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Hello!
So – catching up on news… the weather turned pretty blah here. The rain has been fabulous but the cold not so fabulous. We opted out of our hike the other day as it was a long drive to potentially climb a mountain and not see anything!! Save it for another time.

So I made a lot of soap instead! Of course!

I got to the part of my list that said ‘pickle beetroot’ and did that. So picked the first of this seasons beetroot and I reckon they look pretty fab! Taste good too!

I have yet to photograph the other new soaps but this one… think ‘big soap slab’ haha
Its an old latex baking… tin/tray/??
Anyway, its a bit floppy around the edges but it was fun creating the big swirls of colour, then working out how to cut it!!
Ended up with big chunky bits which actually I quite like. So I might even give that another go!

Oh I am still so very much loving the new potatoes.

Raiding the lettuce patch… Poor thing.
Some of the big lettuce that has gone to seed has fallen over in the wind and rain that we’ve had lately. (Actually so has the dill)

My parents are due to visit early February (yay!!) and I have worded my Dad up to help me put in a watering system for this area!
He said as long as I did all the bending 😀
It will be great as with the wind, the usual sprinkler is hard to get in the right spot to water everything efficiently.

Shirley rang requesting eggs and parsley. So I took a bit extra 🙂 Love having food to share and in the back of my mind I can dream that if I make it into my 80’s that someone might sometimes drop in some fresh garden food for me!! haha – it could happen!!

Market night at Two Oaks!
Ellen (the owner) had us all set up inside tonight as the weather was still pretty questionable! So comfortable we were!
Jeff had his necklaces

And our lovely friend Maureen had her jams, aprons and other gorgeous hand sewn articles

Of course I had my soap… 🙂
It was a quieter night than usual but we all sold stuff and had such a great afternoon relaxing, talking, buying off the other tables etc.

I am popping back out to Sharons tomorrow – she has a workshop happening. Not too many people but it will be fun to join in anyway!
Meet some new people and catch up with Sharon.

We have another hiking adventure planned for next week. Its a 4 day thing – Walls of Jerusalem. So its carry all in like the Overland and apparently there is a lot of ‘up’ involved. (sigh)
I’ll pack on Sunday.
We drugged Pip up to take him to the vet for his steroid injection. Beau is kindly looking after the place and animals for us but he doesn’t need his hand chewed off daily and to be spat at trying to give Pip a pill.
So Pip is good for a week. We’ve worked out that after that Academy Award Winning Performance at the vets that one time where he went into hissy-spitty-alley-cat mode and had to dismantle the box to get to him… drugs are a good option. By the time he gets to the vet I’ve got him as mellow as can be. Much better for everyone involved 🙂
Siamese!! (He is currently curled up under my windcheater making little snoring sounds haha)

Hope everyone has a splendid weekend planned!!
Cheers

Hello!
I left these soaps in the mould a day longer than usual… I have had mixed success getting them out smoothly.
Today most came out almost perfectly! Winning!

I got the pesto made. In fact, I did two batches!
The kitchen smelled fabulous while the garlic was baking!

Other tasks on my list included picking raspberries and snow peas.

Got to get an early night – we have a bit of a drive planned and a new hike in mind.
First I have to remember to go out and turn off the water! Corn will be soggy by now!

Cheers!

Hello!

Monday and I had a list. I even got though a good amount of items on said list!
I started off with a drive over to Rubys to see her granddaughter in law and my friend Marsha. Since she is from WA there aren’t too many opportunities to catch up!

Back home I made up 10 litres of laundry liquid as we had run out. Doesn’t take too long – and now we are set for the next 6 months!

The raspberries in the fridge needed to be made into jam. I am trying not to just throw things in the freezer to ‘come back to it later’
I also need to pick them and the snow peas, but will move that job over to tomorrow.

Egg washing day.

I picked basil but didn’t quite get to the pesto stage.
Also on tomorrow list!

I unmoulded soaps from yesterday and cut the loaf mould too.
I figured that getting some Valentines Day themed soaps might be smart.
The little chocolate moulds I borrowed from Sharon are perfect for this!
The fragrance is Belgium Chocolate – sooooo nice!

I can’t remember the fragrance name on this one. Nifty patterns though.
I bought a whole lot of new fragrances from a different company to try out and the names aren’t sticking in my head a lot…

This one I made with my cousin the other day… Kakadu Plum. Liked it.

Japanese Honeysuckle. Its nice now that its calmed down a bit – but not the fragrance I was after. I’ll have to politely ask the Queensland Soap people if they will share where they got theirs from.

This is a bit indistinct but a lovely soft subtle green. I love the fragrance too – Ajou Pear and lemon zest (I think)(I can’t get up to check these things because Pip is sleeping on my lap haha)

I can’t show you a couple of others as over the past few months, uploading photos has been a right royal pain in the a.
AND I am too lazy to get back online to the help people to sort it out.
I am sure one day it will annoy me into action! 🙂

And finally – some Dragons Blood – complete with dinosaurs!!
Makes perfect sense.

Lucky I have a market coming up at the end of the week. I am starting to struggle for space so I am hoping I can offload a good amount!

Well, thats all from me tonight!
Have a great week
Cheers!

Hello!
How was your weekend?
I had a great time at Sharon’s yesterday with her latest soap workshop.
Lots of good food and lots of really cool looking (and smelling) soaps made.

Today, since I had been supervising others making soaps over the past couple of days, I did three batches of my own.
Still yet to photograph all the latest ones of mine.

I was aiming at Sloth Day but somehow… wasn’t all that slothful.
I got in and gave various plants haircuts.
Like the rocket – was all going to seed and swamping the sunflowers.

Grow little sunflowers grow!!

That new tomato patch also got attended to… the plants are so vigorous! I’ve taken out lots of the big leaves and plenty of smaller laterals…. the ones I could find anyway.

I was finding plenty of small tomatoes starting under all that greenery

Tentacular also got a good trim. It was starting to get tricky getting in the hothouse door!

I’ve enjoyed having the zucchini frittas on the plate the last few nights. Must make another batch!

The cape gooseberry plants are really looking good! I can’t wait until they fruit!

Still haven’t googled about how to make chamomile tea.
I have so many other things on my To Do cooking list right now so it has dropped down the rungs of priority.

Check it out! A Russian Black tomato is colouring up! Yay

Pesto is on the list tomorrow. I think I am just going to have to yank out those extra tomatoes. 🙁

Hebe’s are looking pretty

And just one of the Lions Ear bushes has burst out in gorgeous orange!
Love this flower, so unusual!
Hope your new week starts well!
Cheers!

Hi!
I seem to have gotten rather busy this week. I didn’t even get to make soap while Jeff was away.
Anyway, got a phone message from Random Lady that said Jeff was walking out on Thursday not Friday – should be in at 1pm.

So, got up and did the 4 hour drive down to Lake St Clair – in the cold, fog and rain!!! Our summer is so weird right now.
Jeff didn’t walk out until 4ish.
I took a brief walk to warm up because I was silly enough not to bring clothes for all seasons.

As you can see – the track was super easy and clear so I wasn’t worried that I was wandering about in my crocs haha
This last part of the track is definitely for the tourists not the hard core hikers

Finally my very tired and footsore husband appeared.
Turns out he didn’t skip Kia Ora hut (which would have evened things out a bit.) His last night was at Burt Nichols hut which gave him a 27km hike out!!! He tried to get the ferry but it was full.
What an effort!
I am not allowed to talk about any activities that have the word ‘track’ in them.
Maybe I’ll bring up my ideas tomorrow haha

We had a really nice drive back – no rush. Lots of talking and catching up on news and tales of adventure.
Jeff had a really good time – even met a few people. Camped some of the time, used the huts here and there. Weather apart from the last day, warm to hot and no rain.

Moving on to Me…

Thought I might amuse you with my Morning With Lottie.

Sharon asked if she could drop Lottie off Tuesday morning while she went to Yoga.
No worries. She’s a fun kid – full of energy.
She didn’t want to really pick the snow peas with me but got all inventive about making me a gourmet salad. (Clearly been watching her Mum make fabulous tasting plates and other foods)

Had to provide the proper bowls and chopsticks, no less!

And what cullinary delight was I subjected to?

Snow peas, basil leaves, parts of the fennel bush for that surprising hint of aniseed…raspberries, cherry plums (thoughtfully de-pipped) purple carrot and parsley.
It was an adventure with every mouthful.

My stomach may never be the same again!

Tomorrow I am heading up to Sharons to help her with a soap workshop.
I have already warned her about how much lemon meringue pie I am going to scoff to make up for this!!
Kids!

Anyway, speaking of workshops… I need to get to bed!
Hope you’ve all had a splendid week!

Cheers!

Well… today I didn’t run about too much. My legs are – displeased with me haha.
It did give me time to sit and sort yesterdays photos!

We got to Cradle a tad before 8am and found that everything had changed. A sexy new visitors centre has just been opened for one thing…
Still a lot of construction going on but overall I really like it.
Collecting your Overland Track pass is now a bit different. Due to a record amount of rescues last year, hikers are now taken into a dedicated room for a talk – on safety, expectations, risks etc etc.
They’ve got a policeman on board representing the rescue side of things and a video. We saw neither the policeman or video as its not up and running just yet. But since we’ve done the track a few times the lady booking us in wasn’t so concerned.
People get a bit blase about the hike. And sure… if the weather behaves, its all hunky dory. A lot of people really don’t realise the fast changes that can happen up there – and if you are unprepared, it will kill you.

My well prepared husband was in good spirits when we set out yesterday. Mind you, first thing in the morning up there yesterday, it was icy cold!!

We diverted off the usual track to go up the Horse Track. This way we avoided a lot of the tourists that were heading up. It was really peaceful for us.

The Horse Track is a fair slog though. It just steadily keeps going up. Marions Lookout way has more breaks with a short steeper section.

I had to stop and rest a bit. But since Jeff was carrying the heavy pack I didn’t get too far behind him!

Jeff fixing his flyaway hair and a goofy selfie from me

(Love the fisheye lens haha)

Finally got to the top of that long upwards stretch

As ever, the views are amazing and rewarding. It was turning out to be a spectacular day.

My usual obsession and delight with the pincushion plants

Cradle on the left, Barn Bluff on the right, Jeff in the middle!!

We got to Kitchen Hut, but didn’t feel like lunch, so we went up to the junction and had a hug and a smooch before Jeff continued on his adventure and I went off to tackle the Face Track.
Its rather weird to be completely cut off from contact. We are used to it more than other people with our lack of mobile phone or devices but even so… until I go to collect him I have no idea how he is going or progressing.

🙁
I was a little envious too of course!
But my path yesterday lay to the left.

I think this section of pathway, flanked by pincushion plants, overlooked by Cradle with that classic old wooden walkway rates as my favourite in the world of paths that I have traversed.

I caught up with a mum who was walking down this track with her two young girls. Dad and a friend were doing the summit of Cradle. I was a bit concerned as the Face Track is not for the faint hearted. There are warning signs about the level of difficulty but – not everyone reads them or takes them seriously. The girls looked to be about 8 and 10 max.
I had a chat just sounding her out as I didn’t want to just presume they weren’t capable or informed.
Turns out they had no idea to the challenges of that track. I gave the mum an idea of what to expect and an alternate route back as a better (read: safer) option.
Apparently her husband was also under the impression that the Cradle Summit climb was only going to take him half an hour.
Some learning curves were probably achieved yesterday! 🙂

Civic Duty Done, and I trundled along my way enjoying all the sights

Again – its hard to get a sense of the steepness of the track with the photos, but the views were magnificent (as usual)

I put the camera away for a while as getting myself down in one piece took priority over photography and when scrambling down some of the sections, I didn’t need my camera bouncing about and I needed all my limbs and in some cases… my bottom haha

By the time I got down to the little hut my legs were shot from ‘putting on the brakes’ for so long. So a sit down, a drink and a sandwich was in order.
Wrapped in Bee Wrap of course!

The next section of the hike was a lot of up and down. Each time I went up I thought it was the last time!!

(Jeff is out there – somewhere!!)

Finally made it to the chain links where a very long descent is made somewhat safer with a sturdy set of chains and poles that has been embedded.
You can see from the photo below looking back to where I came down on it. (red line)

The tricky part wasn’t quite over as the remaining track before getting to the more heavily used Dove Lake track is pretty much like walking on scree. Its not too stable underfoot as you go down.

Clearly I did get down in one piece – thoroughly enjoying my days walk.
Treated myself to a fizzy drink, jumped in the car and returned home to a very pleased Pip – who probably thought we were both disappearing on him again!

Hope you enjoyed the walk!!
Cheers!

Hello!
I’ll be brief tonight as I am a tired little chicken right now!

We got up at 5am (NOT my forte) and got to Cradle in plenty of time for Jeff to collect his pass and get on the track. It was REALLY cold at the start – then warmed to a gorgeous day!
Jeff was in pretty good spirits so I hope he has an excellent week out on the track.

I parted company with him a Kitchen Hut and walked back via the Face Track. I forget how hairy-scary that one can be!!

Anyway, will do a proper story after I’ve had a little rest 🙂
Hope your Sunday was/is great!
Cheers!

Raspberries are coming along steadily… really stocked up on Jam now. And eating them sprinkled on ice cream almost every night.
Happy Days…

We visited Sharon the other day… picked up some goats milk for the soap, dropped off some veggies, got fed buttermilk pancakes… the usual haha
Also was given different cheeses that she has been making.
Ricotta, (made into some cannelloni dish and already scoffed) and this lovely chevre! Today I rolled it up into this log and sprinkled with fresh herbs and my garlic salt.
Tried it out on some bikkies. Yummo! Hard to know when to stop!

Zucchini’s are appearing at a steady rate… the snow peas are still overwhelming!
Anyway, have been busy today – Jeff is trotting off on the Overland. Quick decision… there was a spot available Sunday, so he got his gear together, we shopped for food and we are heading out in the morning.
I plan to hike as far as Kitchen Hut with him. We’ll part company there and I want to head back via the Face Track.
If everything goes as we discussed, I’ll be back Friday to collect him.

Early early horribly early start tomorrow morning so I am off to bed!
Hope everyone is having a wonderful weekend
Cheers!

My herb spiral has come a long way!!
I planted some portulaca on the bare side.

I still have more seedlings so need to find a spot for them. They are so pretty.

So – I gave up on the strawberries here. They just did not want to do anything. So pulled them all up.
The black peppermint seemed to take off fine.
I dug up the plot, moved the pine needles, found a frog, then planted lettuce – both seedlings and seeds.

(My friend thought it might be a pobblebonk. Greatest name for a frog or what??)(Eastern Banjo Frog)

Then – thoroughly tired of this ugly area, I covered it in cardboard and straw!
Have decided against building the last bed in the gap.
Part of it is laziness a reluctance to dig into the slope again to level it and part of it is because the bed would need to be cut down to fit and I would rather use the timber as is to make a full sized bed elsewhere.

I’ve been well watering it in – put some marigolds in (after the photo was taken.) Thinking I might get some soil and put in more patches of flowers

What a difference from 6 months ago hey?
Now I have to decide what to do about the path…

The feverfew has taken to the area like a duck to water!
Am really pleased with the chamomile too

The other little pretty daisy like plant I got a while back is going along nicely… hasn’t gotten a lot bigger but its happy enough

Little Moo is a pretty big fellow now. He is back in the next paddock and comes over for his treats (at the moment lettuce leaves) and head rubs and pats!! Big Sook.
He was so happy when a couple of the neighbouring cows came over in typical curiosity… so he licked one of them for about 20 minutes haha

I look at this cucumber daily. It should be ready soon.
Having thoughts about planting more seed directly as all the cucumber plants are as slow as molasses! Not even putting out climbing tendrils.
Weird season.

The two capsicum plants are doing really well… they will be long yellow ones – or should be.
The other seedling I bought is about a metre high and so far no flowers or fruit!!!

More pesto coming right up!

A steady supply of zucchini now happening.

Golden nugget pumpkins…. still unsure if they’ve pollinated

Enjoying the summer flowers appearing.

Hope you are having a lovely week.
Cheers

Hello!
The other day I went for a hike over Anniversary Bay and did the loop up and around following the Postmans Track.
Probably at least 17km. So a good healthy outing!

I went with my friend Nardia (on right) and her friend Lara who I met for the first time.
Weather was perfect for hiking.

We decided to do the coastal route up as the tide was low when we started out.

You don’t have to wonder why its called Rocky Cape NP

Finding the pathways over on the coastal route is a bit of ‘Choose Your Own Adventure’

Of course everything takes so much longer when you stop to obsessively look for cowrie shells!!
I think Nardia found the most! We were too tired at the end of the day to compare cowrie numbers!

(I didn’t keep it but the spikes were such a pretty purple!)

Don’t fall on the spikey rocks!

So hard to leave the beach… I might find just one more cowrie!

Rocky pathways

Yeah – pretty sure there is a path in there

Slightly overgrown in places.

One last stretch of beach/coast before walking up into the hills again

We found a real tangle of nets and rope. Would like to have moved it off the beach but it was a bit heavy to take with us!

When we got off the beach, we had to start off hiking doubled up as the scrub completely enclosed the path! (This bit was actually a bit more open than before – I failed to get a photo)

Looking back over the coastal route!

We reached our ‘halfway point’ and decided to hike back instead of calling Nardia’s husband for a pickup.

According to the sign we had another 3 hours hiking ahead.
I had never done the inland side of the Postmans Track… I was keen. (Until the first hill five minutes later)

Pant pant puff puff.
I suck at hills

Luckily Nardia was still snapping away. I just put the camera away as it was really weighing around my neck.

As always, the rewards for slogging up a hill are great!
So beautiful!

We started out at 2pm and got back to the car at about 8.30pm, slightly footsore/legsore but in pretty good spirits.
Always brilliant to share the gorgeous countryside with like minded people who oooo and ahhhh over rocks, shells and views, just like me! 🙂

Must do it again… maybe after a few days rest though!
Cheers