We’re deep in snow as twins born

EVERY year gives us a glimpse of spring, then goes back to winter.

On Thursday we awoke to a bright light streaming into the bedroom through the gap in the curtains. It could only mean snow and lots of it.

I groaned, the children squealed. A day off school as the taxi would never get to us. It wasn’t the nice dry fluffy snow that’s great for playing in, it was the heavy type that soaks everyone.

The sheep that had spent the winter in fields of grass at

Carlisle had returned at the beginning of the week so it was a shock for them to be back into Artic conditions.

I skidded my way to the moor with bales of PROUD: YOW & LAMB hay and bags of pellets. It wasn’t easy feeding the sheep as there was nowhere dry to put the feed. At least we were three weeks off lambing time and the unborn lambs were undoubtedly better off where they were for the moment.

As I made my way back I could see the children were waiting for me and couldn’t contain themselves.

“Lambs, we’ve got lambs,” they shouted.

Sure enough, in one of the stables a yow stood guard proudly over two very bonny gimmer lambs.

The children had sorted everything, with a full hay rack, water bucket and a turnip.

I asked how they’d got the yow and her new offspring into the building. “We picked up her lambs and she just followed us,” they said. I haven’t a clue who the daddy is, but it doesn’t matter. The outcome was a very smart pair of Swaledale twins.