Hunter Gatherer

The garden is going so fantastic. I just can't believe how well everything is doing! I'm making a salad for tea tonight (to have with the fresh scnapper from last night). The salad will be gourmet lettuce and rocket and baby spinach leaves, spring onion, radish and tomato - all from our garden! Oh! and the chives on the baked potato will be from the garden too! How mouthwatering does all that sound?!
I've got a very busy couple of days ahead......... I have to get a bed ready for the 40 corn seedlings that I raised. It's a lot of corn but I want to get heaps of kernels in the freezer. We have 4kg of peas in there that we grew and harvested ourselves, I want to do same again with corn. I've also got a lot of spinach growing too. I priced it the other day at Woolies. $3.50 for 500g of frozen spinach portions, Can't wait to get mine in the freezer and add up how much worth it is.
Also on the SELF SUFFICIENCY side of things........ Home Brew Rocks! I have a brew of Corona going at the moment, and I have a Blonde and a Crown to put down as well. Also, I've been making my own fruit juice wine. I did the first batch as the instructions told me to, but now I'm experimenting. I made some apple and cranberry champagne and everybody is going nuts for it. I can't keep up! Have also made some apple cider with honey and cloves in it (haven't tried that one yet) and apple and blackcurrent wine with a star annise in it (haven't tried that one yet iether). I have 2 Christmas shows to go to this weekend, so all flavours will be getting a go.
Anyway, this isn't getting the gardening done, is it? Want to do a bit of fertilizing before the wind picks up too much. Oh well, better get cracking hey. Seeya

The Rain is Optional

Hey Warren, this one's for you!






Just wanted to say 'G'day' from Cleve!

We're getting some fantastic rain at the moment. Here's a couple more pics

This is my tomatoes and silverbeet. The background is the neighbours land. Where I is the light coloured stuff to the left.

This tree is to the left of the house. The light coloured stuff in the front is oats. That is a paddock. I reckon it would be great to plant grapevines in it and start a boutique winery. Everyone reckons i'm 'full o' shit'. LOL

Okay........ Not necessarily a part of the garden................ But a vital part of the gardening process, none-the-less. My home brew pale ale. Ve-e-r-r-y nice!

Cluck Like a Chicken!

Meet the new chooks! 6 hens and a rooster. They're only a few weeks old. Hopefully in a little while they will get all clucky and broody and make lots of babies for the freezer. Please forgive me but with all this new livestock happening (lambs and chooks) I just can't help thinking "Hmmmmmm............ Webber.............".

They're living in a kind of holding pen at the moment so the other chooks don't monster them and kill them. But they will be let out into chook society as soon as possible.

And guess what else?! The zucchinni's and strawberries have got heaps of blossoms on them, and the tomato bushes are absolutely loaded and Scott found a red one this morning, so we should be getting some PRODUCE really soon. I'm so excited, I just can't wait. I really need to get busy out in the garden over the next 2 weeks though, I have to get a bed ready for the corn seedlings to go into. I want to plant them out Christmas Day because I know I'll be off that day, and I just didn't realise how close it is.

Things are finally starting to pick up at both jobs, I had a fairly busy week this last week. I thought I had another job too and I was really happy about it, but it turns out I'm not going to be able to do it because of conflicting hours, so I had to let it go. But next year when everything goes quiet again I can re-apply, so I'll definitely be doing that.

Things are good. I've been walking every day (am thinking to forget about it today though - just catch it up tomorrow), diet has been good (till last night and today), I'll definitely get back on track tomorrow. I've been keeping a food diary on calorieking.com and checking into the forum there every day for support. My budget goals for December seem to be falling into place. I've got the cardboard to make my dreamboard for 2009, and I've been giving it a lot of thought, so I'll be getting stuck into that over the next couple of weeks too. I didn't make one last year and I got a little lost, seemed to lose my focus, so I don't want THAT to happen again! Anyway....... I'm going out to say hello to the babies again and see if there's any more blossoms in the garden. What's that they say about a watched pot never boiling?.................

Ho-Hum

A quiet week on the home front. Planted a whole heap of seeds last week, and they are all coming through. They'll be ready to put in the ground around christmas, so that is actually my idea of a perfect Xmas day, planting everything out.

Check it out! A new baby lamb. It was a twin but the other one got tangled up on a fence and died. Please forgive me, but I just can't help thinking "Webber..........."

My home brew is GREAT! This week I had a go at making some wine. I found this place on the net that sells yeast and special caps for juice bottles. All you do is add a measure of the yeast, cap with the special caps, wait 4 days and get into it. So tomorrow is the big day.... having our first home-made wine taste-test.

I've been doing lots of baking in an effort to keep the grocery shopping down to the barest minimum. I've always cooked meals from scratch, never been much of a fan of jars and cans and that. I always baked when my kids were little but haven't done much of it for years. I'm really enjoying it. It's working out a lot cheaper and it's definitely healthier, because I'm using all low-fat recipes. I'm thinking about having a go at making bread. I'm looking around at the moment to see if I can find some tins. I don't want to use a breadmaker, they're too expensive to run. That's a little goal anyway, something to get around to.

Still waiting for tourism to go into overdrive around here. Everybody is saying it won't be long now. Can't come quick enough for me. I want the money! Can't wait to do some serious banking.

Started ANOTHER diet today. When I quit smoking on Feb. 25 I promised myself I wouldn't beat myself up about my weight for 1 whole year. But 9 months and 15 kilos later, I don't think I can afford to wait anylonger. Any health benefits I'm gaining from quitting are being negated by the massive amount of weight I've put on.

So..... Wish me luck with the diet, the garden, the tourism situation, the livestock...... Whatever. Just check in with me again next week and I'll let you know how things are going.