Okie dokie… so we got back into the hothouse today and sliced off a bit of that top piece of timber so it wasn’t sitting so high. Left the rough edge as I liked the character!
Then we had a bit of a scavenger hunt for branches to start filling with bulky materials
And yes… Flea was back. She can’t help herself. She just has to be where the action is!
I hemmed and hawed about putting in the woodchip… (Acidity?) Anyway, I went for it – a good way to fill in the cracks
I think I will layer it all in newspaper then add in the decent soil. Have to check with my local nursery. I am assuming that all the soil is currently sodden so not sure about picking any up just yet…
And some keen animal (not chook) has been digging under the door to squeeze in and I guess get to the food we had in here for Flea. I had to sort that out.
So… absolutely making progress… yay ! I have high hopes for the hothouse produce this season… better make sure I don’t lose momentum and really get it all together in the next week or so!
The borage has popped up and out into flower again. I enjoy the way it just self seeds!
Yesterday for most of the day was sunny and lovely. Went for a walk around the river with Cousin Fiona then decided to try to get something done in the garden while it wasn’t raining
10 minutes later… it was raining!!! Eyeroll… So I just put on a raincoat and continued on. I planned to do the two strawberry patches and hopefully another bed
Haha – yeah right! I got ONE done. Still… its one less on my list. Such a mess – sadly a lot of twitch has gotten in so that takes ages to pull out. And try to rescue as many of the strawberry plants as possible
My back turned for 5 minutes and the ‘helpers’ are right in there!! They get tolerated until they start chowing down on the rocket, then its eviction time!
I topped the bed up a little then planted the best of the strawberries that I could find
Admittedly it all looks a little underwhelming at this point. Gave them a light mulching with the straw… when they (if they?) perk up and get bigger I’ll top up the straw more.
A bit before getting the straw, I herded all the chooks back down the other side of the yard – I had visions of leaving the bed to get the straw and coming back to see a squadron of them digging up the plants!
You would have laughed to see the sequence of events… I had Flea tucked under one arm (she doesn’t shoo… she just wants to follow me!) and the rest of them in front herding their waddly fluffy butts down the back through the gate. Well… they all went in like little lambs EXCEPT for Flossie (Flea’s sister) She under NO circumstance was going to go with the others… The little snot actively dodged and ran every way except the gate and took off… so there is me, Flea still tucked under my arm chasing her. In the end I put Flea over into the right area, got a long stick to give myself extra arm length to herd Flossie back Nearly there and she took off again, so I am totally running about in my big gum boots shouting at her while she just charges over the gardens, up on to the veranda and for some reason up onto the back table OVER MY CAMERA where I finally caught her!!! All this was to the tune of a LOT of indignant bok bok boking … Here is a (not so flattering) shot of me and the Miscreant Flossie!!
So… 15 minutes later, I was able to finish the garden and put the netting back up (Some native animal really likes to eat the strawberry leaves)
I was done for the day really… in my ‘older’ age I find an afternoon of digging or bending over patches really makes me feel every muscle that night and the next day! Very annoying! Above – herb spiral. The oregano is coming back nicely. Will have to keep the mint and lemon balm at bay this season.
We are a month off spring but already some flowers are popping out, which is awesome! Gives me some enthusiasm
I had to pull up one of the borage plants as it was in the strawberry patch. 🙁
Daffodils!! Soon!
The plum trees also have some blossoms already!
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The little rhododendron is about to flower… I got this from Ruby’s place!!
Lush green with sprinkles 🙂
The white garlic looks pretty good!! Almost 100% germination!
Dunno what this is yet… there are two of them in the grass!!
The carrots I planted in October!! Still going strong (what wasn’t nibbled by rabbits anyway) Handy just to pull up some as needed. Not long before I need to clear the patch so I can start fresh!
Anyways, thats me done! Hope your week is going well!
Looking a bit shabby hey? Nothing a lawn mow and net removal probably can’t fix though.
Flea has moved back into the coop with her sisters… I miss the little Brrrk Bok Bok’s from the corner of the dining room at night
As you can see… she misses us too and ends up at the back door
So… a project thats been on my mind for a while is taking shape! The Hothouse!
Er… yah. I am sure its Flea’s fault there are random pots everywhere?? How does that even happen?
So I pulled up all dead plants and weeds, found a random potato… (Thats a puzzle… I dont remember a potato plant at all there last season)
Some bonus snow pea seeds
And just generally sorted the main area. Hoping to replant the chilli bushes…
This next photo amused me! A finger in front of lens??? Really?? I did that???? Eyeroll.
Anyway, stellar photography aside, we brought up a bunch of lengths of timber to work out what we had and what we needed for the project at hand. Happily not too much cutting overall
Flea and Flossie were the first of the snoopervisors in to inspect.
And no show without Punch, so here is Pip As you can see, I am looking to get a U shape all the way around the edge to bring the height of the beds up to the concrete skirting. That way they will get the light quicker in the morning and for longer at the end of the day
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The inspector conferring with the labourer
Perhaps a difference of opinion?
Ummm
Clearly someone is not listening so Inspector Pip moves up to loftier heights to sort things out
Cats!
So… anyway (is that a smug look from Pip or what?)
Its not quite all together. I will get that top plank cut back to be even with the others… I am debating on leaving the raw top just for the look of it.
Looking forward to filling it up ready! We won’t do the middle bed until I’ve filled the others. Will just be easier without dancing around a narrow path for that job.
I am also thinking of putting in some shelves that swing down over the beds – just a chicken wire frame thing that I can put seedlings on while needed then fold them up and away when they are done. We shall see how that works out…
The dodgy weather continues… really its perfect winter weather. I am enjoying the gloom in a weird way.
So… what is underneath the soaps? Time to cut
So pleased with this one. Simple, yet fairly striking. I used lemongrass essential oil
I did two loaf soaps at once. First with the black, which I let set before doing the next batch to pour in the white – I didn’t want the colours to bleed through each other.
I didn’t quite get the perfect diagonal… but thats ok. I can live with less than perfect haha
The second loaf I added sprinkles – grated soap from older offcuts I thought the straight divide of black and white might be a bit underwhelming compared to the diagonal.
Not too overdone
And they do smell really good!
I did have a little leftover mixture… so put it into one of my bee moulds
And I had forgotten about the leftover mixture I poured from the orange soap – it was in the freezer!! (The hard plastic mould is problematic but if I freeze it – pops out easy peasy!) Love the colour blend!
Hope you all are doing well and have a fabulous weekend planned! Cheers!
Hi! Its getting VERY squishy underfoot out there at the moment! Sometimes there is a break in the rain. I did spend some brief time in the garden (with Flea) to cover the purple garlic
Flea did manage to get in and tromp over a few plants before I spotted her!! Sigh. The whole garden at her disposal and… Anyway, I wanted to cover it just in case squeezy rabbits get in and take a liking to the shoots
The white garlic is poking up now! yay!
The mulched potato patch has stayed free of weeds… funny to see potatoes popping up in winter though! They are super keen
Poor spring onions! Still living on the stump!
Celery… has been going in soups and also picked another batch for more celery salt
Every time I go out the back – I cause a stampede!! If one sees me, they all come gallumping up – then bellow at me.
A few of the braver ones are looking for treats
Plenty of grass over our side at the moment…
Share and share alike…
They get grass, I get cow slobber
Thats a long reach…
A few little flowers are out here and there
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There are recipes for using fresh aloe in soap which I would like to try
I’d also like to dry then soak the calendula petals in oil before making the soap… apparently it colours the soap really nicely
I have a jar of dried ones already but they’ve faded a bit… thinking if I go to the effort I should use mostly newer ones. At the moment there isn’t a lot of calendula about though.
Speaking of soap… this was the bar I made out of the leftover soap mix the other day. I really like the wiggly stripes
A few hearts for good measure
I tested out an essential oil.. rose-geranium. Its lovely and so far its holding the fragrance (a lot of essential oil fragrances get killed by the process so I don’t use them a lot (expensive to use if you can’t smell them!))
I didn’t really get this design right… as with the rose fragrance oil, this ess oil made the batch thicken reasonably quickly.
Oh well… the colours are pretty even if the design is a bit wanting…
Today I put together a soap that will have the ‘shimmy’ pattern – hopefully. It was meant to be for a workshop tomorrow for people to cut and discover the design. Unfortunately its been cancelled. There were only two people booked (friends) and one is sick so Sharon is planning on a pajama day and scoffing the food for lunch. I am tempted to go out and help. (What are friends for anyway?)
Oh, I went to a local workshop that teaches people how to make baskets in the traditional manner. A lovely Aboriginal lady took the class. It was cool seeing all the examples of baskets made with natural fibres of local plants
I got a reasonable way along with twisting my leaf strands and started the bottom of my basket
I have to go into our garden and see if I can find suitable leafy plants to continue. I do plan to return next week to do some more. If I can master some nice sized ones, I thought it would be a unique way to present the soap in a gift pack.
Thats about all the news from Soggy Tasmania! Hope everyone is having a grand weekend! Cheers!
Flea. Thats one comfortable chook. Taken to sunning herself on the back veranda, just in case someone comes out to give her some treats! Its cute and funny, although I could do without he chicken doo-dahs splatted out there!!!
On sunny days Pip is desperate to be out in the sunshine too. So I put him on his lead, then left the back door open to the slate room so he could get back inside in case the Big Scary Chook came by.
Not long after I hear a very loud “Brrrrrk Bok Bok Bok” … sigh. Yup. Madam had strolled in and was telling me all about it.
She is absolutely determined to be inside to check things out! Chicken Doo-Dahs on the veranda is one thing… SUPER not keen to have them inside, so Flea of course gets evicted and the door shut.
Neither cat nor chook are pleased at this.
Pip wavers between wary and flat out pretending she doesn’t exist… but if Flea gets too close he runs off – wuss puss!
Above is the act of ignoring.
Below is the act of wary…
Flea just doesn’t care! They do make us laugh though
Its been a while since I was down at Black River Beach. Sharon and family hadn’t been there before so we decided to go for a drive. (Jeff was sleeping off nightshift)
It was sunny until we got onto the beach then in true Tasmanian style… it rained! Luckily it blew over and stayed away, the sun poking its head out every now and again
Lottie had a lot of fun collecting shells
Paul picked up rubbish (Happily there is not a lot, but now there is even less!)
Tiny crabs were everywhere
Digging down!
Lots of sand patterns
Black River cutting into the sands edge We kept hearing little crashes. Once we started watching, we could see chunks of the sand dropping into the river
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Don’t stand too close! Too cold for an unexpected dip that day
Quite satisfying to watch really…
Lookout Lottie!!
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It was nice wandering down the river
Time for Lottie and Lisa to play in the sea foam
And…
Splash!
Enjoying the winters day
Wait… there’s one more!
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Time to sit down for a snack…
A nice spot in the mini – dunes with great views
The sun was putting in a bit of an effort
We walked back up along the river
Hello Pelican!
Reflections
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People come down here to get oysters… we could see the discarded shells. Paul went across the river… of course Miss Lottie followed
Not long after we hear the sound of excited screaming at the level usually reserved for someone winning 10 million in lotto Lottie found an oyster…
They took home a bit of a feed (I declined – not really a fan but its exciting to forage for food!)
Great day out! Hope everyone is having a great week so far!
So… Flea is still separate from the rest of the flock. She thinks she is a dog or something. The other girls aren’t trustworthy around her now that she has been away so long. (The meanies) She is happy living in the hothouse(although she free ranges around the top garden) and coming inside in her carrier for the nights. Funny to walk out to the dining room in the morning and hear a chook crooning from the depths of the cage. She won’t let you forget that its high time she was OUT!!
Her foot/leg/shoulder or whatever she damaged is pretty good. She will still favour it slightly but all in all… she’s fine. Follows us about if we are outside of course and tries to come inside when she spots a chance.
I got tired of my hair dreadlocking at the ends so the other day I just cut a nice big hunk off it all!! Showers are much speedier now that I am not fighting to get a comb through it.
Before the fence went up I moved a few barrow loads of sawdust from the paddock to the chook coop and the path down through the veggie patch
Its done wonders for the slick mud walkways.
The purple garlic is all sitting up. I replaced about 6 cloves that had rotted but all in all a pretty good % success rate.
(I found these on the ground happily growing where I dropped them! So they got planted too)
My super dooper slow winter tidy up of the garden. Another plot dug up..
Weeded and mulched
With a bit of protection for the parsley that something keeps eating
There is a fabulous little patch of rocket up in the top garden that I threw seed in and amazingly nothing has eaten it (except me)
Still loving my almost nightly rocket, feta and pickled beetroot salads
Late late passionfruit! And wow… it was exceedingly tart! (the kind of tart that makes your ears meet in the middle)
Still pulling up carrots as needed. They are doing fine considering I planted them in October last year! These went into a lasagne that I made last week
My celery, much neglected and slug ravaged, nevertheless has been growing well
I picked a whole lot, cleaned up and pureed and popped into the dehydrator
I’ve been stocking up making my garlic salt, and a version of garlic salt with chilli… I also wanted to try making celery salt
Pleasing colours! Wasn’t sure of the ratios but popped in a generous amount of salt to the powdered celery and mixed it up
I am super pleased with the results too! Now I need to cook stuff that I can go nuts sprinkling salt over
So I picked more celery. Some went into the soup but I’ll make another lot of pureed celery – at the very least the powdered celery is easy to store!
We were down on laundry liquid… so I mixed up a new batch. We are good to go for a while!!
I’ve finally picked up the crochet hook again – I started this years ago then got distracted with many many things. I was working on it in Japan – one of my girlfriends there was admiring it. I had decided to give it to her but its taken an eon to finish it off. Its now in the post!
Currently in the beginning stage of a new rug. Two colours only so fairly simple. Night falls early now so its nice in front of the fire after dinner watching something on Netflix or whatever 🙂
And why not finish up with some soap?? I haven’t had a chance to create some in a while with the fence and everything. After a bit of snooping on youtube I thought I would give this pattern a go in my slab mould!
I am glad I made the dividers!
I am quite happy with my first go at this design. Some of the middle bits were a bit chunky in the design where there wasn’t enough definition and I know how I can improve that. I used Peppermint Ess oil for this one and it smells lovely and fresh!
Well… thats a bit of a roundup of the misc. ‘stuff’
Hope you are all destined for an amazing weekend! Cheers!
Hello there! I hope everyone’s week is going well. The sunshine ceased in the last couple of days and its been raining steadily today. Luckily, got the fence all sorted within a sensational week of sunshine
Sharon’s husband Paul – who knows how to do so many fabulous and excellent things – took on the job of fixing our fence, now that we (the collective ‘we’ meaning Paul, one or two of his friends, myself and Jeff) had finished clearing the timber on the neighbours paddock.
As you can see, this corner of the properties was a bit of a mess, so the other Sunday while Jeff was sleeping, I got in and tried to clear and move as much as possible so when Paul got in the next morning, we’d have a better shot of getting in to work on the fence.
Hmmmm Chopping, dragging and pulling up clumps of weeds along the fenceline. Lucky with the recent rain, the grass clumps came up without putting up too much of a struggle
I unearthed the tin and steel droppers that we put in ages ago to stop the cows from wandering into our yard.
Cut everything back and dragged them out too
Some of the bigger pieces of timber I couldn’t move without the help of the steel droppers. I’d watched Paul move huge logs with a long crowbar and took a leaf out of his book
Amazing what you can do with a little leverage!
Felt good to be doing something constructive
There was a lot of timber in under this grass… big and small. I dragged the bigger ones over to their own pile and Jeff sorted them out with his chainsaw a few days later.
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Oh… and a bit of blackberry that slowed me up a bit – annoying grabby bitey stuff!
The next morning, Paul came in and helped me finish up clearing out the area
I got the job of rolling up the wire so we could reuse it all again.
A couple of the treated pine posts we were able to set aside and reuse. The rest of the posts we took from what Paul and Co. had milled a few weeks back. Once the area was clear, Paul dug a whacking great hole for the corner post. I helped carry this massive beast to its resting spot and I tell you – that was the very limit of my carrying capacity! So heavy!! Its gone into the ground down about a metre and a half. Its solid!
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Well… you can’t really see how deep
Once the corner post was in, Paul ran a string line to one of the other posts that was still part of the fence line to find the places we needed to dig holes
Deep holes
So… as apprentice Hole Digger I managed to almost complete two holes. Luckily Paul isn’t as slow as I am.
Ahhh… the satisfaction of lots of nice holes haha
And some of the things found whilst digging those holes
So… Tuesday and there is no more hole digging (yay) I will confess that Paul finished off the two holes I was working on. Mostly because I was having trouble once they got quite deep getting the soil cleared out. And because he got to the paddock before I did Tues morning!!
Back to putting in posts, filling with broken pieces of cement blocks and soil. Paul has chiseled out the posts to put in a cross beam as well.
Starting to string the wires back up and things are looking fence-like
The chook wire did get a bit stretched after dropping a few trees on it, but this handy little gadget helped by snicking it all back into place, best and even as we could
Paul has all the cool fencing gadgets for sure!
Morrie, who has the paddocks, stopped by to check things out. Reckon he was impressed so far. Honestly he needs a medal for being so patient for so long!
Wednesday… Jeff recovered from nightshift usurped my place as Apprentice Fence Builder and got in to help Paul and learn a few more things along the way.
They cut down timber to size and moved it to the fence
They put up the three cross beams and decided to forgo the barbed wire. Will be completely unnec. with the timber in place
Meanwhile I did more than stand about looking gorgeous (snort)
The old pallet fence that was half mangled by the falling tree then turned into Ugly Fort Knox trying to thwart chooks from flying over needed to come down
So I pulled everything up. A lot of wire to undo!! Happily the steel droppers came up pretty easily which I wasn’t expecting. Usually there is a big fight peppered with lots of swear words
We will keep the pallets for now as when Ed comes back with his mill, we will need something to put the milled timber on to store it, so we will use them to set something suitable up. Now that the fence is down it also means getting the mill in and working in this area will be a lot less hampered.
Well… I reckon Paul did an absolutely fabulous job! He was very particular on getting it just right and was also really patient teaching both of us useful bits and bobs along the way.
Lucky to have such excellent friends! Honestly… I dont think anything is going to break through this fence in a hurry! Morrie must have been totally confident too because he let the cows back into the top two paddocks the very next day!
Cow photos coming soon! They are super cute – and keep rushing up to the fence to stare at us if we go out the back!
Oh… and I have a question… Groots dodgy Grandpa or an Ent??? Cheers!
