Bex the farm dog keeping winter chills at bay.
By Julie Patton
There are things to enjoy about cold weather - curling up in front of a fire, cooking delicious casseroles and puddings that feel too heavy the rest of the year, digging in the wardrobe for the favourite boots and warm layers.
And it's a nice quiet time of year on the farm, before the madness of spring. But as daylight hours shrink, the rain falls, and damp and chilly months stretch ahead, sometimes it's just nice to get away, as we did this year.
We were lucky enough to escape to Hawaii and it was wonderful to pack just a few light summer clothes and bask in the sunshine.
But reality must be faced at some point and Down Under we returned. Upon touchdown, still trapped in our steel tube, an official bearing spray cans greeted all us returning Kiwis and visitors - and with little warning we were all liberally coated with insecticide.
As a child, I was dragged around the world by my parents, and the homecoming cabin spray was relatively familiar. But I hadn't experienced it for some years and didn't realise it still happened, and, judging by comments I heard, it certainly came as something of a shock to newcomers to the country.
I assume it was an attempt to exterminate fruitflies or mosquitoes or some other threat to our agriculture industry - so as a tiny cog in the wheels of said industry, I tried to feel grateful, while wondering exactly what I'd been sprayed with.
Still, no flies on us as we exited the airport, into the icy blast of the coldest night of the year so far. The car heater kept us warm on the long drive home, and the house sitter had left the place beautifully tidy, even leaving a couple of lights on to make us feel welcome.
Unfortunately, strong wind had blown open a door and the whole house felt colder than the inside of a fridge. I shivered all night and struggled for several days to acclimatise from 30C down to single figures. It's so much easier to go the other way.
Thankfully cold snap has now departed, we're a month past the shortest day and it hasn't even rained that much, making for a smooth start to calving. Bruce is taking a while to get his eye in with the springers though, as his drafting hasn't been entirely successful.
He's looking after five mobs of cows, so perhaps he does have some excuse. Yesterday he moved a mob of cows off a grazing block across the road back to the home farm and went back to shut the gate, only to find a bewildered calf standing in the middle of the paddock wondering where everyone had gone.
Newborn calves aren't easy to herd without other animals; it was too far to carry her so, having no other option, he popped her onto the back seat of his ute, where she stared around her as if wondering what alternate dimension of space she'd been thrown into.
We've had visitors coming and going.
Most are unfamiliar with farming ways, and they take to it in varying degrees. One boy's mother asked if we could adopt him, he loved everything from working with the animals to shooting possums. Another might not be so sure - our son and his friend went to the run-off with Bruce to move some animals.
It was a long walk, and as the boys watched Bruce load up the tractor with a haybale, Jack asked if he and his friend could sit on the haybale, thinking a ride back on the hay would beat walking. Sure, said Bruce - and walked off.
The boys climbed up and sat atop the bale for some time watching him walk into the distance before they realised he had parked the tractor up ready for feeding out the next day, and wasn't driving it anywhere.¦