Hello again!

Firstly, I have to send out a gigantic big THANK YOU to my family, especially my mum, for being so wonderful as to send me a package full of goodies all the way to South America - including Fazer chocolate, which is hands-down the best in the world. Seriously, try it. I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH! You make me blush. Thank you :) I feel very lucky.

So, down to business! Anthony and I had our house warming party two weeks ago and Anthony's wonderful colleagues thought it would be a wonderful present to bring us four chicks. As in live chickens. Our faces, absolutely flabbergasted.

Anthony had apparently spoken very eagerly about  chickens at work and so... here we are - we'll be able to start a farm soon I think :P Heeey! That could be good, we could start taking admittance fee when we have friends over. Business 101!

Also, we hope they are female as we've given them all female names. Oh well, we are a modern anyway - we can always argue that we are challenging the concept of gendered names. Jolly good.

Here they are, our four little HENS! (... hopefully)

Gertrude, the largest and "leader" of the brood. She already tries to flap about and fly.

Margaret, the beauty of the brood (she already has a few tail feathers peeping out).

Astrid, along with Claudette, is slightly smaller. Small but clever. The lightest of the bunch.
Claudette, is also small. She is an eager "digger" and very adventurous. She has gotten stuck in between the bars of the cage twice already.

They really are quite wonderful to just sit and look at as they bob about peeping and digging.

They also look very cute when they drink.

Four little chick bottoms in a row :)

Melba has taken to watching them religiously, it is rather sweet actually. Now, I don't actually know whether she is watching them in order to size out the best moment for chopping them into little pieces and having a nice fresh lunch, or whether she is actually twisted enough to think they are her little babies due to the high pitched squeaking noise they make. In anyway, she tends to have an eye on them throughout the day, especially when I clean the cage.

So! We spent the majority of last weekend building this! ... and when I say we, I really mean Anthony. But I did keep him hydrated and well fed throughout the process, so I do deserve some credit :) And the best part, the entire structure and all materials are 100% recycled (even some of the nails!) as it is made from pallets.


Here he is, my little carpenter.


... hard at work, recycling nails!

The frame came together really quickly.

Just along the finishing line.

The inside, including a peg and roosting area, as well as a sliding door!

placed perfect in the garden, now we just have to construct the outside pen and voila!

I had to take a picture of the door because Anthony was very proud of it. For good reason too!

The only fear I have are the coconuts (of death!) located right beside the pen. I still have no idea how you're supposed to get these down safely and avoid death by having a coconut fall on your head.


Our other pets are doing very well, Melba is getting on fine even though it is still rather hot sometimes. But she does love romping around on the beach (... and bothering some of the joggers to my dismay).

She still makes me laugh on a daily basis. She was out blank in this very comfortable looking position. And she has also developed quite the impression of a noble guard, even though she would actually be utterly useless if someone really did decided to rob us. But she is sizable enough and makes one hell of a racket if you dare to walk past our gate, so I think it puts people off from taking the chance. She still needs two long walks a day to keep her head screwed on right which keeps me busy enough.


Charlie tends to sleep for hours and generally just look wonderfully cuddly on a daily basis. I swear cats always know how magnificent they look too. He just lies about the house as if he is surveying his territory and his loyal human minions. So in that respect he is very cat-ish. Otherwise, he is too fat to catch anything that actually moves, except maybe leaves, if even that. But Anthony doesn't like me calling his cat fat so I have to keep these comments to myself mostly. But he looks gorgeous and anyway I quite like his cuddly belly so I don't mind his pudginess, even though he might be (utterly) useless in all other respects. If he sees a gecko he sits and meows at it until it leaves - enough said.



Our wonderful avocado plant (grown from a seedling!) who I have named Albert, is pictured above.

Carpenter gone gardener.


But, we actually had a bit of a disaster on the home front. Our dear plants did not take well to the amount of nutrients we (/Anthony) decided to add to them so I'm afraid we will have to see how they get on. Albert has changed from bright green to beige in colour. And our tomato-plants have slouched and shriveled together. Oh well, you live and you learn - at least our other living things are doing well!

We did however, find a bit of time for some leisure. It was very windy so Anthony took his kite-surf for a spin.


Up up and awaaayy!


... and then you walk back, and then you're off again.

total pro



Melba did not take her eyes of Anthony for one second, she really doesn't trust this wing business I think. Although she did find time to roll around in the sand in order to get sand everywhere in the car later. Yup. She is handy like that.


Even when I tried to pose for some pictures with her she was too busy watching Anthony. So I made him come over to take a picture of us instead. The result...


Yay! My girl and I in the sun :)



and back to work, when unexpectedly...


Horses. So I died a bit on the inside and made Anthony promise to come with me on a horse ride on the beach. Anything really can happen in Kourou. Also, he said yes :)  So that will be the topic of a post to come!

But before that... well, I figured kite-surfing couldn't be that hard - looking at all these other people. Easy enough, I figured. Well, it actually isn't. At all. It is actually really really hard I found out. But I wanted to try so Anthony strapped me up aaaand then I almost died. Apparently, your'e not supposed to pull down on the bar when the wind takes you as it multiplies the strength of the kite - yeah, so I didn't know that and off I flew. Anthony desperately trying to hold on to me, shouting "let go of the bar! LET GO!" Meanwhile I was panicking so of course, holding on to the bar for dear life, whilst pulling down. Not a very good situation.

But, it ended fine, thankfully. You live and you learn, again - hopefully! I'm not sure whether I'm supposed to applaud Anthony for the faith he has in my innate sporting abilities or whether I'm supposed to be worried that he almost killed me without a thought about wether or not it would be safe to strap your girlfriend into a kite-surf belt, attach her to a giant wing on an extremely windy day when she has had no previous instruction what-so-ever on how to use it. Hmmm, it's a thinker. Well, anyway, all is well that ends well.

And here we are. Yesterday, I made a very very tasty chocolate cake, to make up for all the excitement of chicken-hutch building (and in the hopes of not flying quite so high the next time my boyfriend straps me into a kite-surf) :D  I am just full of bright ideas.

I hope you all have a great day and thanks for reading!

Peace & Love to all :)