My lovely young friend Katie Morgan who we so sadly lost on 21st January, 2012, aged just 18 years old.    Katie was a beautiful young girl, whose lovliness was inside and out.   A gentle, unassuming soul with a ready smile and happy nature, Katie loved animals and dreamt of becoming a freelance animal photographer.   Her photographs were astonishingly good, indistinguishable from that of a professional and I was always asking her to let me paint them.  Of course, Katie always said "yes" and would e-mail photographs to me.

She was a very competent horse rider and like me, really enjoyed the thrill of a fast ride.  I never got from A to B more quickly than when I rode out with Katie.

It hasn't quite sunk in yet that somebody so beautiful, young, bright and talented has been taken from us.   Katie, I'll miss seeing your lovely face.   My heart aches. x

That makes Lucy, our light sussex chicken spring to mind.   She becomes broody every year.   When this first happened, we kept taking her off the nest, trying to break the broodiness.  But this never worked and she ended up on that nest throughout the summer.   By early Autumn, she had become very scrawny and was in very bad condition.

The next year we had a plan.   A spare "nursery" chicken coup was prepared and as soon as the broodiness started, in she went.  We bought some fertilised eggs and there she sat for 21 days in her trance, waiting for them to pip.   She has since proved herself to be the most fantastic mother.     

She's just finished bringing up her second little batch.   Her babies, now as big as her, still hug her side, not forgetting that she's still mum.