Three eggs today

In January we fulfilled one of our living-in-the-countryside dreams and bought three chickens.

After David had eyed up expensive, finely combed Basque fowl and we'd considered the pros and cons of a cockerel (he looks after his girls but might have your eye out with a claw) we eventually settled on three point-of-lay bog-standard red hens from the local garden centre. They were only about five euros apiece, but by the time we bought a coop, some food, a feeding trough and a water dispenser it's going to take a year or so to repay our investment.

We tucked them up against the freezing winter winds with generous piles of sawdust and stacks of straw bales, bought 'Chickens for Dummies' and hoped for the best.

Eventually, one morning around Valentine's Day (the traditional start of the laying season) we found our first tiny brown egg nestling warmly in a corner of the coop. After that the eggs became bigger and bolder, but only ever one a day which seemed to signify that only one chicken was in lay (unless they were taking it in turns).

Then last week one of the hens shuffled herself down into a big pile of straw in the chicken run and began to make a nest. David predicted the second egg of the day and he was right - we got a little brown speckled one. We celebrated with eggs for breakfast on Sunday.

It was all going well until Sunday afternoon when the chickens were pootling around happily in the shade of the pine trees. (They have their own run, but usually escape and wander around until we put them back.) We'd forgotten that the puppy was off her lead. There was some barking and clucking, then a lot of squawking, flapping and pounding of paws. The puppy isolated one of the chickens and chased her down down the terraces into the forest, David chased the puppy, I tried to herd the other two chickens into their coop, David rugby-tackled the (very happy) puppy in a gorse bush and dragged her back to her kennel, and eventually we pulled the miraculously-not-dead-chicken out of the forest. Only one egg the next day.

But then today we had three eggs - hurray!

Winter's end?

Most Brits cheerfully chuck out their winter coats when they move to Spain. But it can get pretty cold here too. A couple of weeks ago I hung out some washing at 10am and by 11am it was frozen rigid. That night my money plant and geraniums suffered a bitter - and probably fatal - northerly blast. And the next day I spent 5 euros on a fake - but very warm - fur coat at a local market.

Our little house is well protected against the weather with its thick stone walls and sturdy windows, and we've got a big log burner to keep us warm. It's certainly lovely to be tucked up in the glow of a flickering olive wood fire, but reality doesn't quite mirror the woolly romance of the Toast winter catalogue. You can't wear a floaty knitted scarf when you're chainsawing firewood, and a handwash-only lambswool jumper isn't the most practical attire for sweeping the ashes out of the hearth. Nevertheless, a fire fuelled by wood out of the forest is cheaper and greener than central heating.

Now it looks as though spring might be on the way. The almond blossom has been trying to get going since early January, and suddenly this week fields of uninteresting brown twiggy trees have been transforming into swathes of scented pink beauties (see below). We had a lunchtime barbecue a couple of days ago, I spotted some swallows back from the south, and at least one of our three new chickens has started to lay tiny brown eggs (Valentine's day is traditionally the start of the laying season).

Let's hope I haven't spoken too soon.

Mules, mutts and mice for Sant Antoni

No sooner have we recovered from Christmas than the village has launched into another fiesta.

Sant Antoni kicked off yesterday with a procession of gegants i cap-grossos (giants and big-heads; see Wikipedia for background) accompanied by the village drummers. It was rainy and cold so there weren't that many people out, but they made up for it later by practically blowing up the village square. A spectacular firework display began with a flaming rocket zooming down the street suspended from a wire hung between trees and lampposts and concluded with giant fireballs. (Sorry, no photos of this bit, I was cowering in a doorway with my hands over my ears.)

Gegants i cap-grossos, and a sort of caterpillar

Then today was the big celebration of Sant Antoni Abat (Sant Anthony the Abbot), the patron saint of domestic animals and traginers ('beasts of burden' - mules, horses and so on) as well as our village. 'Tres tombs' saw animals of all shapes and sizes - beautifully groomed stallions, manky old mules, cows with ribbons in their horns, bulldogs with choke chains, toy dogs in pink babygros, canaries and mice - parading three times around the village, culminating with them being blessed by the priest.

Here's a selection of animals and their handlers...

And the blessing...

The queue for the priest (lots of barking)

Our puppy dodging the holy water

After mass, vermouth and prawns were served in the village square.