Christmas is over and I survived the process of present wrapping relatively intact. I rarely turn down the offer from a store assistant of their gift wrapping service but this year I made some online purchases which I had to wrap without Alison seeing.

Needless to say, I eventually succeeded, but only after drawing blood while using a tape dispenser. I never considered the health and safety aspects involved in the whole process – it looks so effortless when a professional is doing it. Not that the time and effort lasted long when the kids got stuck into the pristinely wrapped presents here on Christmas morning. Santa brought them all they wanted and, what’s more, he dropped off a lovely red Massey Ferguson tractor for me too – unfortunately with an invoice attached. Sure the man in red would have to be a Massey fan.

As I mentioned earlier this year, I was looking at changing the old MF690 for something more suitable for around the yard and light field work. Well, I couldn’t find anything in the secondhand market that suited me. The new arrival is a MF3630. It is only 76 horsepower, but its manoeuvrability around the yard is unreal for a four-wheel drive tractor.

It has been attached to the straw blower which I use for feeding out the bales of silage to the sheep while they’re housed – a job that hasn’t fazed it at all.

A loader has also been attached, and this should prove to be very useful in cleaning out the sheep housing prior to lambing. This tractor will allow me to clean out the sheds without having to dismantle all the feed barriers that had to come down with my larger tractor. As all farmers know, anything that makes a job more time-efficient is very welcome.

Before Christmas, I renewed the farm insurance. This is a major cost for me and most other farmers and an area in which savings can be made by shopping around in advance of renewing with the usual provider. Loyalty is something I admire, but something that companies don’t seem to care too much about until you say you’ve got a better quote from someone else and are moving. Then all the stops are pulled out to keep you as a customer.

I must admit that I’m not changing this year as my provider succeeded in bettering the quote I received, but you never know who will be supplying it to me this time next year. You need to have knowledge of the market in order to be able to get the best price rather than the first price.

Things on the farm are relatively quiet here at the moment, which has given me lots of time to play with the kids over their Christmas break. All that said, work still has to be done.

The next big job is to scan the ewes to assess how the breeding season really went and what sort of lamb numbers I can expect come the spring.

All going well I hope to get the scanning started next week. Hopefully we can all look forward to a prosperous, healthy and happy 2016.