Blooming where ive been planted

 Its easy to see wonderful productive veggie patches and start to feel like mine will never get there.
My summer plantings didn't do as well as I had hoped. Being that they were planted in soil that had possibly never grown anything but weeds my expectations were probably far too high. I got more tomatoes during the summer than I ever have before so really for me it was pretty fantastic. I think the difficulty is that my gardening goal is to produce enough veggies to live off but that's something to work towards, not something that I can necessarily achieve just yet.

One day that will happen. One day we will be in our forever house.
Benny and I talk about a little farm house on the outskirts of Kadina. I'll have sheep for wool, he wants honey bees. There will be infinite space for my veggies and the soil will get better year after year.
For now I build up this soil to make it healthy with the knowledge that about the time the soil finally fills with worms and gets truly productive we will be ready to move on. Like at our last house. The good healthy soil I tended to had turned from clay to soft wormy loam and now its covered with pavers  (they have no side fence and ill admit to occasional snooping and reminiscing as I walk past:) I love where we are and also look forward to moving on. Its a lesson in patience and letting go, to put so much love into a garden knowing that we wont be here long term but its worth it for the food and fulfilment in the meantime

a tea cup pot my friend Kylie gave me as a 'just because' present. It makes me think of her and the tea parties we love to have together . Its planted with oregano and thyme

For now I need to remind myself to bloom where I've been planted. To be thankful for what I have now. To not be hard on myself. To feel proud of every single plant. To remember that each and every piece of food I bring inside is one less piece I have to buy, one more thing to bite into and smile

 Sometimes I think back to when we moved in and feel pretty amazed and full of joy that this section of unused empty land is now well on its way to being a healthy and productive veggie patch. Dirt is pretty amazing stuff, each seed that sprouts is incredible

 I look at these fluffy little veggie patch helpers and I remember reading the book that inspired me to get chickens. I was sitting in my hammock under the shade of the big orange tree at Mum and Dads. I had borrowed some gardening books from the library and one was about permaculture. I was so inspired reading about the chickens, how helpful they are in a garden. My neighbour had chickens so I went next door to find out about taking care of them. A few weeks later I had my very first chickens and my very first fresh egg!
Its good to remember that I'm slowly on the path to self sufficiency and although its not a fast path I will get closer and closer

 Here is our first row of peas for the year, I noticed today that the first peas on another row are popping up too
Its a good feeling to focus on what I have now. Its all good

knitting and chickens

I'm loving this hoodie, Its turning out just how I hoped! The alpaca is so soft and cozy. Ravelry notes here . Im thinking I may have the record for most times a cable needle can be lost during a single project. Im up to aproximately 5 thousand times. Can anyone beat my fabulous record?

Three years ago when I moved to this town I found out about a women's craft group at the church. Today I finally went along! I had the nicest time crafting with ladies of all ages. It was great fun knitting away, seeing every ones different projects and hearing about the day trips they go on together. Xavier had the greatest time smiling and babbling away to the ladies and they all loved him.

 These are the cuddliest chooks ever. Every where I go in the garden they are right there to see what I'm doing. They are so sweet in there calm unobtrusive manner, just plodding along and happily pecking about nearby

 Ive been digging, adjusting garden bed shapes and dreaming of the winter veg I will soon be planting. Ive put in some broad beans and I'm trying to be patient, not planting to much in case there are still more hot days to come

 Oh how I love the warm late afternoons in the garden. Wonderful soft light streaming down. I'm soaking them up but also looking forward to the soon to come cool afternoons. They better come soon as my grey cardigan is nearly finished

I love bees. Soon after I took this photo I stood on one in the grass and got a not so nice sting. But I still love bees.

a million rainbow seeds

My current knitting project is a stripey blanket.
Its similar to the rainbow stripey blanket I started a while ago, but doesn't involve all the spinning.
 I'm not sure if it was to do with how wobbly my spinning wheel was, the lack of proper cord or my lack of persistence but I got to the point that I wanted to keep knitting the blanket but didn't want to spend all the time getting frustrated with the spinning wheel. I never really 'got' how to adjust the wheel properly, hopefully one day I will get a better wheel and take some lessons because I know I would enjoy it once it got easier. Anyhow, back to the blanket!

 I got the wool from Bendigo Woolen Mills. The colours aren't quite as nice as the colours I dyed myself for the last blanket but they are close and I do love them.

 I was going to knit it with just a small seed stitch border but I like how the colours blend together gently rather than bold stripes of regular knit stitch so the seed stitch continued.. and continued.. and now I thinks its plain to see that it will be a seed stitched blanket!

 Its going to be so warm and cozy, I really do love it

I love that the seed stitch is so puffy and soft

Here are my silkies in a place they love and the place id really rather they visited a little less often, my chamomile patch. If they have their way I think I will be buying shop bought chamomile tea next winter! But still, its the only thing in the veggie patch that they bother so I don't mind too much

fluff balls

The little silky chicks have been oh so busy growing, can you believe they looked like this only about 6 weeks ago! they are the funniest little fluff balls and great little garden companions.

muddy fun in my garden

 A few mornings ago the day care children and I dug up the last of our potatoes. Today after adding manure and straw we planted the bed with broad beans. Broad beans really are my favourite thing to plant with children. The seeds are big and easily handled and the sprouts are extra exciting because of their large size. Everyone had fun poking them into the ground and saying 'bye bye, well see you when you sprout!' (except for josh who was saying 'night night, see you in the morning!)

 After that I let my chooks out to stretch their legs. The chickens don't free range all the time because they are rather mischevious....

 See what I mean? she is heading straight for our newly planted broad bean seeds! They realy seem to be able to sniff out newly planted seeds

 Lucky they lay us so many delicious fresh eggs. Weve been eating so many scrambled eggs lately, theres just nothing better on these cool days. They are best served with home grown tomatoe sauce from our local craft co-op (yes aj, I got some more. hope your enjoying yours too!)

now that the hot weather is over our rainbow chard has sprung back to life so soon we will be cooking more egg and rainbow chard slice

On the weekend Anneke and I checked out a local market that is being held at my new favourite cafe. It was lots of fun an I got some ridiculously cheap plants (yay me!) Im contemplating setting up a stall and selling some hand made goodies there one day. If only days were just a few hours longer so that I would have more making time...

I am thankful to say, now that Hansi has gone on to school Im feeling so much more relaxed with one less child. I swapped my days around and now have monday mornings off. Im enjoying my days so much more now that im not quite so buisy. Now... must resist the urge to accept more work (ill try, its just so hard to say no to looking after more little ones, there all just far too cute:)

Holidays day two

 Enjoying summer solstice. The pretty crystal was a present from my wonderful Mum yesterday, perfect for soaking up sunbeams on the longest day of the year!

Rosemary, little dasies, purple flowers

Sun tea


 And sun biscuits (yep their meant to be suns:)

Two of my chickie girls laid their first egg! Yay chickie girls!

daycare activities this week

Notice how its not called 'daycare thursday this week? Yep having some computer issues. Anyhow, this is some of what we did this week.

Made Banana pancakes, like Anneke made for me last time she came over. They were so good and dissapeared quickly!

 This pretty flower bloomed

 The chooks got spoilt with extra food as usual:)

 We made slippery slimey friends

 I weeded the veggie patch while the kids collected snails and the chickens pecked up bugs

gardening and woodwork

My garden is going realy well. I am noticing more and more worms, there are seriously HEAPS! When we moved to the house there were none to be found but mum let me take lots of healthy soil from my old veggie patch at her house, along with the worms in it. I guess they've been happily multiplying as ive been adding goodies to the soil for them to eat.

 Benny scored me the two new wooden garden beds from work (they used to go around pallets or something) Ones already been filled with compost, chook poo, cow manure etc and planted, the other is my compost spot. I dont actually do 'propper' compost, its never worked for me (or perhaps im just too impatient, probably!) Instead i just dig food scraps onto the dirt as they are. My plants dont seem to mind that I 'dont do it right' In fact they seem quite pleased with my way and reward me with yummy food treats anyway.

The new little chickies have got their feathers already and happily wonder the garden and sleep outside. They each have their own little personality and were becoming good friends. I can tell them apart if I look closely. Isabella is lighter in colour, Lavendar has a little brown line by her eye and Gracie is the one left after identifying those two!

Im going to be growing a sunflower and bean tee-pee with the day care kids. Ive put up the structure, tomorrow ill prepare the soil and ill plant it with them at the end of the week.

Ive also been making some more toys, the children and some animals from 'Children Of The Forest' book. I think the owl is my favourite. Benny bought me a wood burner which is realy fun, I loved wood burning my projects in tech class at school, its bringing back great memories. Last time I painted with acrilyc paints but I'd rather use more natural colouring, does anyone know what i could use?

And one last pic of chooks and veggies and sunshine. Its beginning to feel like spring!

well...

Look whos come to live in my garden!

 I'd been getting an idea of what kind of chickens i wanted to get, and got some advice from a lovely fellow chicken lover. The advice was that isa browns are friendly girls, nice and cuddly just like i was looking for. So I put them on my list of good breeds to look for, to see if i could find some on the internet to buy.

This morning while visiting Mum and Dad we visited their local pet shop and guess who was peeping away by the door?

 These three and about 80 sisters of theirs! I think they said they're isa reds, but they sound like a similar temprament. 

A girl i was talking with in the shop said that she has a few and they love being picked up and cuddled.

 Mum also said she'd talked to a man that had bought the same ones and apparently one sits on his shoulder while he eats brekkie and he passes bits of cerial to her to nibble on!

 It sounds like their fabulous egg layers too.

So... There not my old girls who i miss very much, but its nice to have them peeping about and to know that once their a bit bigger they will be keeping me company in my garden. Thanks for those that wrote me lovely comments last post, they made me feel much better:) 

Any name ideas? So far our ideas are Lavendar, Buttercup, Gracie, and a few others