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Hello and Seasons Greetings!
I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas/Festive season and that 2023 is completely amazing 🙂
Later today I am expecting the first of my family to turn up.
They all should be here by the 4th

Lots of beach and walking and talking time coming up!

We’ve spent time getting stuff done around the yard and this last week… proper housework
(ie moving furniture to clean. Um… I’ve spent a lot of time saying ‘Yuck’)

Jeff made this path look way better!

I continued in on the back garden

One of our chooks (Nihon) got out and dug up my newly planted lettuce within 12 hours

And apparently its the bed of choice at the moment for Pip!!

I do have backup seedlings that are going along nicely actually…

The long pots are giving them time to happily establish then I will be able to plant with minimal root disturbance. (They look a lot better today than a week ago which is when I took this photo)

Jeff also weeded the garden path and put down new sawdust. I weeded the blueberries. We’re getting fruit! But it gets eaten pretty quickly so haven’t taken snaps

Despite the appearance, the mulching on this plot has made the clean up mostly painless.. although I just haven’t had time to get in and finish it.
I want to plant my corn here

Some self sown potatoes provided a nice feed and I grabbed some little carrots.
The garlic is ready for proper harvest… Maybe my nieces and nephew might like to help out there?

Emma and her boyfriend are vegan so I was practicing some muffins…

Wrote the recipe wrong and forgot sugar (shudder)
Chooks happy

Spoiled…

The second batch was much better… although there was an aftertaste which I’ve since learned is due to the bicarb.
SO… will make them next time without that and just the baking powder!

Anyway, I have a few things to fuss over today before heading down to the airport so I better get a wriggle on!

Thanks for hanging in there with my sporadic blog posting in 2022.
Maybe this year I’ll be a bit more focused?
I’ll let you know if I come up with any real goals haha (the pressure!)

Cheers!

Hello!
I’ve had precious little time to make batches of my own soaps… so my stock is dwindling with all the Christmas sales.

However… its not like I haven’t been making/supervising!
Three workshops…

Lots of lovely people coming to learn about soapmaking

I let people branch out a bit with designs since I am there holding hands

But I encourage them to go home and make a plain batch to get the hang of it on their first run solo

A lot of fun colourful stuff from this group!

People are enjoying having a go painting with the gold mica too 🙂

Another ‘Phoenix Rising’ demo soap… that one sells well so why not re do it?

Then I did a soap workshop for 4 friends at home.
Bit of a ‘thanks for supporting me and doing workshops’ kind of event.
Plus it was nice to hang out too

The hardest part of it all was clearing our dining room table!!!
Such a nice big convenient surface…

The ladies had a heap of fun choosing their colours and designs

I chuckled about the fragrance choice… three of the four chose Japanese Honeysuckle!
It is one of my favourites… and I don’t take that to my workshops. (Gotta have some secrets I guess)

We had fun with designs

I didn’t get a lot of ‘proper’ photos – things were…um.. a bit rushed that week

I think I had three workshops and one market within 8 days

It sort of felt I was continually loading and unloading the car with soap stuff

I didn’t get any snaps of the cut version, as I took it to the workshop for my friend to cut there!

And moving right along to the last workshop…

A mother and daughter team made their soaps with all natural ingredients – clays and essential oils.
So lovely and subtle and beautiful

To the complete opposite with some wild pinks

I really enjoyed this white and natural soap colour mix

And a beautiful one pot swirl with the purple!

In my demo soaps for cutting for the last two workshops I used patchouli ess oil. And just reversed the colours in the design. So now I have a nice matching lot curing (A bit groovy?)

And my last show-off demo soap.
Wanted some fun light hearted colours.
So there you go… a million soaps!!

Now… to carve out some time for me to start the big restock!!
Cheers!

Hi there!
Not long before Christmas!
I hope everyone has lovely plans!

Summer has been mild so far but has thrown in a few beaut days!
Nights are still cool

A few weeks back I gave up waiting for steady warm weather and chucked one lot of my tomato seedlings out into the big wide world.
Of course, at first they were total drama queens and fell over, but they did come good again

The weather dipped again and they were looking unhappy. Covering them with the bottles wasn’t doing the trick as they were too big.
My friend Jude, who I work for in her garden on Mondays, uses her old feed and compost bags to create easy little shelters.
So… I followed suit

They’ve enjoyed their little homes and I noted that they’ve perked up nicely
I had to dash down late tonight to cover them back up as I had forgotten so I got a quick snap

Ahhh… the garlic!

Couple of weeks ago I saw that the garlic was looking a bit manky.
I think they are basically ready for harvest

I cut off all the scapes though as I wasn’t ready to do anything with the bulbs yet

I think I used some of these in a spaghetti dish or something

I’ll see about pulling them up in a day or two. Then I can use that plot to get some beetroot in!

Carrot patch going along fine so far

We’ve also spent some more time yard cleaning…
Much to the chooks delight, we pulled up all the pallets as now that we are not cutting down massive trees we don’t need all that wood storage space.
And it was looking pretty bad.

Looking bad AND unorganised!

So, I set aside a spot in the ‘duck yard’ to put the pallets and store all the odd bits of tin we’ve collected.

And random poles and tiles

All neatly accessible.

Weather had dried up enough to burn the rubbish pile!

I put in some pumpkins… however… Nihon kept getting out and she’s pretty much destroyed this patch.
Sob.
So… will have to start again.

Jeff got out to the side garden the other day and proceeded to rip out all the insane paddock grasses and pulled the rock wall down and rebuilt with half the rocks.

Today was another nice day, so I continued in the area, digging out more weeds and smothering with cardboard and sawdust

I hooked the bore up to give the cardboard and newspaper a decent soaking

And…
Voila!

So much better and hopefully will help keep the weeds manageable.

I did a lot more in the back garden but its not finished so will save that when I have the properly finished ‘after’ photos!!

Cheers!

Hello!
Sorry to be so neglectful of managing to get back here to post!
I seem to be up to my eyeballs in markets, workshops and general around home stuff

I am not finding time to sort photos and write! (Or I am wasting time somewhere, which is a distinct possibility.)

I am working Mondays in my friends garden now too! They have a permaculture setup and its really interesting – nice to work outside and learn things 🙂

Above! Basket weaving today was lovely. We were outside with all the great stuff Adele had collected and made wreaths! I kept mine all natural and feel pleased with how it turned out. (Although I am itching to string some fairy lights through it!)

Nice to finish a full project in one session! Usually this is as much as I get done (in between socialising and eating cake)

That basket did get finished! The raffia style is faster than the straight flax

My friend dropped in the pressure washer and I’ve had a bit of a go at it and now want to wash everything in sight!

I just have to get through a few more days of commitments and I’ll be free to pressure wash my little heart out!

(Basically three soap workshops and a market within about a week, flanked by gardening days)(So I am running my tail off!)

Getting a few strawberries. A handful of raspberries too but I ate those before taking a snap

Getting a bit better at the sourdough bread too – although I need to be home to knead it the day before I want to bake it – I did a loaf for a workshop I did at home here for friends and it was very well received (proud moment)

Picked up some flowers from my friend Jude – she gave them to me at the end of the market the other weekend
It was a fab market. Sold really well!

Three of the four apple cucumber seeds I planted have come up

Its 11pm and I’ve just finished making a batch of soap as my demo to let students cut.
The next workshop is on Sunday but tomorrow is a market down at Sisters Beach. Happily its an afternoon to evening market so I will have time to prepare workshop stuff tomorrow morning.
Then later it will be home from the market and repack car with workshop stuff, fall into bed, get up and hopefully do a good job of the workshop!!

After that I’ve not got any more market or workshops scheduled or booked before the end of the year!
Will be time to prepare for family coming in January and pay attention to my garden

I’ll leave you with one soap photo that I was pleased with recently…
Hope everyone is doing well!
Cheers

So… I decided to go for some Wife Points by finishing stacking the wood

Sorted.
And then… drum roll and cue Cousin Jeff

Sob.
Haha… I am just being a drama queen.
Its good to get the wood in and stacked up early

I got this lot partially stacked.

I did however tackle the path and edges

I like before and after photos!

They please me

Jeff got in a few days later and cleared out weeds by the veranda

Onto the next mess..

A fair bit to do in this area

Had to stop for some head butting and quality cat time

Pip eventually hunkered down and I got on with the job

The middle area I want less work and less weedy… so cardboard and sawdust it is…(Will probs top with straw later)

Working through tasks section by section

You have to take advantage of the good days – because its still swinging back to cold and snow in Tassie!!

Planted some apple cucumber seeds and transplanted a lettuce that I found when weeding this plot!

I am getting to eat a few strawberries too… slowly coming along

Been meaning to scrub the decking for an eon (and it looks it)

Hard work but satisfying when seeing what I did.
Mind you, after I posted this bit on Facebook a friend took pity on me and dropped in their electric water pressure cleaner today!
I am super keen to have a go but have a market tomorrow so Sunday might be the day…

After all that we are going to need to do some staining too.

The smaller cherry plum trees are laden, but the big old one doesn’t have much on it this year 🙁

Enjoying the flowers around the yard

Okies, I have to finish prepping for tomorrows market!
Have an excellent weekend!
Cheers

Well… its snowing around Tassie at the moment!!
I am glad I delayed putting my seedlings out. Its not snowing at our place but I sure do have the fire back on!!
The last couple of evenings I have sat in front of the fire after dinner with some Netflix on and making up soap dough flowers for future projects.
I found a little set of daisy flower cutters which makes the process… faster!

One of my cousins came around the other week to make a few of her Christmas Presents ! We had a fun morning

Which reminds me… I like this swirl method and need to try it again

Beck also decided on using the Oatmeal Milk and Honey fragrance… always a comforting scent!

I got to and made my last Christmas soap batches and was pleased with the results

Above was Apple and below, Apple and Peppermint

I had another workshop the other weekend too – only three people this time but it was a nice group of ladies, they found other common ground with bee keeping and other things so that was lovely

Nadeane chose the Anjou Pear and Lemon Zest… with lovely ribbons of purple and yellow through her soaps. She also had a bit of fun with the decorating

Her daughter Emmy wanted to use the same fragrance but in the end opted on something different so they could share (Crisp cedar and amber)

That fragrance caused the mixture to thicken a lot more quickly so we abandoned the ‘drop swirl’ design and did a manual swirl with a skewer. Turned out great!

Kay had a go at a Taiwan Swirl, and with those soft colours – it looked gorgeous

Smells amazing too… Lemongrass and Exotic Lime

My demo to cut soap I used Lemon Verbena… mmmm

I might have been in a hurry as the shimmy design was a bit chunky – but still cool and exciting enough for the cut.

I decided on Australian Lavender for the show off demo soap with some soft colours

I think we were going to call it ‘Nanna’s Retro Kitchen’
Its still sitting in our dining room smelling lovely!

I haven’t done a lot more with soap since then – the nice weather said “Get your butt into the garden!”

I did start a new basket… using the raffia this time. Its been growing quickly

Its nearly finished… just have to cut some more flax from the garden to do a few more rounds. Finishing with the blue/green again.

Of course, why finish a project when you can start another?
Grabbed some of the crazy vine at the side of the house and made this open air basket!

Pretty quick and fun to do! (Although it probably won’t hold water…)

Thats about it from me!
Fingers crossed the weather gets warmer again.
I’d love to get some tomatoes in the ground as well as the pumpkin and plant the corn! Its mid-November after all… time to get a crack on!

Hope your day is great
Cheers!

(Somebody is broody!)

Hello Again!
The weather lasted long enough for me to get another solid days work weeding that raspberry patch

I’d put the sprinkler on after the first go to soften the ground up as I knew I’d be tackling that horrible creeping buttercup

All the chooks got right in to ‘help’

Funny but so pesty!

This was a slow tedious task… the creeping buttercup puts down tentacle roots that hang on. And as it branches out, it has elbows in the branch that ALSO throw down those roots!!
In among the canes makes it hard to get out easily

I relocated a bunch of canes that were too far out. Hopefully they wont even know they’ve been moved!

Looking more hopeful

I simply dug the shovel under the patch of weeds at the front and sliced off the problem plants.. came up reasonably well as they were growing on top of the woodchip and not too far into the soil

The girls had SO much fun!

I was done in… and it rained on me 15 minutes before I was done! Of course

Yesterday Jeff came down to help with the netting and stringing side of things

Just stretching out the net to check it was usable

We immediately trapped 4 chooks inside it haha

From there it was a matter of getting all the sides pinned down, putting some blood and bone through the patch and mulching it

I watered it in again to soak in the fertiliser and from here I should be able to pop into the patch weekly to pull up any weed that dares poke through.
Don’t want to go through that again!!

Lots of raspberries in the making.
Looking forward to sharing these with all the family when they arrive early January!

Pip snoopervised of course. Pictured below sitting in the scattered patch of straw that the chooks immediately kicked about everywhere before I noticed!!
Little darlings. (I had dumped an armful of straw there then had to do another task – I looked back to see them all in there kicking it to bits!!!)
(Hence waiting until netting the patch before mulching!)

Hope your weekend is fantastic!

Cheers

Hi there.
We’ve had some lovely spring days.
The potatoes are sitting up nicely through the mulch now

I weeded the second garlic patch… also threw mulch on and fed both patches some ‘power feed’ (Run out of kelp juice so I need to take up beach walking down at wynyard with a collection bag.)

This patch doesn’t look great but overall because I’d kept a heavy mulch on it over winter… it wasn’t too bad

Ready for … something!

And here is my problem child.
The raspberries are soldiering on despite me not getting back to them
I wanted to pull everything up and create raised beds but… didn’t happen for this season.

It was a long afternoons work and I am only halfway through!

I had the Bug Squad keeping me company

Kinda cute and kinda smelly – so nice of them to drop ‘Doo-Dahs’ right next to me when I am weeding.
Pong.

Still doesn’t look super fabulous but a def. improvement
Hoping to get back out there in a minute and continue.
Once both rows are done I’ll give them a good feeding and mulch.. although I’ll leave the mulch until Jeff is away and can help me re net the area.
Otherwise the precious little chooks will kick the hay right back out again.

We are getting a few sea mists recently.
Kind of cool watching it creep over the hills

It gets to the point of heavy fog everywhere

Out the back I pulled up most of the borage
Its a super bee attractant but they were getting too big and taking over.
Lots of smaller plants have seeded so they’ll be back soon

I can walk down the path again!
Although that lemon balm needs another haircut!

Lovely herbs

(Sage flowers)

The remaining apple tree is half dead but has put out some blossoms anyway.
Doubtful we’ll get apples…

Don’t have the heart to cut it down while it is trying… and don’t need another tree to clean up just yet

Calendula

OKies, Pip has been yelling at me for the whole time I’ve been typing this so I am going to go and take him for a walk outside before I explode having to listen to the constant whining haha
Then I’ll go tackle the rest of that raspberry patch!

Have a great day
Cheers

Clearly I have not hurt myself in the garden by overdoing it haha

Poor potatoes

The weather hasn’t been kind, so with that and madly having to get my Christmas soaps done and dusted to cure in time… I’ve not done heaps in the yard

This was a Dodgy Brothers weeding job… mostly hoed stuff up to upset it, ripped out handfuls then just smothered it with the straw.
Today the potatoes are popping up through the straw nicely already!

Little wisteria by the chook run is looking sweet

Then the other day it was on to the raised beds by the back veranda…

ummm…
No real convincing excuses for this tragedy

And this travesty

Even Pip was judging me…

Time to get into the dirt properly

I dug up a squillion cape gooseberry plants. Took a bucket full down to Farm it Forward Tasmania where I do my workshops and basketweaving etc and we put them out the front for people to help themselves.

Lots better. The straw should keep any recurring weeds down until I decide what to plant (Salad greens most likely)

Pip’s creative Siamese Knot tying skills…

We’ve had three sunny days in a row!!! I am really hoping it will continue!
Jeff got out and did a huge effort with the lawns (out the front was pretty bad)
Between weather and work he hadn’t gotten back to them and at this time of year… things grow fast!

Meanwhile I thought I would be a clever clogs and stack all the wood that Cousin Jeff dropped off.

Looking back I think this was a bit ambitious for one days work…

First stacked wall…

I started the third wall… but had to quit as I was getting pretty sore!
I took a break and weeded, fed, mulched and netted one of the strawberry patches, came back and did another couple of barrows but then gave up. There really isn’t much to go and I was miffed to not finish it off, but I needed to be able to walk and stand upright today.

Body still hates me today haha

So… in other exciting news, I went into town with my friend & Market Buddy Maureen last week and spent a good portion of my saved Soap Money.

What did I buy I hear you ask??

Well, since you asked… I bought tickets to go to Japan!!
(I haven’t rung and told my parents all about it yet… so cue phone call in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1,… haha)(Yes I’ll call them tomorrow and regale them with the details!)

I had wanted to take Margie with me to Japan since she has never been out of the country – but she has only just moved back in to her renovated home that is AMAZING, but took forever and of course went over budget. I don’t think I’ll pry her out of the place for about 12 months 🙂

It had always been a dream of Maureen’s to go so we have been working at our markets with the goal to save and go.
Then covid happened. Then Maureen got breast cancer – so she had a long recovery road… and has done incredibly well.
So finally, she is well, Japan opened its borders again and I lucked out on some fabulous accommodation so we dashed off and secured our tickets!
We are booked to go next April, hopefully in the right time for cherry blossoms!
Looking forward to it hugely!

Poor Jeff and Pip have to stay behind although Jeff and I are planning to return later next year and incorporate a lot of hiking into the trip

I love being able to plan again!!

Anyway… thats all from me!
I had a soap workshop today so right now I am feeling a bit tired!
Hope your weekends were fabulous
Cheers!

And a basket!!! I finally finished my condiments basket!
Complete with little loop to hold the spoon I use to liberally sprinkle garlic salt on everything!

I took so long to finish this one off but pretty happy with it

(Bottom) Just love the variations in the natural colours!

I feel like now I should be investing in prettier condiment containers!!

Within the last 8 days I’ve had two markets and one workshop. So I’ve been all about soap… plus trying to make the last Christmas soaps to be ready cured before Christmas!

This soap was the demo for students to have a go at cutting

(I think that was Black Raspberry and Vanilla)

A fun bunch of ladies attended last Sunday…
Above was the lovely oatmeal, milk and honey fragrance with a pretty blue drop swirl, made by Genevene. She added a little gold to the top too!

Bernadette used a spicy rose and (something I forget and am too lazy to get off this chair to find the bottle) fragrance
She used the dusky rose clay with some poppy seeds for a scrub
Also we put the patterned bottom on these

Jo did a bit of a fun swirl – with the Kakadu Plum fragrance

She also bought her own mould which we used with the leftover mix…
So. Darn. Cute!

Louise did the soap workshop with Sharon but hasn’t made soap in a while and wanted a refresher and some inspiration.
She had fun experimenting and I love the effect of the sprinkles at the bottom of the mould. They look like soap geodes..

Edna had a lot of fun mixing these beautiful colours into pretty moulds. (Edna usually goes to basket weaving with me and has been eyeing off the soap workshop for a while!)

She wanted to do some gold but by the time she told me it was a bit late, so when I unmoulded them I took some liberties and hand painted a few with gold highlights. She was quite thrilled when she collected them on Friday!
(Baby Powder fragrance)

My show off demo soap was done with Anjou Pear and Lemon Zest.
This design never fails to please 🙂

On the home soaping front I’ve done more Christmas tree soap (I had some at the markets which have been popular.
I also got a new embed mould… lots of owls! So I put them into some square soaps with a bit of gold swirl to fancy it all up!
(Oud Wood and Moss)

And the soap I have had the most fun with lately…. ducks!

We were watching a Japanese Anime and there were these little funny duck characters and I thought their design might be simple enough to make out of soap!
So I did!

Their faces are such a crack up!

I managed to unmould and cut without duck injury and rather pleased with this first go!
I would make the blue ‘water’ part a bit more wave-like for any future soaps!

Well… thats it from me.
I had a market today and I am feeling like bed would be a splendid idea!

Hope your weekend is going well
Cheers