Month: April 2020

 

Today it was a wet miserable day with fog and rain. Dad and I took the dog on a run and looked at what the baler and rake did last night. They had done most of what was there in the paddock. On the way back to the house Dad showed me the gears on the farm truck. Me and Mum also started making some homemade glue out of milk powder you had to separate the curds out to make the glue.  My sister and I started playing a loud game but Dad said it was too noisy so we had to go outside and play under the veranda. After an hour it got too cold outside to do anything so we stopped playing and came inside.

Chapters 19 – 22:

There were two German Shepards running towards them, Arkady had to calm them down, soon the dogs were friendly and Vita and her crew went to the fountain in the walled Garden,  after Silk had picked the lock into the garden.

They started digging around the fountain as this is where Vita told them the Emerald was.  But they got caught by the guards and got led through the house/castle and locked in the cellar.  Eventually, in the cellar Vita asked them why they didn’t run when the guards had her.  They all said they never promised to run and would never leave her there alone.

Now Vita went on to tell them that everything was a carefully laid out plan and that when she went to visit Sorrotore she had dropped her red notebook so that he would be led down the wrong path.  She actually needed to go to the safe in the chimney of the drawing-room in the house/castle to find the emerald.  But it was not there, so they are making their way to the almost falling down turret (that her Grandfather found when he was a kid) in the hope that the Emerald is hidden here.

Sorrotore has made his way by a motorboat to the house/castle, he is the scariest thing for Vita and he’s just arrived at the castle door!

Today we had another zoom talk and Mrs Campbell set us up with a challenge, we had to go out to a paddock and go and walk around it to find the perimeter, area, and hectares of that paddock. I walked around one of our paddocks called C Paddock a triangle at the top of our farm.  It was hard to work out the area etc of the triangle as there was a little flat bit at the top – so Dad had to show me one way to figure out the calculations I needed. But I didn’t use Dad’s idea I changed it to my own way which still gave me the same answer as Dads – I was very proud of my maths today.

I also made some ice cream in a bag – which I am about to go and have while sitting beside Dad in the combine as he harvests the last bit of a paddock of wheat.  I can’t wait as the few teaspoons I’ve had so far are great!  Must go as I need to turn the dryers off for Dad on the way – as the humidity has gone too high.

Chapter 16 to 19:

Vita went to the Dakota (which is where Sorrotore lives) to see if he was home and not at her Grandfather’s house/castle where they are going. He was not at her Grandfather’s house, because he was having tea with the young Rockefellers. Now that she knew he was not at her Grandfather’s house she made her way to the Grand Central Train Station to meet the others – to go to Hudson Castle (her Grandfathers house).

On the way to Grand Central Station, one of Sorrotore’s workers tried to stop her so she went into the underground train subway to get away from him. But she dropped her red notebook at the subway and Sorrotore’s worker picked it up (the bad thing is that she has all her plans in it for getting her Grandfathers ruby etc back).

Once everyone had arrived they got onto the train. When they got to the closest train station to the castle they got off. There was an old man who owned some horses, she was going to pay him to take them to the castle, but she got picked pocked at the train station, so they had to think of another idea to get them to the castle and walking would take too long.

So Arkaday talked to the horses, they used them to get to the castle and when they almost got to the castle they put them into a forest to graze while they walked the last bit to the castle. Where they found Vita’s grandfather’s old boat and used this to cross the lake to the castle walled garden. They went over to the garden wall and Samuel climbed up it and the rest followed him after he dropped the rope down to them. When they all got to the top they saw something running at them…….

Day 1 of Lockdown School

 

15.4.20

Today I helped Dad empty the trailer and put the grain in the drying silo so we can dry it. I also had my first Zoom talk on the computer with Mrs. Campbell and the other Year 7’s. It was weird seeing people on the computer screen. It is quite strange to be at home so long and not going anywhere but we are lucky we can do stuff around the farm, not like the people in town who are stuck in their houses and not able to go out, to the parks like we open the gate and have fun.

I am reading a book called The good Thieves by Katherine Rundell.  Today I read chapter 15 out loud to mum.

The main character is called Vita a young girl that came to New York from London with her Mum, to help get her Grandfathers house back.  A criminal called Sorrotore has cheated Vita’s Grandfather out of his house by only paying him several hundred dollars for it.  Vita has assembled a group of talented children to help her on a quest to get her Grandfathers house back.

Samuel (a trapeze artist), Arkady (a bird talker and trainer) and Silk (a pickpocket) are about to join Vita (a slightly handicapped knife thrower) on their quest to break into Vitas Grandfathers castle/home and steal back his ruby jewel which they then want to sell to pay for lawyers to help fight Sorrotore.

So far this book has been good and it is very engaging, you just want more!