Month: May 2020

Hi there!
I got out to Sharon’s yesterday for the first time since the whole Covid19 World Tail Spin!
Some people spend ISO eating chocolate bikkies (ahem), others eat their way through the fridge. Some indulge in new hobbies or go super mad exercising.
Sharon and her husband spent too much time on Gum Tree and managed to buy 7 alpacas and a highland bull!

So I got to go out and meet them all! They are so funny and adorable! They ‘Fooff’ their chaff at you – not really spit (much) and make the weirdest funny noises!

Baby!

I think Paul is going to give them a little bit of a tidy up trim since all the girls look like Rufus-The-Rough-Nut!

Dalton is the stud! He’s a fabulous animal – pretty quiet and easy to handle… mind you he had to go back on his lead as he got a bit… amorous… lol. Yup – twas all happening down on the farm yesterday!

Who has taken an alpaca for a walk huh?? 😀

We walked over to meet… oh my, I am pretty sure its Fergus.
Anyway, Sharon took Dalton away from the ladies… buuuuut… the ladies followed! (And the ram who now seems to be part of the alpaca flock and is a bit species-confused if you get my meaning… next on their list is some ewes for the poor ram)

And here is (hopefully) Fergus. Isn’t he adorable?? (Its pretty lame to say ‘adorabull’ isn’t it? Yeah, thought so)

Damn…. haha – just checked my messages. Its Hamish. Hamish not Fergus.
Hmmm

Anyway, Hamish-not Fergus – is a gorgeous big fellow and hopefully if all goes well there will be little fluffy calves in the future – jersey & highland!

Ok… There is a Tinkerbell and a Clarabell… What is going on with my brain!?
Anyway, above cow is loving having a bit of a scratch from Paul!

And last but not least – this gorgeous hound, Betty (Pretty sure I got this name right) was picked up as a stray and has now become part of the family! She is a gorgeous girl… still timid at times as they were fairly sure she has been mistreated 🙁
She’s all bum-wiggles and pounds your legs with her wagging tail! So glad she’s found a home where she will be loved excessively!

Cheers from me and Dalton!!

So – am starting with soap! 🙂
Love these latest drop swirl ones! (Above is White Ginger and Amber and below is ‘Made to Measure’ (kind of a manly fragrance)

Testing out how to separate the swirly bits from the plain top
Above is Kakadu Plum and Bush Cucumber, below is Japanese Honeysuckle.

Today – Prepping the garlic plots.
I’ve been so lazy about going out to garden!

Ready – then a sprinkling of blood and bone and lime!

Jeff came out and helped me dig plots! Yay!

Cleared out the zucchini plot and topped with straw. It can rest until spring.

I had the garden gate open for the chooks to come in and play but only a couple discovered it!
They had a lovely time!

No broccoli heads showing at all… and I know!! I need to get down there one night with a bucket and sort out the slugs!!

Happy to still have some lovely rocket in the garden!

Still some passionfruit!

Potatoes… of course potatoes!
It would be a very unusual day to dig in the garden and NOT find potatoes!

Ta daaa… Garlic salt done.
Mind you, I’ve got enough to make another batch but I might put that job/idea on the backburner for a while!

In sad news, my photoshop died somehow.
I haven’t started to look to see if I have the original CDs or look at getting a new one. Not being able to fine tune my photos like normal is killing me!!
I’ve got a type of photo editing program I am using but its not up to scratch for what I need.
I’ve started procrastinating about sorting it out… so… in a few weeks?? Hmmm
🙂
Hope everyone is going well!

Cheers!

Drove west of our place today for the first time since all the restrictions!
I was dropping off a book to Fiona and she suggested a bit of a hike!

So – Mt Misery! (What a name) was the challenge. We are not talking so much of a hike as a bush-bash. No tracks – just game trails, a creek, a river and a lot of ‘up’

Hey look!! Its me! Complete with super-hero shirt!

The colour of the river is spectacular! Its stained from the tea trees and I just love it!

This spot was fairly shallow – we didn’t get too wet as we smartly stepped across.

How spooky does that look? Almost devoid of colour!

I didn’t have the camera out a lot as once we were really going up, it was a scramble over and under logs and fallen branches.
Soon enough the huge rocks appeared out of the landscape

On the right side above is the underside of a fallen tree!

Fiona clearing dead branches as we decided to go up this side of the rock…

Um… I kid you not. This bit was a challenge. We’d just scrambled up the soft leaf litter slope (not much shy of vertical) then up to the left on our tummies between tree and boulder!
So Fiona – nearly 60, me, nearly 50 and we are stuck up this ridiculous rock laughing our heads off because we were imagining how embarrassing the rescue was going to be!
When it was my turn, my feet lost purchase below (you know, on the sheer slope) and I am on my stomach, gripping that tree and some dirt.
Fiona got my hand and I got dragged up enough to be able to haul myself up!

Nope. Things are rarely boring here!

We found more stable ‘paths’ and got to the top of the rock where we enjoyed a mandarin, a drink and a sit down!
We firmly agreed that we’d find another way down – often sliding on spongy leaf litter and going from tree to tree to get some stability (and that goes well until your cousin tries to drop a tree on your head…)

It was an awesome afternoon!!
My clothes need a good scrubbing though!!

Cheers!

Hi!! How’s everyone doing?
Last Friday we had a bit of a fire-fail when the old baffle plate finally buckled and dropped off its rails (and smothered my fire)
Of course it does this on a Friday.
Luckily a local heating shop was open Saturday morning.
I popped in to try to get a new baffle plate. There wasn’t one the right size, but I brought home one that was close – in hope.
Sadly, nope.
Even sadder – no fire on Saturday night.
And what a drama that was!! Pip!! You’ve never seen such a performance!
He sat and stared at the flue where his towel should be hanging warming up. (Then looks at me accusingly)
So… because the little toad is mega-spoiled, I go find the hot water bottle, fill it and warm his spot on the couch with his towel.. and put him in it.
He wouldn’t have a bar of it!! I tried to tuck him in blankets next to me on the couch… Nope. I couldn’t have him on my lap (which seemed the only other place he wanted of course) as I was cutting and sorting garlic.

Cue the sad face. He sat on the floor fluffed out, then when that didn’t work he hopped up onto the coffee table where I would be sure to notice him better – all hunched up, fluffed out and woebegone.
Eyeroll
Tried the blankets and towels again… not good enough!!
Seriously award winning drama!!

I let him onto my lap when I was done with the garlic, under a blanket. He settled in but no purrs.

When Jeff got home I asked him to smash out the old baffle plate so we could at least use it until we got the new one as I wasn’t going through that again

Fire back on Sunday and someone was the sweetest content-est and purriest cat ever!!

In other news, our squadron of possums are wrecking havoc in the garden (by squadron I think I mean three)
Cute little buggers, but grrrr on eating all my parsley in the top garden! They’ve pruned the strawberries too… a lot!

The strawberry patch needs a tidy up anyway…

I didn’t mean to but I ended up weeding the plot below and mulching. (That was the B12 talking)

The possums are getting into the main garden too… I think I know where so I should be able to fix it. They started getting into the parsley there too but I now have netted it to slow them up somewhat

I am up to $110 worth of garlic sales – I’ve separated all the good planting cloves. I’ve set aside mine to replant and sold a lot more.
I’ve still got a couple of bags to deliver and then I’ll have to sort the purple garlic

All the small middle parts of the garlic or the awkward cloves I cut and peeled and finally got to and mixed up my garlic salt.
Yes, it does look like vomit!! Erk
I ended up putting 500g of garlic and a kilo of pink rock salt together – whizzed it all up and added in some parsley as well. Its spent a lot of time in the dehydrator… like 20 hours or so.
The last couple of nights I’ve taken the chunks of it and been painstakingly grinding it in a mortar. (It thwarts my Gee-Whizzer – it just jams up!)
Anyway, I am getting there. We’ve really enjoyed using the home made garlic salt over the last 12 months, so its worth the effort now.

The weather is mostly gloomy and rainy. We have been out hiking a few times this week… in the wet weather gear! Still trying to work off the choccie bikkies!
I made some soap today… hoping to do another batch tomorrow.
At some point I might even do some housework… who knows? I’ve lost the plot when it comes to any semblence of plans or schedules!!

Take care and stay healthy wherever you may be!
Cheers

Hello… Bouncing back kinda slowly after my B12.
I’ll catch you up on goings on next post – but in the meantime, here are the first five photos from the current photo challenge I am running via Facebook. We’ve got nearly 30 people participating… lots of great photos and fun ideas appearing.

Above was my entry for ‘Colour be Bold’ – basically pick a colour and don’t be subtle. 🙂

Day two was ‘Food’
So I went and raided the garden and had some fun putting all the fresh food into a big heart! So colourful!

You saw my Day Three submission for Black and White – nice frothy waves at Fossil Bluff.

Day Four was ‘Make us Laugh’
My caption for this was
“Sebastian was crushed when he realised, that without legs, he’d never get to wear the Yellow Jersey… “
My Dad made an alternative suggestion (too late) and now I wish I had set Sebastian up with a satchel and some letters and titled it ‘Snail Mail’
(Future project only when very very bored as snails take sooooo long to do anything photogenic!)

And tonight I posted Day Five: Scavenger Hunt.
We had to go find 10 (or more) objects starting with ‘R’ and get them all in a single shot.
Its actually quite fun searching each photo for all the R things!
I had no clue about this one until about an hour before posting… During my driving about today I had an idea how to set it up. Then Margie gave me the idea about a reaper (Scythes from Ruby), so I get home and …”Jeff… I got this GREAT idea!!!”
He hardly even eye-rolls now!!

Cheers!

PS – How many R objects do you see??

Hello!
Yesterday I raced off down to Fossil Bluff to get a photo suitable for ‘Black and White’ for my photo challenge. The area is now open but only for exercise.

I exercised up the (very empty) beach, rested and took photos…

And a few more…

Exercised back again then rested slowly and might have accidentally found a few more agates and other pretty rocks 🙂

This morning I got my B12 boost… over a month overdue… that certainly explains my lethargy.
I have high hopes for tomorrow.
Tomorrow does include a trip to Burnie with a buckled baffle plate from the fire.
It fell out, mostly crushing my fire!
We certainly need that fixed ASAP as the warmth from the fire tonight dropped considerably. Really hope they have something in stock I can just get rather than having to order and wait. Fingers crossed.

Jeff back at the hospital tonight! His ward is finally open again

Anyway… time for bed!
Cheers!

Another job on my list taken care of. Most of the plants in the hothouse were past their best, so out they went. The cabbage that has been there since last season… it was half heartedly going to seed so I gave it to the chooks!
Out came the failed eggplants, most of the tomatoes and the basil. (And the weeds)

I left a couple of the tomatoes – still one or two tomatoes left that we might get.

Collected the last of the basil seed.

I saw an interesting idea when it comes to growing potatoes… and since I wanted to try to winter a couple of plants in the hothouse, I thought it would be fun to try.

So… cut the bottoms out of two old large pots…

Found some keen potatoes!
I’ve just put in some straw and some cow-poo-straw and covered them up. Will top up on soil as they grow.
The idea at the end is to be able to pick up the pot and have the soil and potatoes drop out. I think three is too many for one pot… but… its all in the name of experimenting.

I put some more snow peas in as well… since most of the last lot got eaten!

All done.

I spent a lot of time later in the afternoon waiting for a snail to come out of its shell and pose for a particular photo I wanted for the current challenge.
What a pain that is!! I fired two snails before settling on ‘Sebastian’ who at least wasn’t either acting totally dead, or didn’t froth up in a mass of bubbles and fall off the item I perched him on.

I am sure I’ll share the outcome of the photos once I’ve posted it in the challenge group.
In the meantime… there’s a grasshopper photo to look at instead, as I was wandering about looking for things to amuse myself while Sebastian was coming out of his shell.

Hope you’ve had a great day!
Cheers!

Hello!
I was lucky enough to be given some saffron bulbs – corms? – a while back.
Suddenly they were sprouting in my seed drawer so I popped them in some water and had to think about getting a spot ready!

I wanted to go and get one big pot for this area… but its still a bit dodgy going out if we really don’t need to, so I’ve put together a few of the pots we had.

A mix of potting soil from the supermarket, my cow-poo-straw and the leaf compost

The leaf compost has turned out amazing for absolutely really no effort!

I didn’t have quite enough so I filled one of the pots halfway with some straw. Turns out I didn’t need the three pots. Oh well… will have to think of something else to pop in there. Some other small and pretty bulb maybe.

Pip was MOST interested in the straw… must be lots of mice living in it.

I decided to pick the butternut pumpkins… I actually don’t think they are quite ready but its pretty cold and the vines are all but dead. Overall there just wasn’t enough summer.

I’ll leave them for a while inside – hoping they might just finish off in the warm.

Collecting wood… those chooks are like fleas! Hard to get rid of haha

They literally get under my feet when I am in their part of the yard!

Or helpfully sitting on the wood I am moving

Heave-ho!

Spent a short time tackling the weeds in here. They weren’t too bad, just better to do it now before they got out of control.

I re-mulched then re-netted. The cabbage moth is done but I saw some possum poo in the garden so don’t want to make things too easy for them!
They are getting a little eaten by slugs but nothing devastating. One of these nights I’ll pop out and do a collection to slow them up.

Another couple of ticks off my list 🙂
Motivation is still… hard to come by. Aaaand perhaps calling the doc to get an updated B12 injection?? Reckon I might be due!
Then, look out garden!!!

Cheers!

Actually took the camera along on our hike this afternoon.
We got rained on a bit…

We left a bit late today so weren’t out as long as usual – its getting dark a lot earlier!

See the rainbow through the trees??

We detoured off the road up along one of the manky old logging tracks… seems like the fungi have taken over!

As you can see its a bit of a sloshy path!

Up, up and up we go… this hill goes on for a while… and you think you are at the top – then it turns out you’re not. Then it goes up again MUCH more steeply lol. Not kind at all!

Puff, puff, pant, pant. Stopping to take a snap and get my breath back!

Because we are so grown up – we found this funny…

Then back over the road and down another dodgy logging track

These tracks slow us up more going down than coming back up. (That was a weird sentence – but I know what I meant) Its actually a little hard to capture just how ‘down’ it is at times!!
Mind you, I am not exactly Ms Speedy coming up them either!!!

Overall it wasn’t too bad – sometimes in the dry its worse as the gravel can just slip under your feet! Then its hiking on your bum time!!! Ouch!

By the time we got down it was raining pretty steadily, so I tucked the camera under my raincoat and enjoyed the rest of the hike back to the car on less demanding paths!

A lot of the strict lockdowns in our area have been lifted – just back to asking people to only go out for essential trips/exercising and observing social distancing.
From what we can gather, Jeffs ward should be ready to reopen midweek – yet to hear anything official.

Hope everything is going well in your part of the world and you are staying safe and healthy!
Cheers

Hello!!
Bit of a kitchen day – yesterday I washed all those tomatoes (ie 9kgs of them) and today I put them through the food mill to squash out the seeds and skins. Its still on the stove slowly reducing to tomato paste – I’ve not added anything to it – so its just straight tomatoes.
Taking aaaages! And I couldn’t fit it all into one pot so there is another 4lts in the fridge waiting its turn!

Not that that has anything to do with the muffin photo…
Still got lots of apples. Looked up a recipe and gave these apple and cinnamon muffins a whirl.
Yummo!
Maybe I’ll make a few more batches 🙂

I did another batch of soap today, but these were from the other day – slightly more subtle than my last loud lot!
(Anjou Pear and Lemon Zest)

I also put together some more beach sand soap with eucalyptus

And these celtic knot ones were made with the extra mixture I had with the Wasabi batch

And on the side, just for amusement, I’ve started a new photo challenge (Beginning May 11th) on Facebook
10 new subjects – its getting so much harder to think of a good mix of subjects now!
Anyway, I was being a smarty-pants and thought I’d put up the subject ‘Build a House’ I didn’t even give people hints or clues so will be fun to see what creative ideas or work arounds they will come up with.
I had vague ideas of insect houses or card houses (My creative efforts get a bit exhausted at first coming up with the new subjects haha)

Anyway – mix some paint, a sharp blade and a cereal box…

I am having quite a lot of fun with it!
Tonight I finished the front and attached it to the rest of the house. The roof needs a bit on top to finish it off and keep it together… but I put some fairy lights inside it and I was pretty excited by the effect.
Looking forward to finishing it off and photographing it properly!!!

Well – I’d best go give those tomatoes another stir (and maybe indulge in another muffin…)

Hope you are all doing well
Cheers