It has been a beautiful couple of months here on the farm! Life has been full and busy, but very gratifying.
AT HOME: It has been freezing! So the empty master bedroom has turned back into a teenagers’ bedroom because of the cold nights - too cold to sleep in the caravan! Nothing else is new around the house and to be honest I have barely given the renovations another thought lately!
We’ve been getting vegie boxes through a new buying club which started up locally. So I’ve been spending more time in the kitchen, inspired by the lovely, fresh, organic, local produce we’re buying and harvesting from our own garden. I’ve been menu planning to make sure it’s all used up by the next week’s delivery. I’m also regularly making sourdough bread, yoghurt and feta cheese. Such abundance!
We have been enjoying our birthday season - lots of presents and lovely dinners, cakes and celebration! I was rapt to receive all of my favourite things for my recent birthday - thoroughly spoiled!
AT WORK: I just wrote an article on Play for Stepping Stones magazine, the publication of the HEA. It’s kind of like full circle for me, because the original Stepping Stones magazine, created by Grace Chapman many years ago, was where I first had my writing published!
Spiral Garden has been quite slow. We had a couple of major technical hiccups with the website, which means we couldn’t upload all of our wonderful stock from Mercurius and new products for awhile. But everything is working again and we’re having a quick stocktake sale!
As usual I have been very busy with my volunteer work. We have implemented new systems to ease my workload a little and I’m blessed to have some enthusiastic helpers. Some friends and I are restarting the Seed Savers group around here, so that’s really exciting as it’s something I feel strongly about (local, open-pollinated seed).
We are currently farm sitting for some friends up the road - they have cats, chooks, ducks, turkeys, guinea fowl and goats - as well as lots of permaculture gardens to tend and harvest. It’s an inspiration to observe a long-term system in action.
ON THE FARM: I have recently updated the Home Grown blog with our winter happenings. It has been a busy time in the garden and despite below-zero night time temps and frost, everything is coming along nicely.
The sunshine has really helped us get back on track after the long, messy wet season.
As of today, I’m milking a new cow. She’s here to visit with us for several months and is really quiet and lovely. Lucy is excited to have a new friend in the paddock! Lucy is expecting a calf and will have a holiday with Poppy and Wags in the bigger paddock until she’s nearer to calving.
HOME ED: Our group schedule was busy and varied this term - we always have so much fun visiting different places. Last week we spent the afternoon soaking at Innot Hot Springs, which is west of here. Bliss! Term 3’s outings are in the planning stages, but it looks to be a lot of fun.
Our new routines with extra Italian classes (at home), Australia studies and Wordsmith course are going well. The sewing we haven’t been getting time to do, but the girls have been practicing their various instruments more often, and Bryce has picked up the guitar a few times as well. Everyone seems to be doing more art, and Immi finally created the flower garden she’s wanted to tackle for awhile. Everyone seems to have discovered book series they are mad about, so there’s plenty of reading happening around here - lovely snuggly winter activity!
Nature Kids Club with Queensland Parks is over now, as are the extra art classes. We have 2 weeks ’school holidays’ now - some down time before any activities start up again. We’ll use this time to do a bit of spring cleaning (can’t wait till spring, we always have a bit of a de-clutter and do some dusting during school breaks.
I hope your winter days so far have been as fun-filled as ours…
AUTUMN 2011
I travelled to… Mareeba, Ravenshoe, Cairns and many places in between!
I listened to… the birds celebrating the sunshine.
I read… A Goat in My Bedroom, recipe books, gardening magazines and seed catalogues!
I watched… lots of great documentaries, some funny films, and episodes of Little House on the Prairie too.
I wore… jeans and boots already, as it seemed Winter came early.
I planned… the garden, a camp kitchen and our weekly menus of course.
I celebrated… The start of the birthday season in our home, a wedding anniversary and the return of the sun!
I dreamed of… making changes.