So – I got back on the bike… bottom less sore today than yesterday so that’s a bonus!!! š
Once recovered I got into a few of the vegetables that have been hanging about multiplying.
Have made the first step of the BBQ sauce by making a simple tomato sauce recipe. (See below) Six pounds of tomatoes. That took care of quite a few!!
Even though compared to the amount of plants I have in, not as many zucchinis as I would have thought… but enough!! So got to work and chopped them all up
Five bags for the freezer… these can be used at a later date
Then it was the chillies turn –
Anyone want to come and stay and garden? Will feed you.
The long skinny chillies make such a good font…
Anyway, enough of that – I clearly have too much time on my hands!
I did get outside for a good long time this afternoon and enjoyed some hand watering and picking more stuff!
The corn is now eaten!! I picked the capsicum as I noticed a couple had rotted!! But I was expecting them to change colour. So I tried this one in my salad tonight and it was lovely! Ā Must be time to make up some spaghetti sauce and freeze batches of that!
Cheers!
Tomato Sauce Recipe (Ketchup)
6 lb tomatoes chopped
2lb sugar
1/2 pint white vinegar (300ml)
2 & 1/2 tablespoons salt
1 teaspoon ground cloves
1 teaspoon allspice
Boil all for about 2 & 1/2 hours, then ‘mooley’ (Or blend or whatever you like to do to remove seeds/skin
Re heat and thicken with cornflour if nec.
Bottle up!
Hello!!
I have finally stopped procrastinating and making excuses and getting on Jeff’s stationary bike trainer.
Lets not go into into too much detail about the pain in my nether regions shall we??
Seriously – thought I had enough padding… I mean that is the REASON I am on the bike!
I dragged my one and only fancy dress out of the cupboard as I am guessing I will need to put on something nice for the wedding in Texas.
I was actually dreading trying it on, but happy to find out it fit comfortably!!!! Not saying I couldn’t benefit from shedding about 10Kgs, since I am not going to be able to hide the extra bulges under bulky Tasmanian – suitable clothes as I suspect Texas will be slightly warmer!
Back to the garden – I finally wandered over to next doors paddock with a pair of scissors and brought my escapeeĀ pumpkin back to our side of the fence
I think there are about 4 pumpkins on the vines which is a slight improvement on the one single one I thought I had!
We also thought it time to take down the raspberry netting. The weeds were going sky high and there is no fruit left anyway
The chooks are loving having a new area to scratch and hide in. Every time I go down the back they are buried in between the rows!
Hello! Hope your weekends have started in fine style!
We got to the potatoes today – really its the best part of the season. The thrill of discovery!
All looking quite woebegone!
The soil wasn’t dry but seemed more compacted than normal. Took a bit of effort to dig into it – we mostly used the hand trowels so we didn’t massacre too many spuds
Done for the day! I won’t say all dug up because you NEVER get them all!
Time to sort…
Its a little uncharacteristically OCD of me to sort the potatoes into sizes… but I hate scruffing through little potatoes trying to find bigger ones when I am cooking. I’ll just wash and steam the smaller ones, but if I am doing mashed potatoes I have zero interest in standing about all night trying to peel 30 tiny potatoes. Nope!
I line boxes with newspaper and also layer with newspaper
Not too many weird ones this season
Overall not a bad haul… like everything else, not as good as last season. But plenty to keep us going for a while.
One box will live in the pantry and the other three wait their turn out in the shed!
Time for me to go wash the red dirt off! We are planning to go out to the movies – best have a scrub up!
Hello! Amazing how quick Friday seems to appear and disappear!! What are the grand weekend plans for everyone?
If the weather is reasonable tomorrow, Jeff and I want to dig up our potatoes. That will be a fun, grotty job!
Yesterday was lovely. I did nothing. I didn’t even get out of my nightie (A huge time saver when going back to bed… not having to turn the place upside down looking for it! š )
I crocheted a few granny squares and generally relaxed!
Today – back into a bit of gardening. I popped around to Ruby’s and did a couple of hours in the garden
Sadly no parsnip germinated and only 10 carrots – will have to put some more in.
This plot was getting weedy and scruffy
I have left all the self seeded potatoes in – Ruby loves going and finding bonus chat potatoes.
I also used most of what was left of her seaweed and covered the entire plot to tidy it up and slow the weed regrowth.
After a cuppa, I went back home and did a bit in our garden. Mostly taking out the dried snow pea vines and collecting the pods… more than enough seeds for next season
And look!!
OK – they are really not fat enough yet, but they were sweet and it was so nice to FINALLY have some corn on the plate!
Monster Black Russian tomato!
I really enjoy picking food! It does mean a lot more kitchen time coming up, but its all so satisfying!
Hello! I would like to let those of you who were worrying know, that I completely survived my shopping trip. Even more amazing I came home with FOUR items of clothing and only one book.
I have impressed my husband.
I bought a couple of bra’s – Ā which was agony in itself… I cannot wear underwire and I don’t need anything padded. (Happy with my natural padding) BUT – seems everything was wired and padded!
Finally found a place that sold some normal bra’s. I hadn’t bought them for about 10 years. Kid you not. I have been wearing crop tops but they get a bit saggy and the old bra’s I have been wearing to death are, to be honest, a bit manky.
Well… foundation garments sorted, I moved on to the hiking pants and rain jacket issue.
Sigh. Womens sections of shops are useless to me. In the end I bought some hiking pants from the mens section of Rivers, along with a water/wind proof lightweight jacket. Doesn’t anyone think women hike or work in outdoor situations?
I bought a book because it was easy, fun and stress less š
Home again I enjoyed an enormous slice of tomato on a piece of toast for lunch then amused myself in the garden for a while!
Two nice days in a row – gives me hope that some of these very very very late tomatoes have a slight chance of ripening
I have a mad amount of tomato plants out there!
The corn is also agonisingly slow. The cobs are showing signs of fattening up at last.
I did peek into one but it is not ready yet. I have to stop going down every day to see… Maybe if I ignore them for a week…??
Happily the seaweed mulch is really doing its job where I put it down… the weeds have really been cut back
Weeds flourishing on the right side where I didn’t get to weed and mulch
I had almost given up on the runner beans – but they are making a significant appearance now
Half the bean arch is falling over!
I finally got around to putting in a few small rows of carrots. First time I have tried using my own seed
Then I took a pretty bad and boring photo of the patch… haha
My potato patch is looking fairly scraggly and done in. I think its about time to dig the lot up and use the space to get more winter vegies on the go.
I’ll wait until Jeff has his next lot of days off so we can do this together. He loves digging potatoes as much as I do.
(But I did sort of accidentally dig another plant – I’ll view that as a reconnaissance job)
They weren’t huge, but decent sized and a good amount under a single plant
This one was under a self sown potato that I found when planting the carrot seeds
Rogue potatoes under the macrocarpas doing well with no assistance from me!Apple cucumber (got two more of those)More self seeded parsley appearing and doing well!
And out of all the pumpkin plants I have one measly little pumpkin growing!!
Short and sweet tonight!
Had a lovely afternoon picking and digging!
I have alreadyĀ cooked the celery, carrot, zucchini and quite a few tomatoes into a vegie mix that will get dehydrated for one of our hiking meals.
I also stuffed some tomatoes and steamed potatoes for dinner tonight (Jeff BBQed up some steaks and it was all perfect!)
Looking forward to pickling that beetroot. I miss it in my salads – I ate the last lot pretty fast!
I completely failed to capture the gloomy, windy & cold nature of today.
This summer I am officially awarding a 3/10. Disappointing to wade through the dark and gloom of winter to not get your proper summer!! Seems every second day is cold. We are still getting stuff from the garden but it should have been a lot better. (and earlier) Happy to be feeding ourselves, so I can’t whinge and complain too much. We are halfway through the last month of summer and it doesn’t feel like it at all!
The saving grace of the garden really is the hothouse
Beautiful jungle
The heirloom capsicum are coming along really well. They don’t have the same shape as what I grew last season – but I am looking forward to trying them.
Hand for scale
The ones outside have started showing some fruit which is nice!
In among the tangle of the rockmelon plant I finally found ONE little fuzzy fruit!
The sunflowers enjoy living in the hothouse tooIs it weird to find their dying phase more interesting?These ones look like they have had one drink too many!
Despite trying other non-chemical methods… looks like our apples are full of codling moth again! Damn. Jeff seems determined to break out the non-organic pest control next year and drown them! (We shall see)
We still eat the fruit – its just a pain cutting around the grub
The girls are being slack! Three eggs from 11 birds!!!!
I was trying not to do too much today – so I got onto youtube to see how to crochet granny squares. I have been watching Mavis’s (from 100 dollars a month) adventure of learning to crochet and I was also keen to see how to do one.
Then I got carried away
And now its after 2am with a small granny square explosion
Its going to take forever to make a blanket, but I like them!
Pip says go to bed
Cheers!
Pip wrapped up in the knee rug Ruby made for me! I love it! So proud I have something she has made – will wrestle it back from the cat now!
Hello!! How has everyones week started? I have done something annoying to a muscle under my shoulder blade and ow ow ow – I can’t turn my head easily and its a general pest! Things got done slowly with a lot of whinging. (Jeff was asleep so I had to whinge to myself)
Anyway, I had a really nice time picking things today. A silly amount of cucumbers were ready – hoping to sell these but if not, will have to break out the cucumber relish recipe and make up a batch or 10.
From the outside gardens
I got into the kitchen to start processing – sweet chilli sauce was up first. We ran out a while back and I finally had enough chillies to make a batch. It takes a lot of chillies to get 300 grams! (about 10 ounces)
Midnight in the kitchen not the best time for taking photos – oh well
I also had enough tomatoes to make up a batch of tomato relish! I think we are close to being out of that too – its one we use a lot! (as well as the usual use on meat and sandwiches, it makes an excellent pizza base sauce)
So I made a start by chopping 6lb’s of tomatoes and 2lb’s of onion. It has to be sprinkled in salt and stand overnight. Tomorrow I will pour off the excess liquid and start cooking
During the chopping, I multi-tasked and set the ice cream maker going (I had pre-made the first bit earlier in the day) then added the pureed cherries that I did the other day.
I enjoy taste testing
Anyway, got some bread baking now for my breakfast tomorrow. Best get myself to bed. Its horribly late! š
Hi there – slow, cool & rainy Sunday for us!
Thought I would have a quick peek at what was happening February last year. This season is waaaaaay behind in comparison!
The girls were in top formBeautiful big potatoes!Tigerella Tomatoes!
This time last year I was gobsmacked by a photograph of a potato that sold for over a million dollars. So I had a go at taking my own potato photo – sadly no-one even offered me twenty bucks for it!!
(Still accepting offers)(snicker)
Our cat was still cute (I think) and we were starting to stock up on firewood
And the vegetables just kept on coming!
I dabbled in a bit of selling out the front
Its annoying I just don’t have enough to put out the front yet – my Texas Fund needs topping up!!
And of course there was lots of pretty stuff too!
Hope your weekend has been excellent and relaxing!
Hello!
Lovely day here today. We took advantage and made a start on the garden boardwalk (clearly I convinced Jeff it was a great idea!)
Eventually we need it to continue up over the stupid concrete filled barrels, but for today, it was a small start at the bottom end, to see if the
Dodgy-Brothers-Millar-Team could actually make up something that would work.
Starting point – rocks to be removed, weeds to pull and look – my container of collected crap treasures!
Gathered materials (all the free wood we have collected)
Lets take a moment to pause and admire these excellent sawhorses that my mother made!! She is an amazing dressmaker and all around crafty person – but she did a stint in woodworking while I was in high school. The sawhorses were one of her projects. We were lucky enough to be given them and they have come in very very handy many times!
(And my husband is also awesome at sawing š )
Spacing out the slats. (Flies were really bad today! Hence the fly veils!)Aaaaand it pretty much looks like a tableSpirit levels and cement time
Aaaaaand it still looks like a table!!Is a lower angle better??
Tomorrow after the cement has set, I will go about building up the rocks around it so hopefully the first part will fit into its place a bit more naturally.
Now that we have done one small section, we are a bit more confident on moving on to the next bit!
There was still plenty of daylight left by the time we had packed up the tools, so we decided a hike around Anniversary Bay would be good for us and the upcoming trek
The views along the coast never disappoint
Game time – spot the echidna:
Spot the wallaby:
Tide is a lot higher today than when we were last hereXanthorrhoeaI like the down parts of the path
The tide being high, we had to walk over more rocks in this section than usual
