s. Update - Faye actually managed to complete Year 3 in just 7 months, she's now in Year 4
• Had fun in the snow,  Kevin's bought snow sleds that we have to try out as soon as possible this winter! 
• Bought Christmas decorations, tree and all the other odds and ends you need with kiddies for a merry christmas. 
• Managed to be a part of the birth of my second grandson, Daniel, even though we are so very far away. 
• Secured permanent positions in jobs for Kevin and Hayzel 
• Secured clients for my self-employment as a transcript typist. 
• Figured out how the oil central heating works and sourced oil topping up when necessary.   
• Ditto to the salt tablets that we have to put into our water supply on a regular basis to stop lime scale build up (something South Africans don't seem to have to worry about)
• Purchased furniture, crockery, cutlery, beds, bedding, cupboards, washing machine, tumble dryer, kitchen appliances, carpets, outside garden furtniture, garden tools, lawnmower and generally furnished the house to the point where it is now getting rather full!
• Organised National insurance numbers, drivers’ licenses, National Health membership, self-employment registration with Her Majesty's Revenue Services (me), sourced accountant to take care of my tax returns and other financial assistance. 
• Visited lots of places in Norfolk – including the sea side - and still have thousands of places to see! 
• Travelled to Wales as a family for Auntie Jean’s special birthday celebrations. 
• Travelled to Wales and then on to Scotland for a wonderful holiday with Auntie Jean (me) 
• Been visited by my Auntie Barbara and Uncle Les during my birthday week. 
• Got ourselves a puppy.  
• Seen the spectacular fireworks display in Norwich for the Mayor’s Celebrations. 
• Became familiar with the bus routes, which bus to take, where to go, how to get around. 
• Became familiar with driving in the UK
• Experienced the NHS hospital care first hand – Hayzel - and found it very good indeed.
• Found all the best places to shop. 
• Learnt the value of Tesco’s coupons system – it is possible to get as much as £10 off per shop if you are clever and watch how and when you buy your groceries!  For instance, we bought some groceries the other night and Hayzel also bought a top – when we came to pay, she had quite a few individual discount vouchers (from previous purchases) and we added them all up, it meant that she basically got her top for free. I am now an Orchard member and am getting special deals on promotional items and foods that are in my ‘profile’ (part of Tesco’s market research programme). I have amassed enough Virgin Flying Club points to fly anywhere in Europe for half price. 
• Learnt how to pump our own gas! 
• Got Faye started in Brownies and Ewan in Martial Arts (L’il Dragons) 
• Managed to pay for and book our short holiday back to South Africa in February next year. 

What else? 
There's much more I could list here and I will have forgotten some important things I'm sure, that Kevin or Hayzel will remind me about.  But I think we all need to be proud of ourselves and give each other a good group pat on the back.  Well done folks!  


 

Hayzel and the NHS

As you may or may not know, last night we had to rush Hayzel to the hospital.  She started with severe abdominal pains in the afternoon (on her day off too, what rotten luck!) and just after supper she was in real agony, crying and puking and rolling about on the bed, not able to get any relief.  Hayzel isn't a baby, she never cries or makes out like she's having a problem, so I knew that things were really not good.  So Kevin took her through to the Norwich hospital and I stayed behind to watch the kiddies.  Ewan was already fast asleep, after his hectic day but Faye was very worried about her mum and she had a little weep, as well as make mum a get well soon card, which she put on her bed for when she got home.

Sporadic updates followed and at 1225 they arrived home - 5 hours altogether.   The hospital staff at A & E gave her pain killers initially that didn't do anything, took blood and urine tests all the usual stuff.  The doctor who was on call, a Nigerian doctor, thought she might have a peptic ulcer but when they saw that the anti-acids and other drugs weren't doing anything, they decided that it might be gall bladder.   Her local GP said that she had gall bladder problems and we were actually waiting for the results of tests she had done a couple of weeks ago about that.       She ended up seeing another doctor, a German lady doctor, who said that she had a severely infected gall bladder and that it had to be removed but they couldn't do that until the inflammation/infection had gone down.  They gave her morphine for the pain, anti-biotics and other drugs, so by the time she got home she was sore but at least able to have a bit of a sleep.   She was scheduled for an ultra-sound for this morning.  

After having the scan today, the next update was that she had gall stones but now it turns out that they want to remove the gall bladder. As I type this she is waiting to see the surgeon to discuss this and when it will happen, which looks like happening only when she gets back from the SA holiday early next year.

Hayzel said that the hospital was like all typical A&E's, practical, very clean.  All the nursing staff were really kind and efficient.  When they came to leave, they told the doctor that they didn't know if they had enough cash for the parking as they'd been there such a long time and where was the ATM?  The doctor waived the parking fees and said they could just go straight out.  All the treatment she got so far didn't cost a cent.

Anyway, more updates as and when they happen. 

Ewan's Christmas Pageant

This morning it was Ewan's Christmas play at school.  Hayzel had the day off and took Kevin's camera and tripod - she took a video, so we'll see how it went. It was difficult filming in the hall as it is very small and there were a lot of parents all trying to get good photos of their kiddies and it was quite dark in there.    I also battled to take photos but anyway, these are a couple of shots. I'm sure Kevin will post the video soon.

 Hayzel and I were right at the back in the corner next to the Christmas tree.  The tripod is too short, so when she was standing with it on the floor, she actually had to hold it off the ground by about a foot, so that doesn't really serve the purpose hey?   She ended up standing on a chair and was stuck in that position for the rest of the concert.

Somewhat out of focus Sheep

Every time I lined up a shot, some other kid stood in front of him.  He was singing Away In A Manger in this shot.

In the afternoon, he stayed at school for three-quarters of an hour to make Christmas crafts that they are selling at the Fayre on Saturday morning. 

Happy Birthday Andrew!

Happy Birthday Andrew.   Hope you have a great day today and get spoiled.  We are missing you and looking forward to seeing you in February.   Lots of love from Hayzel, Kevin, Mum, Faye and Ewan.
xxxx

X-mas tree erecting

Today the Christmas tree was put up...

Edit - Reposted!