Our biggest weekend yet

OK, it wasn't quite as dramatic as that ill-fated camping trip in remote West Australia when we spent eight hours trying to dig our 4WD out of a river while an electrical storm raged overhead, and Farmer Wan had to walk out the next morning to call for help from friends in Karratha, 100km away... but it was still pretty big.

Firstly, we had guests in the form of BLT, dear friends from Oz who we hadn't seen in six years. Their gorgeous little girl quickly made Buddy the Dog her willing slave.

Then, on Saturday, we launched Muntanui onto an unsuspecting public at Festival Nelson Lakes.

Pita bread stall on one side, strawberries and cream on the other. The gods were smiling on us.

The Viva Muntanui! stall featured a select range of produce, mostly donated by kind souls who'd heard me moaning that I didn't have anything to put on it.

My unique sales patter ("Welcome to the Muntanui Festival! I don't know what all these other people are doing here but feel free to check out what we've got!") seemed to strike the right kind of note. Farmer Wan's more subtle approach was a huge hit as well. Meaning, people actually bought things.

Buy, or I'll smite ya.

After taking out the cost of the stall hire and the money owed to friends on whose behalf we'd sold stuff, we made a grand total of $30. Factor in the time we spent in the lead-up, not to mention the cost of the promotional material we had printed, and we're deeply in the red. So we're not going to do that 'factoring in' thang. At least, not for our very first market stall. We prefer to bask in the thought that we made 30 bucks. Yay!

The absolute wonderfulness of the weekend culminated in the arrival of a handsome, hairy, red-haired Scotsman called Hamish.

He's a whole lotta bull.

We've arranged for two Highland cows and their calves (a steer and a heifer) to join him in early February. We're also getting ten Wiltshire ewes, with a complimentary ram thrown in.

2012 is the year of livestock at Muntanui. It's the year we become proper farmers, rather than the glorified gardeners we've been over the last five months. This year, it gets serious.

Seriously scary.

Posted by Farmer Nik