SPEAKING OF TIME....

I spent the afternoon just wandering around the yard looking at where we have got to in terms of the garden revamp. We moved here 11 weeks ago, and here is what we have done so far: ...Removed two lots of lawn ...Put in a herb garden & paths ...Started the dig for the fish pond ...Had a bedroom, patio roof, the shed and bathroom painted ...Planted out 20 various fruits and berries ...Completely enclosed the patio, pond & herb garden for the dogs ...Had a split aircon put in for winter warmth & those horrid humid days ...Completely graded and levelled the back yard ...Removed the side carport and utilised as a roof to the new chook house ...Removed two full skip bins (you see them on building sites) of rubbish from around the house (nothing salvagable) ...Covered the back chook pen fence (long & 7 feet tall) with shadecloth to give the chooks some summer shade and some privacy generally ...Put in a round-about in the back yard and had roadfill put in to prevent bogging in the winter. Not bad going for just about 3 months. Tomorrow and Sunday will be spent on cleaning up the old compost bin they left here full of heaven only knows what and putting the tin up around the new nesting/roosting house. Still a couple of week-ends work around those areas to go. Hope you enjoyed a few photos of home, we have some beautiful countryside in this region, more to come next post.

Here's to a relaxing week-end ahead! Take care of you and yours:)

TIME GOES NOWHERE!

I cannot believe it has been almost two weeks since I last posted! My most abject apologies, life has had a habit of getting in the way of blogland lately. Project number one has been the revamp of the chookpen. OMG what a job it has turned out to be LOL! Remember we removed the carport from the side of the house? We decided it would make a perfect roof for a much larger TAJ MAHAL type nesting, roosting and laying area.....and the work began... You can see the mess we have found whilst pulling everything in sight apart! And this is just the beginning. FuzzNut, the inquisitive one, had to come and see just what we thought we were doing to her little home! This chook cracks me up, it not only reminds me of the road runner, it runs like that cartoon character too! So, back to the chook pen....in putting the roof on we decided t0 take the tin from the old woodshed, and utilise that for the walls. Of course this has meant that the old composting box in the front of the new nesting house would have to move.... Here is the mess we have to move to ensure our tin is on nice and neat all the way around. Once complete we will paint the outside to match the workshop and garage...oh lordy, what started out as a reasonable idea has ended up with a project bigger than Ben Hur....you ever do that? LOL And here's my boy...working hard on putting on the angle iron to attach the lower sheets of tin. He is a blessing anytime, but on this project-vital, neither hubby nor I can weld! Hard to believe I spent my birthday (Sat) & today on a chook pen, but you know what?..........I loved every minute of it, it is where I am most happy...in the yard! Amazing how once you look to simplify life the simple pleasures become so important and soul soothing! Of course the Boss & Lady Jane were out enjoying the gorgeous sunshine we had today, they are weeding out all my sprouting peas from the pea straw...another job they do and save my back from! PowderPuff, the chook that looks like she has been through drier hell and back was busy preening and making those cute feathers sit just where she wanted them, she spent about 30 minutes fussin! So, where did we get to? We pulled down the old wood shed, cleaned out the new nesting, roosting covered area, put up the bird netting over one area (We have a problem with cats and crows) and all the welding is complete, we're ready to put all the tin up next weekend. My daughter just called....."Mum, they cut a tree down and there was this baby possum crossed with a mouse thing that fell out of the tree" LMAOOOO!!! That girl slays me! Crossed with a mouse indeed! Anyway, needless to say we are going to have some type of possum (I will find out what when she gets home) to stay for a while. It has been many years since I have been a wildlife carer, however I still have the books and all sorts of info, won't be too hard to raise and release if that young. Life has a way doesn't it?

Hope the week ahead is a super one Take care of you and yours:)

AMAZING TALENT

Catching up this evening on my reading of your ever intriguing and instructional blogs I came across this one at Hermits place and simply had to share it with you too! The man has an amazing way with this harmonica! I have learnt that not only can the harmonica be fun, funky and great for those country tunes, it can melodious and classical in a beautiful way!

Enjoy!

HAVE TO LOVE THOSE DELIVERY MEN!

They deliver all sorts of wonderful things! This box, and another came today, just what I was hoping for as I am having some time off tomorrow....lets hope it doesn't pour all day! These all came from the Eastern States as the plants I love cannot be found or obtained here, so it requires ordering, quarantine and expensive transport, but worth every cent, perhaps I will actually get to taste this lot! Here they are in all their glory, there was: 4 Midyim Berries, a shrub that occurs naturally throughout the coastal areas of northern NSW and south east Qld. It produces pretty white flowers and an abundance of fruit. The soft pulp is described as being one of the most delicious of all bush foods. It has a sweet mildly aromatic flavour with soft skin and small edible seeds. A beautiful ground cover and bird attractant. 1 Cedar Bay Cherry, a delicious fruit that shows great potential for the exotic fruit and bush food markets due to the high quality of the fruit. The fruit is very decorative due to its bright orange-red colour. They are also delicious, with sweet, soft flesh. The shrubs are very slow growing so they are perfect for growing in ornamental pots. They fruit from a young age, starting in their first or second year. They grow well in sunny or shaded positions requiring well drained soil, extra water and fertiliser will help to speed up it growth a little. 1 Yacon, also known as the 'Earth Apple' this is one of the ancient crops of the Inca's. This relative of the sunflower is popular to the people of Columbia, Ecuador and Argentina. The plant produces large tubers similar in appearance to sweet potatoes, but they have a much sweeter taste and crunchy flesh. 2 Pepino Kendal Gold, a small bush rarely above 1 m tall with yellow fruit stripped purple up to 10cm. Flavour is like a juicy rock melon. Only pick fragrant, slightly soft fruit which are ripe. 1 White Sapote-Hawaiian Supreme, a small round, symmetrical fruit with exceptional flavour characteristics. Skin colour changes from green to pale yellow at maturity. Very refreshing in flavour. Moderate cropper. Self pollinating but a pollinator increases crop size. Small tree ideal for backyards. 2 Peanut Butter Trees, is one of the delicious fruit bearing trees that is regarded as highly underestimated. Apart from being a valuable tree for the fruit it bears it is also highly ornamental. It can be grown into a bush or a small tree with a tendency to go deciduous during the winter. The yellow flowers are produced through late Spring and are followed by a nearly constant production of fruits in varying quantities. The dark-red to dark-orange fruit is the size of a quail egg and needs to be picked every day as they spoil quickly on the tree. They can be stored for several days in the refrigerator or can be separated from the seed and frozen. The skin is very tender with rich, sweet flesh that has a texture very similar to peanut butter or a sweet potato. The concentrated sugars of the fruit make it much like a dried fig. They are especially good when blended into a milkshake. The trees, which have a distant affinity to the Acerola Cherry, are hardy and highly tolerant of frost. They grow quickly and produce from their first year. 1 Fejoa Mammoth, a large, round to oval fruit with a slightly wrinkled thick skin. Very good flavour and quality. Self-fertile but bears larger fruit with cross-pollination. 2 Yellow Cherry Guava, a small pointed dark green foliage forms a bushy shrub to small tree of around 2-5m by I-2m. Flowers are typical fluffy white stamens of the Myrtaceae family inside 4-5 white petals seen during to early summer. It has small sweet tasting rounded yellow fruit with white or pink flesh. In warm climates fruit is produced mostly in late Summer and Autumn and in tropical climates plants may have two crops per year. 1 Pomegranate Tree, a fantastically versatile tree that produces large fruits used to produce delicious juices and preserves. They are wonderful eaten out of hand. The bright colourful sacs of juice can easily be picked out of the rind, burst in the mouth they are truly wonderful. This is a great fruit to share. Pomegranates store extremely well in a cool dry place and continue to sweeten off the tree. The plant itself is very hardy and highly ornamental, it has large showy flowers and is suitable for use as a feature plant, for hedges and container growing, it also makes an attractive and interesting bonsai specimen. And here is the one I am most wanting to try! The Black Sapote, if you like Chocolate you'll love Black Sapote. Commonly known as Chocolate Pudding Fruit this amazing fruit is low in fat and an excellent source of Vitamin C containing about 4 times as much as an orange. The fruit is delicious eaten fresh or used as a chocolate substitute in recipes and milkshakes or simply mix the pulp with yogurt and lemon juice for a refreshing treat. Fruits can be cut in half and eaten covered in passion fruit, in Mexico the pulp is mashed with orange juice or brandy and served with cream, it is also delicious mixed with wine, cinnamon and sugar. The green fruit is picked when hard and allowed to soften and go brown within 3-6 days. At the ripe stage - you should be able to press the skin with your fingers and leave an indent. A very close relative of the persimmon the black sapote is a Chocoholics dream come true!

Tomorrow is going to be a busy day in our garden, my favourite thing to be! Hope your week is going well, take care of you and yours:)

WORM WICKING BEDS

Ever wonder why some of us prefer wicking beds to grow our veggies? The answer is simple....they make sense! Although initially you will have some set up costs, not many if you recycle where you can, in the long term this method of gardening will save you both time and money. Time because you tend to plant closer (similar to square foot gardening) so you tend not to get the weeds you would in the backyard and money because you utilise a lot less water, AND if you include the worms, no fertiliser costs! The principle is for the plants to wick the water up from the "pool" in the bottom, rather than watering overhead and losing some of it in evaporation. You will water a lot less in peak summer, and lets face it, in Aussie water is a scarce and precious commodity! If you include an additional piece of pipe that has holes drilled in about half the length, you can use that to feed the worms you bury in there, no mess, cap it and no flies either, just free ongoing little workers feeding your soil. The link to check out plans is HERE. It's a PDF file so may take a little longer to download, the wait is worth it I promise!

Enjoy the gardening and take care of you and yours:)

WTG BUNDANOON

A town in the New South Wales southern highlands of Australia hopes to become the first community in Australia to ban the sale of bottled water.

Bundanoon businessman Huw Kingston suggested the ban after a company applied to pump water out of a local aquifer to supply the bottled market.

"I put a little article - 'Does Bundanoon have the bottle to go bottled water free?' - in our local newsletter. I guess we have gone on from there," he said.

The suggestion won the support of local businesses. They are proposing to replace plastic bottles of water on their shop shelves with reusable’s and then offer directions to filtered water fountains that will be installed on the main street.

"I think there is an overwhelming opposition to the marketing scam that is stilled bottled water," he said.

Around the world other cities have taxed bottled water - in some places, local officials have been banned from using taxpayers funds to buy it.

Environmentalist Jon Dee from activist group Do Something believes Bundanoon could be the first town to ban it entirely.

"Huge amounts of resources are used to extract, bottle and transport that bottled water, and much of the package ends up as litter or landfill," he said.

"So environmentally it makes no sense and that is what we are trying to do in Bundanoon, is show that a community can live without single use bottled water."

Mr Dee, who was behind the campaign that saw plastic bags banned in the Tasmanian town of Coles Bay, says other towns around the country would not find it hard to follow Bundanoon's lead.

"If Bundanoon can ban bottled water, well many other towns and communities around Australia will also consider their usage of bottled water," he said.

"And at the very least, if they don't ban it then at least they will reduce their usage of it and in doing so reduce the half a billion dollars a year that Australians are spending on bottled water and not just save money but save the environment too." Now if only we would all do that!

FULL STORY

Take care of you and yours:)

THIS AND THAT!

A mixed bag of info tonight. First of all an announcement. Australian Preppers network are looking for someone to manage the aussie blog for them, sites set up and ready to go. If you are interested leave a message on the SITE. A report from OXFAM is raising eyebrows. The synopsis from the ABC news reads as follows: Act now to avoid climate poverty: Oxfam Oxfam says climate-related hunger will become a problem around the world if there is not immediate work to deal with environmental issues. The report found that in some regions, seasons have changed and generations of people with farming experience are facing failed harvests. Oxfam spokeswoman Julianne Richards says climate change is adding to poverty. "Without urgent action, climate change could reverse 50 years of work to end poverty," she said. "Without urgent action to reduce our emissions, climate-related hunger could be the defining human tragedy of this century." Ms Richards says farmers in many poor communities can no longer trust the weather. "They don't know when to plant their crops, or what crops to plant, and they're losing crop after crop," she said. "As a result, thousands of communities are facing hunger and destitution already." Oxfam Australia executive director Andrew Hewett called climate change the "central poverty issue of our time". "Climate change is happening today and the world's poorest people, who already face a daily struggle to survive, are being hit hardest," he said in a statement. "The evidence is clear - the human cost of climate change is as real as any redundancy or repossession notice." Mr Hewett called for the Federal Government to show leadership in delivering a "fair and safe global deal" to tackle climate change. "Australia must show leadership at the UN climate negotiations and contribute to a global climate deal which has the needs of the world's poorest people at its heart," he said.

FULL REPORT HERE

And to the left some of the drying! I still have more leeks on the go and another 2 loads yet of mushrooms to do!

Hope your week ahead is a good one! Take care of you and yours:)

FOOD STORAGE

This weekend I spent catching up around the house and the garden. I love the time to just wander, ponder and re-arrange lol. First the inside where rooms got a little revamp, and the dehydrator got a work out. I don't know about you, but we love onions in our food, and given they don't grow 12 months of the year dehydrating is a great way to store, and to do it in a very efficient manner! The mushrooms are mostly water, so you can imagine how many it takes to get a full jar! We love these in soups and casseroles, great for adding to sauces too, and GOOD for you! I can't wait to get my sheep manure! Put that stuff around your garden and you will have mushrooms for life...at least if the manure was from paddock sheep. The centre garden in the drive way was given a good covering of pea straw and some chook manure. I am hoping the worms will get in there soon as this is where I planted the guavas. I will also be planting the ice cream trees and others in here as it gets a lot of the sun during the day. You can make out the ongoing chook pen project, next job...sides of tin up and a paint job. The work is ongoing as it always is when you move house. I love this place, the space, the quiet........ and the challenges lol. I am waiting on my order from DALEYS, there are some wonderful goodies ordered, and of course more to come when it is the right season, ready to arrive soon are: Midyim Berry Cedar Bay Cherry Yacon - Apple of the Earth Pepino - Kendall Gold White Sapote - Hawaiian Supreme Peanut Butter Tree - Bunchosia Feijoa - Mammoth Guava Yellow Cherry Pomegranate - Rosavaya Black Sapote - Bernicker

Heres to happy gardening! Take care of you and yours:)

LIFE CAN BE HARD SOMETIMES

Yesterday a good friend lost her wee baby boy at 19 weeks into the pregnancy. This post is to let her know we share some of her grief with her and remind her that her friends, in real and online are there for her.

The world may never notice If a Snowdrop doesn't bloom, Or even pause to wonder If the petals fall too soon. But every life that ever forms, Or ever comes to be, Touches the world in some small way

............................For all eternity.

May the Creator keep you and yours in his arms L God Bless

SNUGGLE UP...IT'S WINTER!

It's that time of the year here in Aussie....Winter! I really love this season, the smell of the rain, the damp earth producing new plant growth, watching the flames dance in the fire... Time to think about how we stay warm and the best eco ways of doing that. Here’s a few tips on what we need to think about: Thermo insulated blinds and drapes guard against heat loss in winter, or use old blankets. There are fewer drafts and heating bills are lower. Energy efficiency reduces emissions contributing to global warming. Save on water heating costs with an insulation blanket on the hot water tank and insulation tubes on hot water pipes. Keep it hot and use less energy! Buying new windows? Ask about air leakage and glazing systems with special low-e coatings and gas fill between the panes. There's less heat loss, and less heat cost! If you aren’t replacing windows or find coatings too expensive, get that bubble wrap out and cover the glass. Seal gaps under doors with weather strips or door snakes Seal fireplaces when not in use. Consider using ceiling fans (low speed and on winter setting) rather than air conditioners to make your house more comfortable in cold weather. Close ducted air conditioner vents in winter to prevent heat loss in the house Let in some light. Open blinds on south-facing windows during the day to let in the sun. Close them in the evening to add a bit more insulation. This provides just enough mid-day warmth that we don’t need the heater. Use rugs on bare floors. We have hardwood floors above a poorly-insulated basement. These floors are cold in the morning and the late afternoon. An area rug does a fine job of keeping my feet warmer. Use space heaters. They take a while to get warm, but once they’re going, the can heat a small space cheaply. Bundle up. I love cold-weather clothes: long underwear, sweaters, hats, scarves, gloves. And don’t forget: house slippers go a long way to keeping you warm! Install a programmable thermostat. They’re easy to install and an excellent way to cut your heating costs. Use a hot water bottle in bed. There’s no need to heat the entire house when you’re asleep. There’s no need to even heat the bedroom. Caulk up cracks in your walls, both inside and out, and especially around windows, and replace any missing or cracked tiles from the roof. Thermal underwear gives you extra warmth. Enclosed shoes and wearing tights or socks are a must to keep your feet warm. Slippers are great. Layer those clothes for greater warmth. Rugs, carpet and mats are warm under foot. Mats are great for kitchen and bathroom sinks and places where you might stand for a long time. Take advantage of solar energy. Put a dark rug in sunny areas of your house to absorb the sun's heat. Chilli, hot soups, stews and casseroles will do the trick. Leave the oven open once you've finished baking for extra heat. Fill in the gaps between skirting boards and floor boards (put your hand near one and you'll feel how much air comes through on ground floors) Keep wool or fleece blankets around. Great when you want to read or watch TV, this then removes the need to crank up the heat. Close off any unused rooms. The closed door makes that room another barrier between you and the winter weather. It also stops air from circulating as much, which reduces heat loss. Make your own solar window heaters simply, cheaply and easily, see HERE Light candles. Candles can produce a lot of heat, but be mindful of where they are placed and do not leave them unattended. If you look in the right places you can find candles at very reasonable prices.

So there are a few ideas, I'm sure you can think of others... stay warm and take care of you and yours:)