Simply Suburbia

Solar

2010-08-03T14:31:00.002+10:00

What a wonderful sight!
At last our solar panels are up - all 16 of them. Still waiting for conection to the grid though.

Handmade

2010-07-31T10:56:00.004+10:00

Earlier in the year I started a little shore at Made It to sell my hand made childrens cloth books and other handcrafted items. I love craft and I love others appreciating my handmade items too.

Today I just wanted to share some lovely finds for those that are concerned with loving our world a little more and being kinder to the enviroment. Oh, and because they are very practical, cute and unique.
Owl shopping or library bag.

Citrus dish soap for use washing the dishes and keeping the kitchen sparkly and fresh.
Enviromentally friendly chenille dishcloths made from recycled fabric.

Vegetable /fruit eco shopping bags to cut down on plastics at the supermarket.

Draft stopper snake to keep your home draft free and help reduce heating costs.

Then and Now

2010-07-20T18:19:00.004+10:00

Sometimes it is good to look back and realise just how much progress has been made in the garden.

Front garden in 2008 above and below at beginning of this year. There is always something in flower in the front yard - roses, agapanthus, diamond frost which is the white flowers at the front (always flowering). Amongst all jthat there is a fig tree in a large pot, a mango tree, blueberry bushes and strawberry plants, thyme, and parsley is also growing in gaps.

Below is the raised vege patch in Sep 2008 when it was newly built

And how it is looking now. At the moment I have snow peas as tall as the fence, beetroot, silverbeet, turnips, chillis, eggplants, parsleys and some young tomatoes.

The long backyard when we first moved here - all lawn and no trees or shrubs.

Now the backyard is lush and green. There are now passionfruit vines, 5 citrus trees, 2 apples, lemon grass and herbs galore, peach tree, 4 olives all planted amongst fragrant flowers and bushes.

Mandarins

2010-07-12T11:57:00.004+10:00

The little mandarin tree is loaded and the mandarins are very sweet and juicy. Delicious eaten just are.

But some will be made into marmalade for the pantry.

As a special desert last night I made Mandarins in Ginger Syrup.

Here is the recipe

1 1/2 cups water

1 cup sugar

1/4 cup thinly sliced peeled ginger

4 green cardamon pods

3 whole star anise

6 mandarins

Bring water, sugar, ginger, cardamon,star anise to boil until sugar dissolves. Then simmer uncovered for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Remove from heat cover and allow to stand for 15 min. Strain syrup and discard solids. Chill until cold.

Peel, remove any pips and slice mandarins into rounds. put into a serving bowl and add syrup. Cover for an hour before serving.

Oh they were delicious and I will definately be making these again.

A little break

2010-05-11T10:23:00.003+10:00

But I am back and aiming to blog once a week. Hmm, wonder if that will happen!

While away I aquired this collection below. My aunt is cleaning out my nans house and I have inherited these amongst other things.
They are salt cellars, Salts, and were used in the 1800's and earlier and up to about 1950 to hold salt. In those days salt wasn't fine enough for a salt shaker. IT came to the table in one of these dishes with a cute little spoon. Evidently my nan liked them, so started collecting them. Luckily they are only small so I could bring them home safely wrapped in my suitcase. Next visit I will bring the rest home with me.

This is my favourite - a cute green glass swan with little spoon.

I also brought this back. It is an early baby bottle and was used by my nan as a baby. Evidently it is dated early 1900's and as it says on the bottle is the " improved baby feeder" The top is intact and is a cork with a porcelain top with a hole in it - no soft sipper or spout back then.
I also came home with loads of old clothes - hats, gloves, lace baby outfits etc. They belonged to my great grandma. My nan grew up very poor and never threw anything away! Hence her old home is full of old treasures. She was a real collector/hoarder. And I for one am very glad that she was. I will share a few more pictures of my treasures next post.

Now holidays are over I am itching to get back to the sewing machine. I have a few more childrens cloth books almost finished. My little Made it store needs more stock. I am happy to report I have sold two of my cloth childrens books - hurray.

In the Garden

2010-03-30T11:14:00.003+11:00

My poor garden has been sadly neglected over summer. The only veges to do well have been chillis and pumpkin vines (I say pumpkin vines because the pumpkins didn't grow well) - I did make a few meals of stuffed pumpkin flowers and will share the recipe in another post becuase they were yummy.

Despite the neglect the herbs are all thriving. My mushroom plants are growing fantastically. This herb is amazing. The leaves taste just like mushrooms and are great in stirfrys, casseroles, omelettes or sandwiches. It is high in chlorophyll, calcium and protien - a little wonder herb.
Read more about them here http://www.herbsarespecial.com.au/free-herb-information/mushroom-plant.html

I have also found a use for all the olive oil tins I have been keeping. I have removed the tops, punched drainage holes in the bottom and planted them with herbs. They are just outside the door and make a nice little display.

Picking watermelons. They are all small but very juicy and sweet. They wont last long. I will be saving seeds from these to plant next year.

I have also been keeping busy on the sewing machine sewing more cloth books for my made it store.

I can't believe a whle school term has just about finished! It simply flew by.

Replacing Plastics

2010-03-17T11:11:00.005+11:00

I have been reading a lot about plastic containers and have started replacing the plastic containers around the house. Have a look at the links below if you feel like a bit of reading.

http://www.choice.com.au/Reviews-and-Tests/Food-and-Health/Food-and-drink/Safety/Plastic-food-containers/page/Introduction.aspx
http://www.hoax-slayer.com/plastic-coding-system.shtml
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=plastic-not-fantastic-with-bisphenol-a

My pantry was the first place I began. I have replaced a lot of storage containers with glass. And I must say the pantry has never looked neater and it is so much easier to see what is in the jars. Drink bottles have been replaced by these. I love how they have big openings so cleaning is very easy. http://www.naturallysustainable.com.au/
Our lunchboxes are still plastic but I just love these cuter than cuter Eco Lunch box sets. They come in a huge range of colours too.

http://www.ecolunchboxes.com/product.html

They are on my wish list!

It will take a while to eliminate all the plastic so just doing a bit at a time at the moment but it so good to know there are some great alternatives out there.

Crafty Blog

2010-03-15T13:00:00.004+11:00

I have been busy making a new blog in an attempt to keep the crafty side and Made it shop items seperate from this blog.

Creative Wishes

So pop over and tell me what you think. It is amazing how much time it takes to set up these things!

Meanwhile the garden is looking very neglected. The only things I am picking a lot of is herbs, eggplants and chillis. Fruit flies have found my citrus, pumpkin vines have taken over my yard and aren't even growing pumpkins!

Creating

2010-03-12T10:16:00.003+11:00

It has been a while between posts but there is a very exciting reason for that!

At the beginning on the year I wrote a post about my goals for the year and my word for the year Create.

http://simplysuburbia.blogspot.com/2010/01/heres-to-2010.html

Creating is what I have been doing lots of!

I have been sewing.

I have been glueing.

I have been scrapbooking.

I have been hand stitchitching.
And as of yesterday I have taken the plunge and set up a shop at Made It

http://www.madeit.com.au/storecatalog.asp?userid=12610

Creative Wishes

I have always made things - sewn, knitted, papercraft, scrapbooking, card making etc. My hands need to be busy! I can't just sit and watch tv... I need to be doing something with my hands.

But most of what I have made in the past goes to friends or family as gifts.

So selling my handcrafts is a very new thing for me and something I hope others appreciate as much as I have loved making.

Creative Wishes will give me an avenue to sell some of my handmade items. I have lots of other things to list in the next week or so.

OP SHOPS

2010-02-16T12:34:00.002+11:00

Now it is no secret that I love second hand and op shopping. But lately I haven't been getting the same buzz from entering an op shop. There are still great finds to be discovered and fantastic bargains to be had. But op shops have changed and evolved. Now they have professional window displays, clothes hanging neatly on racks sorted by colour and size. Items are neatly displayed on shelves. There are even new items for sale. One op shop I visited last week has a loyalty card - ten purchases and get the next 50% off!

I used to love the rummaging through boxes and bookshelves to find the perfect book or over looked treasure. I used to love the items not having prices and getting to the counter and getting the item for an absolute bargain. But now they are run as a business and to me have lost that special something. Maybe it is the slightly musty smell you get when entering a second hand shop or the haphazard displays, maybe they have become too neat and tidy and orderly.

Oh well! Maybe they have had to change to compete with people selling on ebay.
Still I miss the older op shops of 10 years ago.

NO, I am not lost

2010-02-05T16:55:00.005+11:00

I know, it has been a while!

Our January was busy with sailing and camping and walking and swimming and keeping cool!

Busy time of the year with holidays and now school starting back. My baby has begun kindy and has had a great week. He is disappointed that the weekend is here and he can't go to school for a whole 2 days. Wonder how long that will last. Guitar Dude and Zippy are in high school and have settled in well (and they are glad the weekend is coming).

So now all the little munchkins have started school I am finding myself with more time for myself. I have got so many things I want to do so I definately won't be bored.

One thing I have been investigating is selling handmade craft on Etsy http://www.etsy.com/ and Made It http://www.madeit.com.au/

Made It is an Australian site for buying and selling handmade and there are some wonderfully talented crafters out there!

This week I have got my sewing machine out (first time for over a year). Part of the reason I haven't sewn for ages is because I haven't had anywhere to keep it set up. It is such a hassle to take it out and set it up on the table and then having to either eat around it or put everything away while in the middle of a sewing project. I have now found a place to set it up permantly. My laundry is large , large enough for a chest freezer and for the ironing board to be permantly set up. With a bit of rearranging I have made myself a great creative sewing place in the laundry. The freezer is going and the ironing board is folded away.

And I have been sewing!

I will share my sewing projects in another post.

After a visit to spotlight to get some material I came away amazed at the price of material and fabric. So whats a girl to do but check out the local op shops for some bargains. And there was plenty to be had too. I came home with material for $1.00 a bunch, zips for $1.00, ribbons and more.

Also picked up this cookbook for a couple of dollars. It is a 1970's book but love the recipes in it. Promotes cooking seasonal foods from scratch with real foods. It even has recipes and instructions for making marmalades, pates, sauces and killing and plucking a chook ( I can't see myself ever doing this but good to know just in case).

And some Little Golden Books illustrated by Elois Wilkin. I am in love with her illustrations of babies and little children and collect her books.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/trywhistlingthis/sets/72157605891976713/

I came across this person on Made It who makes cards from the books.

http://www.madeit.com.au/detail.asp?id=35095

I wouldn't have the heart to rip up a good book but I have come across some in opshops with ripped pages which would be great for cards etc.

How gorgeous is this drawing?

Here's to 2010

2010-01-05T10:34:00.002+11:00

I am not one for making resoluions anymore. I have in the past and usual story I haven't kept them. I do like the idea of a WORD of the year. I know a lot of blogs have been posting their word for the year.
Eilleen at Consumption Rebellions http://consumption-rebellion.blogspot.com/2010/01/my-word-for-2010.html word is Celebrate.
Julie over at Towards Sustainabilityhttp://www.towards-sustainability.com/ word is resilience.

So I have given this a bit of thought and my word for the year is CREATE.
I want to sew more, scrapbook more. I want to continue creative a productive garden. I want to continue being a creative cook. I want to create a more patient positive me. Who else has a word of the year? I would love to hear what yours is.

At this time of the year I like to think of all I achieved over the last year (2009) and what I want to achieve in 2010.

2009 achievements:
Joined a community garden.
Simplified our eating by eliminating a lot of additives and prepackaged foods from our diets. This was a huge goal. Consistently for the last half of the year I have been cooking from scratch, buying veges, fruit, grains and meats direct and organic where ever possible.
Joined a gym with Mr Gadget.
After much planning our family went on our big overseas holiday.
Worked more on making the garden a productive enviroment.
Planted lots of fruit trees including banana, avocado, 2 apples, peach, cumquat, 3 passionfruit vines, 4 olive trees.
Increased the size of the vege patch and made a herb garden.

2010 Goals
Go to the gym at least 2-3 times each week
Finish list of repair/maintenance jobs around the house.
Paint remaining interior rooms.
Redo pool area and incorporate a water tank.
solar panels - investigate more.
Make craft and find an avenue for selling my handmade items.
Scrapbook travel photos
Maintain better communication with family and friends.
Increase social network.
Be a more positive and patient person.

Hmmm....looks like I'm going to be busy!

Cucumbers

2009-12-28T14:55:00.004+11:00

It is raining here in NSW and I couldn't be happier. It has rained for the last 4 days off and on. My garden is getting a much needed soaking. The kids have been playing happily inside with their Christmas presents. The weather is refreshing with a cool breeze each evening - a very welcome respite from the summer heat and humidity.

The vegetables in the raised garden are really taking off. Nothing beats a good down pour to get them growing.
I am picking loads of cucumbers at the moment.
We eat them with salads but I am always after new ways of using them.

So thought I would share some of my favourite things to make with cucumbers
.

Cucumber and cream cheese Mousse

1 large or 2 small cucumbers

275g cream cheese

2 tbs mint leaves

2 tsp white wine vinegar

2 1/2 tsp gelatine

150 ml vegetable stock

Ground pepper

Blend cucumbers, cream cheese, vinegar and mint in a blender until smooth.

Dissolve gelatine in a little of the stock over a low heat until dissolved.

Once cool stir in the remaining stock. Add this to the cream cheese mixture.

Season and blend.

Refrigerate for at least 2 hurs until set.

Serve with cucumber and crackers.

Tzazziki Dip

500g yoghurt cheese

1 large or 2 small cucumbers

2 cloves garlic

tsp salt

Make yoghurt cheese by placing the yoghurt in muslin and let it drain overnight or for a few hours. The whey will be drained off leaving a thicker yoghurt.

Blend cucumbers and squeeze out excess liquid.

Blend garlic and cucumbers with the yoghurt. Season with salt and refrigerate until ready to eat.

Anyone else got some delicious dips or ways of cooking with cucumbers?

BUGS

2009-12-23T10:00:00.004+11:00

The heat has been getting me out in the garden earlier in the morning. While the kids sleep I go out and water and do a quick tidy up.

The insects are still out. They haven't gone for shelter from the harsh sun. It amazes me , the amount of bugs out there. I am always running into spider webs and squealing at the thought of a spider crawling over me. I love them in the garden but not too close and definately not crawling on me. I f I come across spiders in the house they get killed but the ones in the garden I leave.

Noticed something has been eating my bean leaves.

And after a bit of searching found him. Needless to say he ended up squished.

And this bug was in the pool. I fished him out and he is drying in my hand. I am not sure what sort he is but the green is so bright. Superboy has been finding a few of these every now and then and always around the water.

Our week

2009-12-05T09:16:00.003+11:00

It has gone by so quickly! Thought a quick update would be good just to show I haven't dissapeared completely.

GARDEN:

I have been enjoying the garden more than working in it. Plenty of flowers in bloom including lots of sunflowers. I should have plenty of sunflower seeds in a few weeks for my cooking. Thats if I can get to them before the birds do. At the moment we are getting frequent visits from the parrots. They are enjoying eating the seeds from the butterfly flowers.

This photo is a part of the front garden. It is a little overgrown at the moment and like a mini field of flowers. Amongst those flowers I have some herbs growing, silverbeet and squash plants. There is a young mango tree too.

READING:

I have just started reading The China Study. From what I have read so far (which isn't very much) it is proving to be a very interesting book and confirming in my mind what I already believe about what we eat affects our health.

I am also reading Cindi O Meara's book Changing Habits, Changing Lives. I am a huge fan of Cindi O'Meara. She advocates eating real food, food that our great, great grandparents would recognize. Real foods that are cooked from real ingredients.

This book is about making changes one at a time. You read the chapter and inplement that change and once you have got that change down pat move onto the next chapter and work on changing that one. Changes include such things as starting the day with breakfast. I have done that one.

Now my day begins with a cup of water with lemon juice, fruit and a boiled egg or a homemade protien shake (complete with fruit, egg, oats etc).

BAKING:

I have been cooking heaps. It is so quicker and cleaner and easier with the thermomix. After an hour and a half yesterday I had made bread, crackers, chocolate chip and macadamia nut cookies for lunch boxes, hommus dip and custard.

All made from real ingredients and no additives.

Today I am making pastry for a quiche, sorbet and more bread.

Saving Time

2009-11-18T14:36:00.003+11:00

With this little baby.

It is a Thermomix and it is all mine. I am in love. I have wanted one of these after hearing Cindi O Meara talking about how they have made her life so easier.

Cindi O Meara is a nutritionalist with a few bestselling books and she speaks such common sense. She promotes eating food that is natural and chemical and preservative free.

http://www.changinghabits.com.au/

I almost choked when I heard just how much they were. Lets just say that they aren't cheap. The price turned me off for months and months. That is until I went to a cooking demostration and saw one in action. And I was blown away. In a little over an hour it made sorbets, dips, bread dough, coleslaw, lentil hot pot, smoothies, butter ... all in the one bowl with next to no mess to clean up afterwards.
It is a one stop kitchen appliance.
It can grind wheat grains into flour, raw sugar into icing sugar.
It can knead bread and dough.
It cooks and stirs at the same time - no need to stand over the oven while cooking anymore.
It cuts and mixes.
It can even wash itself.
So far I have made bread using wheat grains (remember the Thermomix will grind the wheat into flour.
I have made tomato sauce - it cuts the onion, tomatoes, herbs, then heats and stirs and cooks them.
Sorbet in a couple of minutes - ice, egg white, sugar, mango and banana.
Mushroom soup.
Chocolate spread (similar to nutella) but with hazelnuts. The Thermomix grinds the nuts smooth, melts the chocolate and mixes.

So enough raving! If you have a chance go and see one in action. You can only buy direct from a demonstrator which is another thing that turned me off initially. But I found there was no hard sell. The demostrator I saw using it just cooked and answered question and then let the machine speak for itself.
People who want to cook from scratch like myself, those who grow their own fruit and veges, and those like myself who just run out of time each day will love this. It is so fast and easy.

Hmmm.... did I say I love it yet?

Bulk Buying

2009-11-11T19:38:00.002+11:00

It has been a while since I have posted. But now the holidays are over its back to day to day life.
Since being back I am more determined than ever to get back onto track with our food - both buying and eating. Before I was getting rather overwhelmed with trying to make too many big changes all at once -
- buying local foods.
- eating organic foods.
- growing our own vegetables and fruits.
- supporting local shops.
- eating foods with low or no additives.
- preparing foods from scratch, unprocessed.
- bulk buying.
- preserving our own foods.
Finding the time to do all the above was proving difficult.

Well I could go on with the list of changes I want to make.

Instead I am focusing on one thing at a time and getting that system into place and making it a habit before going onto another change.

So the first thing I am concentrating on is bulk buying. I am lucky to be in touch with a great group of people living locally who are also interested in eating and cooking more healthily. We have formed a bulk buying group and have got our fruit and veges, grains and red meats covered. We haven't found a good supplier of organic chicken or turkey yet though.

I have been part of a fruit and vegetable goup now for over 5 years. At the moment there are six of us in the group. Each fortnight we put in $30.00 and two of us each fortnight go to the farmers market and buy for the group, come home and sort it into 6. This all takes about 2 1/2 hours. Our turn comes around every 6 weeks which makes it very easy. We are going this Friday so I will take a photo of the amount we buy for our $30.00 and post it - huge amount!

We buy our grains wholesale from here
http://www.goodness.com.au/
The wholesale prices are good, its organic and products are great. We divide each up into 1 kg or more lots and share them around.

Meats (lamb and beef) are brought direct from the farm here http://www.moppitymeats.com.au/index.html. Their meats taste so much nicer than that from the supermarket!

Our eggs come from the fruit and vege market and so does our honey.
Milk I still buy from the supermarket. I wish I knew someone with a cow.

And we are very lucky to live close to this shop
http://www.bibina.com.au/content.php3?p=aboutus
They stock a huge range of Australian and imported foods and bulk amounts, hard to find ingredients etc. It is a cooks dream just to wander up and down the aisle.

CARBON MILES

2009-10-22T13:42:00.003+11:00

We've gone through a few!

We have been here...

and here...and here...

and are finally home.

Vege Garden Dreams

2009-08-18T19:44:00.004+10:00

Last September Mr Gadget built me a dedicated vegetable patch. A raised garden bed in a sunny corner of the garden. Prior to this my vege plantings were rather haphazard. I brought and planted punnets of seedlings in any vacant spot I could find in the garden with not much success. The seedlings were competing with other plants, in poor soil, or getting too much sun or not enough.

With the new vegetable patch I developed an interest in growing my own vegetables from seeds and also in saving seeds for use in the future.

Last summer I had great success with basil, cucumbers, eggplants and cherry tomatoes.

This winter I have a great supply of carrots, parsley, radishes, lettuce and chinese cabbage.

I have dreamt of the day I can go off to my vegetable patch and pick all the vegetables I need for the families dinner. Well yesterday I did. We had fish with lemon juice from the tree out the back and rice with home grown carrots, parsley, radishes and tomatoes. Such a small thing but to me it represented a great success and I am feeling rather chuffed at being able to provide my family with home grown fruit and vegetables.

But now I am in need of more room for vegetable growing so I have a vege patch in the front yard. I have large pots growing more carrots, Styrofoam boxes from the fruit and vegetable markets growing chillies, capsicums and more vegetables.

I have a potting area near the water tank for growing cuttings and more seeds and another seed raising area on top of the bunnys cage outside the kitchen window.

My vege garden dreams are coming true and I am happy.

WINTER GARDEN

2009-07-21T13:24:00.004+10:00

The boys have all had winter lurgies - coughs, chest infections ear infections. One gets better and the next gets sick and now they are starting all over again.
I haven't been spending much time in the garden, other than wandering arond with a nice hot coffee in my hands.

I have lots of tomatoes growing. When I emptied the ocmpost loads of seedlings shot up. They seem to be copeing all right with the cold so I will leave them and see what happens.

This year I planted small carrots in pots. These carrots only grow about 10cm deep. They are sweet and full of flavour. We have been eating them raw or with dips. Yum!

Lavendar is my favourite flower. I can't get enough of them. On my kitchen bench I have 4 mini vases and I pick lavendar for here. They give the kitchen a lovely scent. Last year I planted 4 new varieties in the front yard. Two are early flowering varieties and 2 later ones. I want to have lavendar flowering all year long. The bees and insects love this little unassuming flower as much as I do.

The potatoe vines are also flowering over a coupleof arches in the back garden.

The citrus trees are weighted down with mandarins and lemons. The orange and other lemon are still too small to be fruiting. I have been juicing the fruit and we enjoy a glass each day.

Finally a couple of the new fruit trees. These are the apple trees - granny smith and pink lady. I have duo planted them on raised soil. The blue pipes are for watering so we can get the water down to the roots.

FRUIT TREES

2009-07-16T10:53:00.003+10:00

I have been making room in my garden for some more fruit trees. I went through Daleys fruit tree catalogue http://www.daleysfruit.com.au/fruitindex.htm and made a list of the fruit trees I would love to have in my garden. The list was long, more trees than I had space for. So I narrowed it down considerable to just four new fruit trees.

Then I had to decide where I would plant them. This wasn't easy as the garden is full. I have had to sacrifice some hebe bushes to make room. And dig up more lawn to extend the garden. My backyard is long and narrow. It is over 40 metres long and 4 metres wide. The house runs one length and the back fence the other.

In winter the backyard is mostly in the shade except for some sun in the later afternoon towards the fence. In summer this area gets a lot more sun though. I am hoping that the lack of direct sun in winter will mean that the fruit trees I have selected get plenty of chill hours during winter.

The fruit trees I chose are a fig tree (black genoa) - Fig Black Genoa
A large sized fig with purple skin and red flesh and a very sweet rich flavour. It is a high yielding fig making it popular for home gardeners.

Peach - Angel Peach Tree Donut Peach. The Angel Peach grows to approximately 3 metres by 3 metres, and has a beautiful spring flush of pink flowers. There are two varieties of the Angel Peach which can be grown around Australia - a high chill variety, which fruits in January / February, for the cooler areas and a low chill variety, which fruits in December, for the warmer areas of Australia. I brought the high chill one The fruit are donut shaped. It is a very sweet white fleshed variety, which is more soft and juicy in texture compared with standard peaches. Performs best in temperate climates. I have planted it closer to the house. In winter it will get mostly shade so should get plenty of chill hours.

Apples- Granny Smith and Pink Lady. I have plaanted these two trees as a duo planting - planted in the one hole, see the link for more information. http://www.flemings.com.au/documents/plant_a_duo_guide.pdf

The fruit trees I have now include the four above and 2 lemons, 1 mandarin, 1 orange, 3 passionfruit vines, 1 dwarf banana, 1 dwarf avocado, 1 mango, 1 plumcot.

LIKE MINDED PEOPLE

2009-06-24T16:59:00.003+10:00

A few weeks ago I was invited to a gathering at a friend of a friends house. There was a lady there who was going to talk about how her whole family have changed to an additive free eating lifestyle.
Gathered in the room were at least 20 other women around my age, some with kids, some without, some working mothers some not but all interested in a simpler, healthier eating style.
The lady talked about how and why she decided to change her families eating habits and how she eliminated all additives from their diet. Their family have maintained this healthier lifestyle for over 18 months now. She had lots of wonderful hints, delicious recipes, talked about additive free treats for the kids and their additive free birthday parties. She explained where she sources her organic foods from and a normal daily eating style for their family. Her kids have chips, chocolate, biscuits and cakes. they eat sausages and lots of other meats. But the difference is that she buys foods with no additives or if she cant buy them she makes them.
After the talk she had books for sale. Then we all had nibblies and stayed around to chat.
The talk went from eating habits, organic foods, growing our own foods, cooking fresh foods to making yoghurt and bread, soap and perfumes.
Everyone seemed to have something to contribute and different people had different things that they were interested in or talents to share.
We ended up swapping email address', and names and phone numbers.
We have decided to all get together again and share some of our knowledge.
We have organised a yoghurt making day and a herb swapping day as well. We have labelled our little group "Living Good".
One lady has sourced a bulk buy of local organic grown macadamias, macadamia oil and macadamia body wash at a fantastic price. We are also investigating bulk organic chicken and beef group buys and organic grains as well.
I am very excited by all this! It wasn't that long ago that people interested in organics, growing own veges, making yoghurts and breads were a rarity. Now it is becoming a trendy thing to do - a trend I am very happy to follow. I hope it isn't just a trend though - I hope these changes I am seeing everywhere are here to stay. Times are changing, peoples attitudes are changing and I am excited.

MAKING SOAP

2009-06-17T10:35:00.004+10:00

Soap making - this is something I have wanted to do for a long time. I have read about it and always felt like it was a complicated thing to do. Also the danger of using sodium hydroxide has scared me off in the past - it is a powerful corrosive and can cause blindness if splashed in the eyes, it can burn skin.

So I chose a day when no kids were at home.

I used a basic soap mix recipe from Organic Gardening Magazine (Jan/Feb 2008 issue).http://www.abc.net.au/gardening/features/organic_gardener.htm

The instructions were very easy to follow.

First I gathered my equipment.

Now let me say right here that stainless steel pot is the go! NOT ALUMINIUM! I tried making soap in an aluminium pot (I didn't realize it was a problem) and the sodium hydroxide reacts with the aluminium. The mixture instantly reached boiling point and great bubbles burped from it. Then clouds of horrid steam came into the air. I was in the laundry and left until the steam had settled, leaving a fine dusting of chemicals over the surfaces. The smell lingered for ages too.

This time I worked outside. I donned my safety goggles, gloves and long sleeves. I made sure I had some vinegar handy as vinegar will neatralize the soddium in case of splashes. I added the sodium hydroxide to the water (never the other way around). There is an instant chemical reaction that heats the water. I stirred a few times with a wooden spoon which I will use only for soap making and then left until the mix had cooled to 48 degrees.

After this I added the oils being careful not to splash myself. Then I stirred... and stirred...and stirred. Stirring helps saponification. This brings the acids and alkali into contact and helps neutralize the mix. So although soap is made with sodium hydroxide it doesn't contain any at the end of the process. The recipe said to stirr until trace occurs, 5 -40 min. I stirred way over an hour and got the mix to a light trace. Trace can be recognized when you dribble a bit of the mixture on the surface and it sits on top for a while before sinking. I read in another soap making book I have Gourmet Soap Made Easy by Melinda Coss http://www.amazon.com/Gourmet-Soaps-Made-Easy-Melinda/dp/158180217X that trace can sometimes take several hours and dont worry if you are sure the mixture was correct just pour into a mould and leave it to set.

So I poured the mix into my mould and left for 24 hours before taking out of the mould and cutting. For a mould I used a shallow cardboard box and lined it with freezer bags opened up so they would cover the base and sides of the box. Now it is in a warm, ventilated place curing for another 2-3 weeks. Looks rather rustic , doesn't it. The cutting is rather haphazard. This being my first batch, I decided not to add any essential oils. Next time I will experiment with some herbs or oatmeal or essential oils. I am also very interested in making soap with goats milk. Has anyone had experience with using goats milk? I have read that the milk can curdle and turn a nasty yellow and makes the initial mix smell strongly of ammonia.

SWEET POTATOES

2009-06-03T15:56:00.004+10:00

I've never grown them before.

I planted a few sweet potatoes that had started to sprout a few months ago and picked the first one today. I had a bit of a dig around but the others aren't big enough yet so I will wait a while longer before digging them up. The sweet potatoe plants have just started to flower - pale purple flowers that remind me a bit of morning glory flowers.

I have just made a potatoe bake with normal potatoe and sweet potatoe for tea tonight.

M xx

TO MARKET TO MARKET

2009-05-31T11:41:00.006+10:00

... to buy lots of fruit and vegetables.

Locally there is a fruit and vege market. It is only open to the public on Friday mornings and mostly you can only buy veges in bulk. Last Friday we got together with 4 others and each put in $30.00. Then we divided the large boxes of fruit and veges between us.

I came home with tomatoes, onions, cucumbers, corn, pumpkin, oranges, pears, apples, spring onions, spinach. Lots and lots of each.

So this weekend I have been busy cooking.

Stewed apples for the freezer - will be used for apple crumbles, muffins, pies etc.

Tomatoe sauce to freeze. This is very easy - cut up tomatoes, onion, garlic, salt and pepper, herbs from the garden (I used mint, oregano, chilli and parsley). Boil until soft and then blend slightly, ladle into containers and place in freezer. This sauce is wonderful with pasta or in casseroles.

TOMATOE AND CHILLI SAUCE

4cloves garlic

3 tsp cloves

3 tsp peppercorns

2 kg ripe tomatoes

1 1/2 cups sugar

2/3 cup white vinegar

2 tsp sea salt

4 fresh chillies

Stir all ingreddients over heat until sugar dissolves. Bring to boil and boil everything for 45 mins or until mixture thickens slightly. Blend until smooth. Strain through sieve to. Pour sauce into hot sterilised bottles and seal when cold.

PEAR GINGER AND LEMON JAM

5 medium lemons

8 pears, peeled and chopped

1/4 cup glace ginger, chopped

1 1/4 litres water

4 cups sugar

Slice lemons(unpeeled) and combine in pot with remaining ingredients. Stir over heat without boiling until sugar dissolves. Bring to boil, simmer uncovered for 1 hour or until jam jells when tested. Pour jam into hot sterilised jars, seal when cold.
M XX

GADGETS

2009-05-21T15:49:00.006+10:00

One of my least appreciated presents would have to be kitchen gadgets. I am sure you know the ones - electrical choppers, graters, serving bowls etc. They are the type of things I seem to get a few of each year for birthdays or Christmas. My family and friends know I love cooking and creating in the kitchen. But I haven't the heart to tell them I hate most kitchen gadgets. They used to be put into the cupboards and hardly used. I have since found new homes for most of my excess and unused gifts of the kitchen kind.

There are however some kitchen gadgets that I absolutely love and use over and over again. Most of them are are simple things that make life much easier.

1. APPLE CORER/PEELER/SLICER:

For some reason the kids think apples taste better when they are peeled/cored with this. I actually think it is the long spiral of apples that they really like. Super Boy loves apples done like this when he goes to preschool. I use the peeler heaps when making stewed apples for apple crumbles or to freeze. It saves a lot of time rather than peeling an dcutting by hand and it is all manual - no electricity.

2. MORTAR AND PESTLE:

This one is a heavy marble one. It gets loads of use for crushing garlic, herbs, nuts etc.

3. OIL SPRAYER:

If you do a lot of cooking like I do then this little sprayer is very useful. It is a simple hand pump for oil. It is refillable and perfect for oiling baking trays, frypans etc.
And a million times cheaper than buying those cans of oil spray from the supermarket.

4.CORN HOLDERS:

Love these! No more burnt fingers from holding cobs of hot corn. The spiky bits fit togther when storing so no spikes in fingers when rummaging through the drawers. A very civilized way of eating corn.

5. BREAD MACHINE:

I have no idea how much electricity the bread machine gobbles but I think it is worth it for the convenience and time saving. I use mine heaps. Sometimes for making dough for pizzas and foccacia bread and other times for loaves of bread or buns.

I would love to know what kitchen gadgets others find really useful. Leave me a comment on your favourites.

M xx

2009-05-21T15:49:00.001+10:00

DIAMOND FROST

2009-05-16T16:07:00.006+10:00

Euphorbia Diamond Frost is its real name.

I first heard about this plant on Better Homes and Gardens a year or more ago and they raved about it - drought hardy, needs little extra watering, flowers all the time, pretty dainty white flowers...

But when I went looking for it I couldn't find it in any of my local nursery's until last November when I saw three plants for sale on the discount table at my local Bunnings store. I almost left them there as they looked so scraggly and unattractive. Boy, I am so glad I didn't because I love this plant so much.

All the claims are true. So far it hasn't stopped flowering. It will flower every month of the year in warmer areas. It loves a sunny spot or semi shade. Where mine is planted it gets full sun in summer and dappled shade in winter. The flowers are tiny whispy just like little butterflies . The bees and other insects love the plant. The foliage is lime green. The plant can grow to 1m by 1m but mine are smaller than that. They are perfect for a cottage garden look. And the best thing other than the endless flowers is that once you have one plant it is so easy to divide. As I said I began with three and I have pulled off parts from the plant and popped them into the soil to give a carpet effect. I have at least 15 plants now.

It grows really well in a pot too - check out the picture below. How gorgeous is that! It isn't mine, found the image on the web, but after seeing this I am putting a plant in a pot outside my kitchen window where I can admire it.
M xx

RHUBARB

2009-05-15T11:45:00.003+10:00

Rhubarb is such a nostalgic fruit for me. As a child it was served up in crumbles, stewed with apples or made into pies. The gorgeous crimson stems added a lovely colour to our deserts.

In my garden I have 4 rhubarb plants growing. This is their first year and I have been told by an old seasoned gardener that I should let them grow and become established for a year before harvesting any. The leaves are poisonous although that hasn't stopped the bugs chewing at them - maybe they are dead bugs now. Oxalic acid is in the leaves and that is the poison. My dad tells me if he had a mouse problem in the compost he would put a few rhubarb leaves in there with peanut butter smeared on them. The mice would be attracted to the peanut butter and nibble the leaves and die.
The leaves can be steeped in a bin full of water and then the resulting liquid used as a deterrent for cabbage white butterflies. I haven't tried this but I have been told it seems to work and it smells bad!
The stalks on three of the plants are thick and long and the leaves huge. These three are planted in a shady area of the yard which only recieves a few hours of sunlight a day at this time of the year. They seem to be very happy there amongst the nasturtiums and the little olive trees. The other plant is up near my raised vege patch and is in full sunlight. It is not as happy nor as healthy looking.

I am looking for forward to my rhubarb getting big enough to use - I don't think I will be waiting a year though.
Then I will be trying out a few of the recipes from the link below. Rhubard jam and chutney sounds delicious.

http://www.rhubarbinfo.com/recipe-jam.html#index_jam_5

M xx

THE WAY IT WAS

2009-05-13T15:59:00.003+10:00

Growing up in my parents house we led a fairly simple life. As a child I thought we were well off. We had heaps of food, a dodgy tv, freedom to play in our large yard or up in the bush or down by the river.
It is only as an adult that I realized my parents were doing it tough. Without dads large vegetable garden, my nannas sewing and knitting skills and my mums thriftiness, making ends meet would have been a real struggle.
My dad had a large vegetable garden and many fruit trees - 8 apples, a few pears, two huge plums, lemon, raspberry vines, gooseberry, rhubard to name a few. Dad was the gardener. He came home from work and was out in the garden until we called him in for tea and then again after tea for an hour or two.
Mums domain was the house. She had the task of preserving, bottling and storing all the home grown produce. She stewed apples and berries for the freezer, bottled pears, froze excess vegetables, made the most delicious plum and tomatoe sauce (as children we never had store brought sauce).
My nanna and unmarried Aunt kept us girls in clothes. They knitted us lovely jumpers for winter (our Tassie winters were cold), they sewed us dresses for summer. My Aunt always looked out for clothes on sale for us. Nothing was brought at full price - there wasn't the money. But we never felt deprived.
Mum cooked on a combustion stove. It was a great big, soot covered black cast iron thing. Nothing like the one in the picture above. She hated it! The stove also heated up the water, so no fire going meant no hot water! First thing of a morning one of us would light the combustion. It smoked and went out regularly. The hot water took at least 30 min to heat up and it was forever going cold, usually in the middle of having a shower. If we had been out all day the first thing needing to be done was to get the fire going. In summer it made the house too warm. In winter we hated going outside and up to the shed to bring in armfulls of wood.
When I was a teen mum finally got rid of the combustion heater and replaced it with electric oven and electric hot water.
Now having a combustion oven sounds wonderful. Maybe not here in Newcastle in the heat of summer but it would sure beat the electric oven.
Mxx

Going Ons

2009-04-28T20:33:00.003+10:00

Winter Plantings:
I tried to grow spinach from seed again with no success so ventured to the plant nursery and came home with seedlings of spinach, brocolli, silverbeet, basil, onions and leeks.
I also got a golden passionfruit. The old passionfruits have both died this past year. They lasted about 5 years and provided us with a mountain of fruit.
The seedlings were all planted in biodegradable potts. After planting out, the pots can be added to the compost and breakdown. How wonderful! Maybe these pots have been around for a while and I have only just discovered them? When we have bulk rubbish collections the main items I see being tossed are pots - those plastic ones of various sorts and sizes. I have collected a number of the larger black ones and some decent sized terracotta ones.

In The Garden:
I still have heaps of basil. Tomorrow I will make up some pesto and freeze. It seems that the more basil I pick, the more it grows. So if I pick a good bunch tomorrow I might still get some good growth from it before the weather gets too cold.
My carrot seeds have all germinated - very happy about this as I have found it hard to grow carrots from seeds before.
Citrus trees have various problems I need to deal with. The mature meyer lemon tree has some wasp gall swellings that I need to cut off and burn. Again this year there are heaps of lemons maturing on it. The mandarin tree has lots of fruit too but they are splitting before fully ripe. Must look up what this means. The infant lemon tree and orange tree have been sprayed with oil as something has been nibbling on their leaves and leaving a skeleton type track.
I have loads of lettuce, parsley and tomatoes that have sprouted from the compost heap when it was emptied onto the vege patch. The tomatoes probably wont have enought warm days to bear fruit but the parsley and lettuce are very welcome garden additions.

Reassessing Water Usage:
After getting thelatest bill - increased from the same period last year by much more than I am happy about. This year has been drier and I have used a lot more water in the garden. Our water tank ran dry part way through summer unfortunately so I had to rely on tap water. We really need another tank. Priority before next summer. Also Guitar Dude and Zippy (one a teen and one soon to be) spend way too long in the shower. There is a timer in there but it either gets forgotten or turned over and over way too much!

Community: There is going to be a community garden in my area! I am so thrilled about this and as soon as I heard about the plans sent off an email expressing interest to help in anyway. We are all meeting next week at the proposed garden site. It is still very early days but finding out who some of the eager people that are instigating this gives me great hope that the gardens will get off the ground and be a great success. One of the guys helping on the commity lives in my suburb. I don't know him at all but I walk past often to see his latest changes to his garden. First there were veges growing on his pegola roof in styrofome boxes (not sure how he got up and down to care for them), then he converted his front garden into a vegetable patch. Last week I noticed a section of the side garden fenced off and a few chickens there.
Not many of my friends are interested in sustainable living or enviromental issues so I hopefull of meeting some like minded people.
Also not too far away (just around the lake) has began a Transition Town project. I don't know too much about Transition Towns but have read a bit and the idea really appeals to me. Don't like the name though! From my understanding a Transitional Town is a locally sustainable community.

Kids: Back to school now after the holidays. Big ones not too thrilled, little one very excited! Time to get back into a routine again.
M xx

STITCHING 'N' BREWING

2009-04-16T21:16:00.003+10:00

I have been somewhat of a slack blogger lately. I have lots I have wanted to share but just haven't had the time to get on here and write a post. So I will be making more frequent posts for a while now.

I wanted to share these very cute owls. Found the pattern in a handmade magazine and I have been collecting scraps of material for a while. These cute owls are all made from offcuts from old clothes etc. I made them as Easter pressies for two cute niecesof mine but guess what? As soon as they were finished Super Boy and Zippy claimed one each.

I had intended making a couple more but haven't had the time and now that school hols are here I won't be getting the sewing machine out for another few weeks yet.

The herbs in the garden are growing prolifically at the moment. I have heaps of basil, parsley, lemon grass, lemon verbena, marjoran, oregano, rosemary and sage. I tend to get a bit lazy and forget to use them. So yesterday I went hunting for recipes and found some wonderful ones I plan on trying. Not just cooking ones either. As I try them out over the next few days I will share them here.

Today I brewed up a batch of hair shine. I have made this before and it worked a treat, especially on my hair and the boys which is straight and brown. It even cleared up Guitar Dudes flaky scalp problem.

Rosemary and Sage Hair Shine

3 tbs rosemary

2 tbs sage

1 1/2 quartz water

Boil the sage and rosemary in the water for 15 minutes. Remove the herbs and pour the liquid into a container. I use a spray container. When cool refrigerate. Spray on hair and let the liquid sit for 2 minutes. Rinse off.

M xx

POWER BLITZ

2009-04-05T14:03:00.002+10:00

I am on a power blitz. Mr Gadget is very interested in solar power especially with the rebates on offer - solar panels are a gadget to him and he does get mighty excitied about them. He almost blew me away when he suggested it. After a lot of research we have decided to go ahead and get solar power but first I want to see how much we can reduce our power usage. After all it is definately cheaper to reduce our use power use than to make it.

I started off with basic changes.
Turning lights off when we leave a room. All our light bulbs are the more energy efficient ones now.
Turning power off at the wall. Now this sounds so easy but I have been met with such resistance from Mr Gadget and the boys. They argue that it is too hard, not necessary, messes up the settings, doesn't save on power use etc. But really it is just laziness! Slowly they are coming around though. In the mean time I continue to go from room to room switching off power points. Some of the power points are really hard to get too -behind havy furniture but there is a power point gadget you can get with a remote control. Thinking this might be a good idea but I have resisted buying one because a) its another gadget and B) I have a bad relationship with remotes!
I have discovered that some powered items don't need to on continually such as the filter to the fish tank. I used to leave it running all the time, then decided to turn it off at nights and back on during the day. The fish were still active and alive, the tank was still clear. So now I have turned the filter off completely and it has now been over a month and all is nice.
The electric toothbrushes were always plugged in but now once the blue light is on indicating they are fully charged I turn them off and they don't get turned back until they are flat.
The pool filter I cautiously reduced the running time - just by a small amount at a time, and then watched making sure the pool didn't turn green. I think I have it worked out to the smallest running time to keep the water clean and blue.
We use appliances differently now too. I only turn on the oven when cooking a batch of things. I am using the gas bbq and cooking top more than the electric oven.
Our hot water is gas so no problems there.
The phones are cordless and rechargable and were once always turned on. Now I charge them up and turn them off.
So all these changes have resulted in lowering our power usage.

There is one area that is really wasting a lot of power and that is our fridge/freezer set up. We are a family of five and a few years ago found we never had room in our fridge so we brought a cheap small bar fridge for drinks. Then we began buying meats in bulk for freezing and making pasta sauces, stewing apple and freezing other produce. We ran out of freezer space in the freezer attached to our main fridge so went out and brought an electricity guzzling small chest freezer. So with our fridge/freezer, bar fridge and the chest freezer they add a lot to our power usage. I am in a quandry as to what to do since all three are working really well. Our best option is to make the cash outlay and buy the one fridge/freezer that is the right size for our needs rather than running the three we have now. I just dont like the idea of getting rid of perfectly good items and buying new. In the mean time we have emptied the bar fridge and turned it off. Mr Gadget is all for buying a new fridge/freezer but he is all excited about fridges with ice and water dispensers and the fridges with a mini pop open door to get out milk/drinks. Oh, he loves his gadgets! Me, I just want the most energy efficient basic design that meets our needs.

I will be standing my ground on this one too.
Stay tuned.

OKRA

2009-03-22T11:05:00.003+11:00

I have been asked how to grow okra and how to cook with it. I like silver queen okra - seems to grow well here (Newcastle area). I grow mine from seeds and they are very easy to propagate. They love sun and heat so I have planted my okra seedlings in the front garden whick is north facing and recieves sun all day. The flowers are yellow and pretty little things, though they only last a day and really don't stand out.

The okra pods need to be picked when small or otherwise they tend to get hard and woody. When picking them pick with a bit of stalk intact as the okra have this slimy viscous sap inside them. Not at all attractive - like snot was Zippy's comment.

Before cooking the okra I prepare them the Greek way by washing and trimming the stalk but dont remove the cone shaped tops. Place in a bowl and pour over vinegar. Turn to coat and then let stand for 20 min. Then rinse well and dry gently. This reduces the slimyness and prevents them splitting when cooking. I use the okras in casseroles or with stir fries. Just remember to keep them whole. They are a tasty vege and easy to grow if you are in a place which gets enough sun.

FRUIT TREES

2009-03-04T22:10:00.003+11:00

A few months ago I decided to plant fruit trees/vegetables/herbs in preference of exotics or even native trees. I decided that when deciding on what to plant my main factor would be food production, followed by trees native to this area. No more buying for pretty flowers alone or lush fast growth. No now I want my garden to be able to feed us.

My latest plantings have included 4 olive trees down the side boundary of our property.

One navel orange - taking the citrus plantings to two lemons, one mandarin and now one orange.

One dwarf banana tree.

One dwarf avocado tree.

One mango tree tree.

The dwarf fruit trees are in pots in a very sunny corner in the pool area. They get sun just about all day in this area and being on pavers and close to the colourbond fence get heat transferrred from these sources too.

My dwarf fruit trees were purchased from my local nursery. There are a few good Australian sites

http://www.daleysfruit.com.au/fruit%20pages/dwarfs.htm

and

http://www.kendallfarms.com.au/

Both have lots of information on growing dwarf trees in pots, bags or in the ground. Now for the patiences - a few years and I should be rewarded with some delicious home grown fruits.

Funny thing is that just when I am thinking I have ran out of room to plant anymore veges or shrubs or trees I find more - a little less grass or I remove an ornamental plant. Really I think I can find a home for a few more yet!

Reading and watching

2009-02-23T15:55:00.003+11:00

Everyone that knows me knows how I love to read. With the hot weather this summer I have been staying indoors more and have had a great chance to read some terrific books. So I thought I would share a few of my latest reads.

THE COMPLETE BOOK OF VEGETABLES, HERBS &FRUIT by Matthew Biggs, Jekka McVicar & Bob Flowerdew.

I got this book for my birthday and I love it. It is Australian (there is a UK edition due out soon) so all the plants and climatic conditions refer to here. It is divided into three sections - veges, herbs and fruit as well as a section at the back titled Practical Gardening. This section deals with such topics as planning veg, fruit and herb gards with some great plans, crop rotation, pollination and companion planting, mainenance and weeds and pests.

In essence it is like four books in one. I love the info given to each vege, herb and fruit - species, cultivation, medicinal, culinary, pests/diseases etc. There are lovely photographs and some delicious recipes. I like how the veges in the book are not only the common ones (carrots, tomatoes, cabbages etc) but other lesser known ones such as Cardoon (spanish thistle), Purslane, Samphire, Scorzonera (vegetable oyster). This is a book iI can see myself referring to time and time again. I have already made a list of the fruit trees I want after reading through this book.

ONE MAGIC SQUARE by Lolo Houbein

I found this book in the local second hand book shop. Lolo is encouraging everyone to grow their own veges, starting with one square metre of soil. Houbein includes designs and instructions for more than 30 different one-square-metre plots, including salad, soup, pizza and anti-oxidant plots. One Magic Square is Australian and written for Australian conditions. With chapters describing the vegetables, fruit and herbs that can be grown, as well as sections on compost, pests, mulch and seeds, there is everything included that anyone would need to start growing their own food in temperate Australia. I love how passionate Lola is about her subject. The book is full of wit and wisdom with gems of information—like placing a tile under a developing pumpkin to prevent rot. She writes in a chatty, rambling style. This book will appeal to both gardeners and non-gardeners, encouraging them to take the first step to growing their own nutritious, organic food.

BEYOND ORGANICS:GARDENING FOR THE FUTURE by Helen Cushing

This one I borrowed from the library to read. It is like a How To guide to transforming the average garden into a tranquil eco paradise and wildlife oasis. The author exposes some unpalatable truths about everyday gardening practices, and examines eco-friendly alternatives and their advantages. This book packs a wealth of information on biodiversity, conservation, soil and plant selection – interwoven with personal recollections – into one slender volume. Definately worth reading.

Watching on tv.

A new show on ten (Wednesdays) called Guerrilla Gardeners. A group of six young landscapers and renovators who strike ugly public sites and spruce them up without any municipal approval. Last week they tackled a corner block sandwiched between a train station, bus stop, crowded road with gas and electricity wires and dirt with a very low ph. Too barren to grow anything. They made seating, raised beds with hardy plants, painted the electricity box, made a lovely sundial and bike rack. The transformation was good -very good. I will be interested to watch this weeks episode -evidently there is some sort of strife with the local council.

Also heard of another show on Fox starting up March 29th called ALTER ECO http://planetgreen.discovery.com/tv/alter-eco/alter-eco-show-info.html. It is a 13 part series about ways people can live a more earth friendly lifestyle. During the series the ALTER ECO team renovate a 1920's house making it green and showcasing new options available to builders/renovators. The house acts as a base for the crew but it also features food and gardening tips, creative ways to make the green shift. Sounds worth a watch.

M xx

EGGPLANTICIOUS

2009-02-22T21:47:00.003+11:00

Mmmmm, I love eggplants! This year I planted two different types. Got lazy and brought seedlings. I planted eggplant Bonica which is a F1 hybrid. It produces oval shaped fruit. These have been slow to grow and ripen. But finally I picked the first of these today.

The other eggplants I have are mini lebanese. They grow long and elongated and are great producers. Each plant has quiet a few growing on them.

The eggplants are growing in my front yard vegetable garden, the path in the picture leads to the front door. I have lost count of the amount of people who have asked me what these are. No one recognises what eggplants look like it seems. In this garden I also had tomatoes (all ripped out now), okra (will post about these another day), red kidney beans, basil and a border of thyme. This front yard vege garden was going to be temporary (because Mr Gadget was under the impression that front gardens are NOT for vegetables - too unsightly). But low and hold, he has been swayed after seeing how all the vegetables have flourished here and how peole haven't gasped in shock but have commented that they look great. And of course I was a little bit shifty and planted some of Mr Gadgets favourites here too - the basil, tomatoes and okra. So the vege patch will stay - hurray, I say!

My very favourite way of cooking them is to cut in half length way, rub cut surface with garlic or lemon juice, drizzle with olive oil, season with black pepper and sea salt and then roast in oven for about 20 minutes. Delicious! They are also wonderful cooked on the bbq. And a grating of mozzarella cheese melted on top is a bit divine too.

THOSE BILLS

2009-02-09T21:27:00.002+11:00

The bills come in and I gasp at how much health insurance costs, at the latest gas or water or electricity bill. I pay them by the due day and then don't give them too much thought until the next time they arrive in my mail box.

Not today. Today I decided to review my bills and find cheaper options or way to save.

I started with the phone bill. I rang them up after checking online for their best advertised packages. Straight away I found I can save $4.00 each month by electing not to get paper bills and therefore cutting down on admin cost. and also by paying by direct deposit each month. Then I saved further by asking what the best plan was for me. I combined home phone and a mobile and saved a further few dollars each month on phone rental. We have a silent number which costs $2.66 each month but I opted to keep that as is for the time being.

Feeling inspired by the success with the phone bill I decided to check our health insurance. I have a condition that requires me to pay $120.00 each 3-4 months for health aids. These weren't covered under the old plan. But after asking to be insured for this cover the lady on the phoned asked if I stillneeded obstetric cover - my three munchkins are more than enough so the answer was definately no. And since no one suffers from pshyciatric conditions she suggested we stop that part of the cover and add health aids which worked out cheaper. So another success.

Next car insurance and home and contents - I worked out that I wasn't insured enough to cover contents so upped that. Found a cheaper car insurance as we live in a suburb that is deemed safer and I have a good record so that slashed that bill.

Now feeling happier about the days savings I looked at the gas and electricity bills. This summer our electricity bill is higher than it has been for the same periods in the last two years. Not happy about that and I have decided to get back on my bandwagon with the family about saving electricity - simple things like turning off at power points, lights off etc.
The gas usage is good and I have made another aim to reduce the use more.

I have also made a chart of when major bills are due so I am prepared for them. I am so glad I bothered to ring around today and ask if they could offer me better fees and services. It has really paid off.

SUMMER DAYS

2009-01-30T12:28:00.004+11:00

What a dry summer this one is compared to last summer and what block buster temperatures are hitting parts of Australia! Luckily here it is hot but bearable.

So what's been happening here in suburbia?

We are lucky to have a swimming pool and it gets hours of use. I know they use too much money, too much water, too much power but we love ours and it is here to stay. This year we have put into place some methods to make our pool a little less of a water and power guzzling pit. The first thing we did was get a cover for it. The cover reduces water evaporation by over 85%. It also keeps the pool cleaner as leaves, dust and dirt aren't blowing into it. This means we can get away with cleaning the pool less and running the filter less too. We have also connected a water diverter to the gutter near the pool. When it rains we attach a hose to it and this goes straight into the pool. Hopefully we will be able to put a tank in this area soon whijch will keep the pool topped up and water the gardens in the pool area.

Summer veges are growing well. I have been harvesting okra, capsicum, tomatoes, beans and cucumbers. Also plenty of herbs too which I use prolically in cooking - sage, mints, rosemary, basil, oregano.

The vege patch is looking good.

I have buckets of cucumbers. I pick them when they are really small and deliciously tasty.
I have also been saving seeds. The first few okra I left on the plant too long. Okra are nicest if harvested and eaten when 4 inches or smaller and these ones were probably double that. So I picked them and harvested the seeds. I have been drying them on a plate on the trampoline (along with a plumcot pip.) In the paper bag I am drying parsley. I have found the simplest way to dry things with small seeds like parsley and lettuce is to cut off the stems with the seeds and put the seed heads in a paper bag with a rubber band around them. Then leave them in the sun until dry, give a shake and the seeds fall off and are in the bag.

Popped into the local nursery today for a browse (walked out empty handed). They have some dwarf fruit trees in stock - avocado, mangos and banana. As well as blueberry plants, olives, rasperrys and nuts. I have a birthday coming up so will send the hint to Mr Gadget.

M xx

PLUMCOT TREE

2009-01-20T11:18:00.003+11:00

We have fruit!

Very exciting!

Very juicy and full of flavour and I am thrilled that this tree is growing and fruiting and hasn't needed any sprays or additives except plenty of water and some seaweed fertiliser. The birds haven't discovered the fruit so it has been safe to ripen completely on the tree.

This is a plumcot tree (a cross between a plum and apricot). The flesh is orange similar to the colour of an apricot and you can definately taste apricot flavour. The fruit are about the size of a medium apple. I was told when I brought the tree that it was necessary to have an apricot or plum tree for pollination but I haven't. Might be one somewhere in the area. I am thrilled that it is growing so well in this area - I have been told that Newcastle is too humid for success with stone fruits. But my success with this tree has spurred me on and I will be planting a couple more this year.

M xx

HE DOESN"T GET IT

2009-01-16T10:43:00.002+11:00

Mr Gadget that is. He just doesn't understand my need or want to live simpler. He doesn't get why I want to recycle and reduce, save water and power, say no to plastic bags and minimise our spending.
Now before I go further and you all think I am having a big hubby whinge (which I am sort of) let me say he is a man in a million. He cooks often and makes the best pizzas and a mean curry and many other delicious meals. He cleans - he knows how to use the vacuum cleaner and mop and washing machine. He works extremely hard and has built up his business and is only just now getting to reap the rewards of all his hard work in the past years. Finally the business is at a stage where he can take time off and delegate to others and we are in a great financial state. I am extremely proud of him. He is a very hands on dad to our three boys. He is very involved in their activities and their care.
But if I bring up any enviromental issue I can see the bristles coming up. Recently I was discussing with Mr Gadget how I wanted to eliminate plastic rubbish bags. He thought that was absolutely ridiculous so I dropped the subject. I am forever going around the house and turning off appliances at the power points. This drives poor Mr gadget to distraction. All those gadgets - computers, dvds, microwave, washing machines, monitors with their lights shining while on standby I find totally unneccesary. Mr Gadget argues that the amount of power they are drawing is minimal and not worth the hassle of turning off. I argue my point. I turn them off, he leaves them on. If I argue it will save money that irks him - he reasons that we can afford it so it is okay.

The one thing he is nearly as passionate as me about is the vegetable garden. He leaves it to me to tend and grow but he loves the home grown veges and fruit. He willingly built me the new raised vege patch. He is great at composting green waste too.

I have found the best way forward with dealing with Mr Gadget is to lead by example. If I go ahead and make small changes, one at a time, and he sees them working and me being consistent then normally he is willing to change too. But it is frustrating having so many goals and not having Mr Gadget behind me supporting me in these issues. I feel like he initially resists in most areas I suggest change in. But I am certain he will come around eventually when he sees the sense in what i am doing.

Some of the changes I want to make this year include:
Harvesting water - another water tank, gutter diverters etc.
Buying veges and fruit locally.
Less food waste ( I have gone a long way in 2008 to remedy this)
Make some fruit/veg bags.
Planting fruit trees - thinking either espelier or mini fruit trees due to room issues.
Meeting more like minded people living locally for ideas and support.
Building an outdoor wood fired pizza oven (Mr Gadget is very keen on this idea).
Get chooks
Preserving more foods

M xx

DECLUTTER

2009-01-09T12:05:00.002+11:00

I always have a big declutter after Christmas. It seems a good time as so many new things and presents are coming into the house so it is a great time to get rid of no longer used or wanted items. And to find room for the newer stuff.
I used to have a semi minamalistic house but then along came children and a bigger house. More children meant more items -clothes, toys, bed and so on. And as the kids have grown their interests have changed.
Guitar Dude who has a very healthy lego collection is now music crazy. He has accumulated a drum set, 2 guitars, music stands, sheet music, cds etc.
Zippy began collecting rocks and accumulating sports trophies, posters and paraphenalia.
Super Boy's interests have changed from Dora Explorer and Wiggles to all things to do with super heroes.
Mr Gadget has such a messy office that if he can't find what he is after he goes and buys another. Then a week later finds the original lost item.
Me, I love books and magazines and have accumulated way too many.

Yesterday I began the task of decluttering. Starting with the bedrooms, I have sorted through clothes and toys, books and shoes. Things have been divided into three piles -
Op shop pile
Rubbish pile
Keep pile

Over the years I have become fairly ruthless with my approach to decluttering so here are a few of my tips.
- Have a place for everything.
- Spend 10 minutes each day putting things away.
- Change your thinking about material objects. Value the memories more than the objects.
- As you declutter put items for the rubbish or op shop out of the house. I put op shop things straight into the boot of the car as I am sorting.
- Tackle the house room by room or even cupboard by cupboard. It is easier kto see results this way and the job doesn't get overwhelming.
- RAk your no longer needed items such as books, shoes, clothing to friends.
- Make a rule that if you buy something new then get rid of something old.
- If it hasn't been used or worn for over a year then chances are it will never be so get rid of it.
- Declutter when your partner or kids are not around. They will reclaim too much useless things if they are there.

Tomorrow I am tackling the kitchen cupboards and pantry. Then if I am really brave I will tackle Mr Gadgets office!
M xx

PALMS

2008-12-30T17:15:00.006+11:00

In our garden we have 12 palms. They are planted in a cluster around the pool area and are all mature and tall. So tall that now when the palm fronds die it is impossible to reach them without a ladder. Two of the palms are Bangalow Palms and have self shedding leaves but the rest don't. Now if I was planting palms I would choose all self shedding varieties because it is a pain in the but to cut the dead ones off. Eventually, after a few months they break off the tree and come crashing down to earth. By this time they are very hard and dry. The palm fronds are are real nuisance. They are too big and woody for the compost and take hurculean strength to cut through them. But on saying that I do love the palms, I love laying in the pool and looking up at them and imagining being on a tropical holiday.

Up until recently the fronds used to get broken up and put into the compost or we would wait until there was a bulk garbage colection and put them out for that.

But now that I am now longer throwing garden waste into the bin (gulp) I have found a use for them.

They are the retaining sides to my no dig garden beds. As more fronds fall down I raise the sides. I am working on my third no dig garden now. All green waste like fern fronds, grass clippings and other prunings gets thrown into the bed.

Speaking of the beds, the no dig garden beds are going wonderfully. The first one I made is growing pumpkins and there are a few pumpkins growing nicely. The vines have gone crazy and are rambling everywhere.

The second no dig garden has watermelon growing. In the photo above you can see the pumpkins at the back and a watermelon plant towards the right bottom of the photo. There are more plants there no since this photo was taken. No watermelons yet but the plants are growing nicely.

The no dig beds are on the other side of the fence (not our land but a council walkway/reserve). There is no water supply other than rain but every couple of days I have been taking a bucket or two around the side and watering them. Mainly though they are going well with the little rainfall we have had.

I am so pleased with this reclaimed area being put to good use. And I am dreaming of all the pumpkins and watermelons.

M xx

GOURD BLIMEY

2008-12-18T15:47:00.003+11:00

I have never tryed growing gourd before. So this year I brougth a packet of seeds from Eden seeds. They were easy to grow from seeds. I grew 8 seeds and planted four into the side garden.

The side garden was an unused area - tree prunings, lawn clippings etc would be thrown into this area. Soon weeds grew over the rubbish and then nasturiums grew covering the heap. Finally Guitar Dude decided this garden area would be his. So full of very short lived enthusiasm he levelled the area, weeded and dug over the soil. He dug in dynamic lifter and ocvered the new bed with mulch. Then after doing the hard work he left the garden bed for me. So in went the 4 gourd seedlings. And along with the nasturiums they have covered the area.

Some of the leaves of the gourds have powdery mildew. When it gets cooler this afternoon I am going to remove the worst affected and throw them in the rubbish bin. Then spray the plants with the mixture below. I haven't used this spray before so will let you know if it works.

1 tbs baking soda

1/2 tsp liquid soap

1 tbs oil

1 gallon water ( being of the metric era I had to look up a conversion and 1 gallon is 3.78 litres)

I have a number of gourds growing. I have no idea how big they get or what to do with them. I know people dry them and carve them and turn them into bowls and bird feeders and other ornamental things. But I don't know when to pick them or how to dry them or how to carve them. Any ideas would be welcome.

In this garden bed I have also planted 4 rhubarb plants. And they are all thriving. I am very happy about this. Growing up in Tasmania we always had rhubard growing in the garden. It seemed to love the cold and thrived down there. So I assumed that rhubarb wouldn't grow here in Newcastle and never bothered trying it. MMM - I am looking forward to rhubarb and apple pies.

And in my seed raising area I have these red kidney beans growing very quickly. Also cherry tomatoe seedslings, chilli and some more watermelon seeds too.

M xx

Creating Memories

2008-12-13T17:02:00.003+11:00

This time of year is so very busy. We have had Christmas concerts, morning teas, presentation days at the boys schools (I have one at high school, one in primary and one in preschool) , parties ... and the list goes on. I have visited the shops more times than I would have liked buying presents, food etc. While I love this time of the year I also look forward to the pace slowing down a bit.

I really do enjoy this time of the year. The thing I enjoy the most is the creating of memories and the continuing on of traditions. I want the boys to look back on these years and have very fond memories of fun family times and warm fuzzy memories.

There are things we do year after year at Christmas time. We put up the tree and decorations as a family.

I get out all the craft things - papers, glue, glitter, stencils etc and the boys make Christmas decorations. This year the two youngest spent a whole afternoon cutting out stocking shapes and gingermen shapes and decorating them.

I have an advent calendar with a treat in it for each day of December. Each morning the boys check it.

We make lots of delicious Christmas yummy foods like rum balls, Christmas rocky road, ginger bread men. Guitar Dude is a whiz in the kitchen and often gets in there and cooks. He uses every bowl and every spoon and makes a hell of a mess but the end result is usually delicious.

Of an evening we go for walks around the area to admire everyone elses Christmas light decorations. We don't put up outside lights so we walk the streets looking and admiring other peoples homes.

The boys make or buy each other and their grandparents Christmas presents. Mr Gadget and I really want them to enjoy the giving as much as the recieving. They take this very seriously and have made some wonderful gifts over the years.

We go to Carols by Candlelight each year at the local park and watch the fireworks.

Christmas day is sometimes here with just our family, sometimes with Mr Gadgets great big family and sometimes we travel to my families. But no matter where we are santa comes and leaves them a present by the end of their beds.

The other presents are opened later in the day one by one. We read the labels and a helper hands out the presents. There is no mad rush and ripping open of presents first thing of a morning here. We play games together and eat too much.

I have such wonderful memories of Christmas and so does Mr Gadget. His favourite memory is of playing cricket, Christmas afternoon at the beach. Mine is the delicious food and family time. I dont remember any specific presents and neither does Mr Gadget. I hope our boys will have equally fond memories too when they are adults.

How do others celebrate? What special traditions do you follow?

M xx

DUKKAH

2008-12-06T19:43:00.003+11:00

I first tasted Dukkah about a year ago. For those that have never heard of it -it is a delicious Egyptian spice blend made by mixing toasted nuts and spices. Traditionally it is eaten as a snack by dipping flat bread into extra virgin olive oil and then into the spice mix.

It is delicious!

So after a bit of experimenting I have made some for Christmas presents with a little help from my very eager assistant Super Boy.

Here is my version of the recipe.

1 cup pistachio nuts

1 cup almonds

2 tbs dried parsley

1 tbs mixed herbs

1/4 cup sesame seeds

1/4 tsp salt

2 tsp five spice

1 tbs coriandr seeds

Roast nuts in a hot oven for 15 min., mix often to ensure they don't burn.

Roast seeds.

Cool nuts and seeds.

Process in a food processor and combine with other herbs and spices.

Store in sterile glass containers.

This recipe made 2 1/2 jars.

M xx

little HARVEST

2008-11-29T15:16:00.004+11:00

Well this is what it is all about.
The weeks of watching and watering and waiting for the seeds to gently unfold from the soil. Nurturing them with sunlight and water, protecting them from the cold and wind until their true leaves appear.
Trying to be patient until the little seedlings are mature enough to go it alone in the elements in the vegetable patch.
Battling the soil conditions, the snales and caterpillars, too much heat, not enough rain.
But then going out my own door and picking my own vegetables right there in my own garden. Cooking them up and an hour later eating them. I am proud of this little harvest! Not enough to feed a family of five but enough to put a smile on my dial.
The lettuce, tomatoe and parsleywent into the salad. The basil,coriander seeds,silverbeet and thyme went on the fish. Yum, yum, yum.

DELIGHTS

2008-11-18T19:47:00.003+11:00

We have just spent the last few months redoing our front yard. It did have a lot of brick pavers with dips and big puddles when ever it rained. There was no drainage in front of the garages and since there is a gentle slope down to the garages from the driveway this wasn't good news with heavy rain. So we decided to redo the whole front yard. Drainage was fixed, old weeds and all the grass was removed. We redid the driveway with a stampled concrete finish. And I was all for having no grass what so ever at the front. Mr Gadget is far more traditional than me and thinks that front gardens must be very manicured and must have grass. So a compromise was in order.

He got some grass. I got a much bigger garden in the front and a lovely sitting area. I love this front area. It is so pretty and a beautiful place to relaxing. There are fragrant roses, and pretty cottage garden flowers.
The heavely fragrant Double Delight rose

and the gorgeous apricot Just Joey are flowering prolifically.

A hedge is growing along the front of plumbago and in front of the bricks there is another hedge of photinia. Amongst the flowers I have tomatoes, eggplants, parsley, artichokes and thyme growing happily. I have planted a few trees too - a weeping mulberry, coffee tree and magnolia. It makes me happy to see the flowers as I come home and to be able to sit out here amongst them. Everyone should have a place of indulgence and beauty and this is mine.

In the back garden I have harvested 7 beans and two cherry tomatoes! Who would have thought I would get so excited over home grown vegetables. They went into the stir fry we had for tea along with fresh oregano, parsley and sage.

With the weather warming up I have been making lots of iceblocks and icecreams for the boys. Iceblocks are simply frozen cordial or juice. The icecreams are made from powdered milk mixed with fresh fruit or vanilla essence or chocolate topping. The powdered milk is much cheaper than fresh milk and I always have some at hand for using in cooking, custards or for the kids when we run out of fridge milk.

M xx

SUNNY DAYS

2008-11-14T20:22:00.002+11:00

Today was hot. It was hot and sunny. Being a garden lover I spend many hours outside. I am very much an outdoors person during the daylight hours, whether it is in the garden, riding our bikes to the park, walking around the lake or just sitting outside in the fresh air. I have always loved the feel of a fresh breeze and the warmth of the sun on my skin.

But now I am finding myself far more wary of being outside during the high uv hours of 10 am - 3pm. I still am outside during that time but I cover up with a wide brimmed hat, sunnies, sunscreen etc.
You see, at the beginning of this year I found a mole that was changing and had grown in size. It ended up being a melanoma. The mole was right behind my right knee in the crease. Initially I had the mole removed but then had to have further surgery to remove more tissue from deeper and surrounding where the original mole was. I also had lymph nodes removed in my groin to check for spread and those behind my knee were also removed or damaged with the surgeries. Now I have lymphoedema in that leg which is a chronic condition due to the damage of the lymph flow. Means that my right leg swells up due to the high protien lymph fluid pooling. It becomes very heavy and uncomfortable and I need to elevate and rest my leg more that I like (and believe me with three very active boys it isn't always easy to do this). I wear a full length lymphoedema stocking during the day and am still learning what works and doesn't and how to best control and live with this condition.

Now most people that read this blog are gardeners and probably like me spend hours outside. I am writing this as a reminder to others that now with the hot sunny weather coming to please take care of your skin. Wear hats and sunscreen and reapply the sunscreen after a few hours (it wont last all day). But most importantly check your skin for moles that look unusual, are changing, are irregular in size colour or shape. Get someone else to check your back or hard to look at areas, like the back of your legs or neck.
Please slip, slop,slap and be vigilant.

M xx

BUNNYS HOME

2008-11-11T16:31:00.005+11:00

I have been asked about our rabbits cage so thought I would share a few pictures.

The rabbit is Zippy's pet and when he came to live here (the rabbit not my son) in 2006 it became very clear that given half a chance our dog would love to eat poor bunny or scare him to death by barking at him. So he couldn't go into the cage we had set up on the lawn.

Instead we decided that bunny would have to live in the pool area where the dog couldn't get to him. Trouble with this was that he does not have access to grass to graze on all day. So the cage needed to be big and roomy and plenty of room for bunny to stretch and move about.

We came across this pine dresser at the local op shop for $10.00 dollars, the drawers were falling apart and so was the back so it was perfect for our needs. We removed the drawers and the inner wood around the doors. These were replaced with wire mesh. Half of the second shelf was also removed and a ramp built complete with railing. One door was left as is and that part of the cage is bunnys bed area.

A coat of paint using left over paint from when we painted the exterior of the house , a back added, fly screen over the mesh to keep out flies and mosquitoes and roofing iron to keep out the rain and we have the Taj Ma Hutch. One very cute bunny hutch for about $15.00.

M xx

SEED SUCCESS

2008-11-10T20:12:00.002+11:00

Well after the last post about the vegetable garden dilemma I thought I would post about my seed raising success. I think the vege garden will sort itself out. Maybe I should have left the patch to sit for a few weeks before planting it out. Now things are slowly growing and although I most likely wont have a bumper crop in everything I have learnt a few things for next time.

Over the years I have tried growing veges and flowers from seeds with varying success. But last few years I have been taking the easy option of buying seedlings from the nursery. Partly because I was too impatient to wait for seeds to grow, partly because I couldn't be bothered.

So this year I ordered vegetable seeds from Eden Seeds and I have had great success growing them.

The reason seed growing has been such a success is because of the location I chose as my seed raising area. Right outside the kitchen window, in a sunny but sheltered position on top of the rabbits cage. Everytime I look out the kitchen window I can see them. I can see if new seeds have risen, if something has been eating them and if they need a drink. They are in view so haven't been forgotten. Even Mr. Gadget has looked out the window at the seeds and gone out and watered them. At the end of winter and autumn when it was still cool I grew them in covered mini green houses but once the weather warmed up they have been raised in window seal pots and have grown very well. I have grown cucumber, chilli, luffa, gourds, chillis, artichokes, watermelons, rockmelons, zucchinis, corn, parsley, rhubarb, beans.

I have learnt to not be impatient in getting the little seedlings into the big garden beds too early. I have lost a few plants because of transplanting them too early. Next year I will grow them here again but with some of the seedlngs I will transplant them into individual pots and then into the garden when more advanced.

M xx

Vegetable Patch Dilemma

2008-11-04T21:16:00.004+11:00

The new raised vegetable patch is full of seedlings but the growth of the veges seems to be very slow! I think there is something wrong with the soil that Mr. Gadget filled the patch with. The soil was a special soil for new turf and with the excess we filled the raised vegetable patch. I also added compost, blood and bone and fish fertiliser too. I was so excited to have a dedicated vegetable patch that I went out and brought seedlings from the nursery and planted into the garden bed.

And some of the plants have something that has been eating them. I have applied snail bait which has seemed to have helped. I have some sugar cane mulch that I will mulch around the seedlings tomorrow. I don't know what else to do so for now will just hope that with time the veges start growing.

There is only one plant growing well - a zucchini plant. I planted about 8 seeds and while they all came up only this one has thrived. The others are tiny with just a few little leaves. You can see the other little plants overshadowed by this larger one. I think I will transplant them out of this garden and into the no dig garden and see how they grow there.

Else where in the yard vegetables are growing well. I have the first beans on the climbing beans and celery and silverbeet growing well. All my herbs are growing at great guns. Four out of eight gourd seedlings I have planted are growing really well and tomatoes, eggplants and okra are all going fine. But I have such high hopes fro the raised vegetable patch. Ahh, the dilemmas of growing veges!

M xx

NO DIG GARDEN BED

2008-10-29T22:57:00.003+11:00

Since I wanted to grow some pumpkins, watermelons, cucumbers and a few other rambling plants and don't have the space for them to ramble in our yard I have decided to utilise some of the land outside of our fences. The land is council land, walkways between our house and the next. There is a paved pathway between the houses and grass on our side and on the neighbours side too. I have planted about 15 natives out on the council land to give our place privacy and I maintain the area by mowing and looking after the trees. The natives I have planted are a few metres from our boundary so this is the spot I have reclaimed for my vegetables to grow. Hopefully they will be protected from passes by and hidden by the native trees so no one helps themselves to the vegetables. Although since it isn't actually my land I don't mind sharing with the neighbours. I just don't want the veges I hopefully grow to dissapear overnight.

I planted three pumpkin seedlings in a very rought no dig garden mid September and they are growing really well. I was thrilled to see a couple of pumpkins forming on one of the plants.

For this no dig garden bed I layed newspaper over the grass, added lawn mower clippings, blood and bone and a few bucket loads of dirt from another garden bed. Into the dirt I planted the seedlings.

Today I made another raised no dig garden. For this one I bordered the garden with old palm leaves as the sides of the garden bed. Then placed a thick layer of grass clipping onto the existing grass. Followed by newspaper, fertiliser, sugarcane, compost and more sugar cane mulch. I am going to let the garden settle for a week or two before planting out with cucumbers and watermelons.

Eventually I will extend the garden bed the whole length of the fence which will more than double the existing vege patch I have in my yard. This area is perfectly positioned for sun. But watering will be an issue as I will need to bucket water to the veges. from the tap in our front yard as the hose wont reach.

M xx

Conquering fruit waste

2008-10-28T14:04:00.005+11:00

It is working!

I am buying food more consciously with meals and a menu for the week planned. This week I have had some food that has gone off and needed tossing - some potatoes started sprouting so were tossed into the compost, some jelly in a bowl in the fridge was never eaten and some rice went to the dog. Much better than previous amounts that would be thrown away because we hadn't gotten around to eating it.

One of the things that used to be brought and regularly went off before being eaten was fruit. I would buy the fruit with the best and healthiest intentions. But it would sit in the fridge or fruit bowl and the kids, MR Gadget and I would overlook it for other snacks. So it would stay there deteriating a little more each day until it was no good for anything but the compost. So changes had to be made. I still buy heaps of fruit. But now I cut the fruit up (melons, pineapples etc) and put them into see through containers in the fridge. Because they are all cut and ready to be eaten the kids grab them out. There is no peeling or chopping so it is easy and fast for a quick snack. And because I am storing it in a clear container it is very visable and doesn't get overlooked or forgotten. I also add fruit to their breakfast cereals.

If it looks like the fruit isn't going to be eaten in time I will stew and freeze (apples, rhubarb, pears etc).

We have passionfruit vines and they produce an enormous amount of fruit each year. The kids love them but I was always having an excess, even after giving some away to friends. Then Guitar Dude had the brilliant idea of putting them in the freezer whole. They made the best frozen snack. It was just a matter of taking them out, cutting open and scooping the frozen juice and seeds out with a spoon. Big hit and no more passionfruits going off.

I have also began making fruit smoothies using fruits, yoghurt, honey, milk etc. Very refreshing and filling for an afternoon snack.

M xx

SPRING

2008-10-22T12:48:00.003+11:00

While I have said I want to replace some ornamental plants with ones that are edible I could not imagine a garden without flowers. Balance is always a good thing.
In the garden I have ginger in flower. Pretty flowers that don't last long but look gorgeous.

I love the flowers that are popping up at the moment.

I have roses in flower -Gold Bunny, Seduction and Blue Moon.

I brought three blue moon rose bushes on special that were all looking a bit sad and sorry. So I am delighted that they are all coming to life and I have had my first flower. Unfortunately it didn't last long as a hail storm broke the stem. But it is inside in a vase and smells divine.

Lavender is always flowering and looking and smelling gorgeous and attracting loads of bees.

This week I have transplanted tomatoe seedling that have popped up where I have emptied the compost onto the garden. I have tomatoes growing on some of the bushes. I have planted more seeds - watermelon, cucumber, loofa, chilli and thyme.

I have planted in the garden okra seedlings and cleared a patch of garden for two passionfruit vines to grow. Hoping they will grow up an arch way and then spread into the trees on the other side of the fence.

I have begun a new no dig garden for the watermelon to go into on the reserve side of the fence.

Fruit flys are eating all the strawberries. Need to deal with them before they become more of a problem.

Now it is raining. Now that I am so into growing our own veges and fruits I am so much aware and in tune with the weather, the rain, the heat etc.
M xx

GARDEN TOUR

2008-10-14T20:19:00.003+11:00

I thought I would give you a tour of my garden and home. Our block of land is in suburbia. It is a larger than average block of 979 m2. The house larger than average too and is slam dunked in the middle of the block. We are at the end of a culdesac and have a walkway and reserve land running around two of the boundaries. Behind the back boundary is a road.

I hope you can see the numbers on the plan alright.

1. Front garden with coffee tree (coffea arabica).

2. Front garden with man fern, ornamental ginger, mondo and hydrangers. In the front of these plants I have extended and there is tomatoe and eggplant and creeping thyme.

3. Front garden with roses, weeping mulberry tree, apaganthus and flowers.

4. The pool area is paved and faces north. Our bunny cage is in here (so the dog doesn't try to eat him. On top of the rabbit cage is where I grow my seeds.

5. Pots fill this corner in the pool area, mainly ornamental plants at the moment.

6. This garden bed is viewed from the entertainment area. There are palms, hebes, mondo and murraya.

Between 6 and 7 is where Mr Gadget is planning on building a wood fired pizza oven. We already have a movable open fire place and grill here. It gets used heaps for sitting around in winter and roasting marshmallows.

7. Raised vegetable patch.

8. Plumcot fruit tree.

9. pots of herbs (parsley, bay tree, rosemary) outside the back door.

10. Perennial basil, meyer lemon tree, aloe vera. Also passionfruit vine.

11. Ornamental chinese tallow tree and rosemary planted underneath.

Between 10 and 11 and also near no. 14 there are two arches with potoatoe vine growing over. I also grow climbing beans over them too.

12. Hedges of curry plant.

13. Behind the curry plant hedges are lemon grass growing and beside that marjoram.

14. My old vegetable patch and a young meyer lemon tree. Also lavenders.

15. Rockmelon seedlings and more lemon grass.

16. Lemon verbena tree and port wine magnolia.

17. Mandarin tree.

18. water tank (1000 l). In the garden bed opposite I have rhubarb growing (4 little plants at the moment) and gourd seedlings.

19. On the other side of the fence where the pool is I have made a raised garden bed. This isn't actually our land. It is councils but I have reclaimed a bit as where it is positioned is hidden and never used. And besides I maintain it by mowing and weeding it and I have also planted about 15 natives outside our boundary on the council reserve. In the raised bed I have planted pumpkins and hopefully very soon I will lant watermelons out here. I am just waiting for the watermelon seeds to get big enough.

I have plans to grow dwarf fruit trees in pots in no. 5. Install another tank near the clothes line and also one smaller one near No. 4 for topping up the pool. I also have plans to replace ornamental plants like all the agapanthus and mondo with eatable plants and herbs. I really want chooks and they would go between No 10 and No. 7. I want another trellis here for more passionfruit to grow. On the fence between 6 adn 7 I plan on having a narrow 1 metre garden bed and growing espalier fruit trees here. It will probably be years before all this happens. Takes time and takes money. So for the moment I will just keep adding to my wish list.

M xx

NANNA WISDOM

2008-10-10T21:27:00.003+11:00

My Nanna was one of the people has influenced me the most. She was a truelly remarkable lady. Her life was not an easy one but she was such a positive person who just got on with what needed to be done. She managed her family through the depression and world war two. She had to endure the doctors decision to sacrifice her unborn baby boys life so she could live and provide for the children she already had. She never forgot this baby, the little boy she named but never saw. She only found out where he was buried when she was in her 60's - in a unmarked area of the cemetry where stillborn babies were buried together. Even at the age of 80 she would talk about him, not in a grief stricken way but as a matter of fact way. She was a breast cancer surviver of more than 15 years. She went through a mastectomy, chemo and radiation and just accepted it as a hiccup in her life. She talked about her false breast and her mastectomy in a positive way and just got on with living.

Nanna once said to me that she was an enviromentalist and a recycler before it was trendy to be one. By this she meant that out of necessity she needed to be frugal, needed to recycle and reuse things. She needed to care about here patch of earth and ensure it provided all she needed it to for her and her families day to day survival.

There are many things I remember about my Nanna and I thought I would share a few.

She started every morning with a warm water with lemon juice squeezed into it. The lemons were from a large old tree in the backyard that always seemed to have a never ending supply of lemons on it. The tree is still there in the yard and still provides a prolific amount of lemons each year.

She would sew, knit, crochet just about anything she set her mind to. This started out as being a necessity - making handmade dresses for her little girl, knitting socks for her husband, scarves, beanies, baby clothes etc. As she got older she began knitting and crocheting for pleasure and for here children and grandchildren. Each of her grandchildren were given a hand crocheted mohair blanket as a 21st birthday present. When I had Guitar Dude, my first born very premature baby, she was knitting tiny beanies, matinee jackets and booties for him using dolls clothes patterns. I still have all these put away. She made bunny rugs for her great grandchildren and the most adorable soft knitted toys, baby blankets. I have fond memories of sitting in Nannas kitchen , near the old kerosine heater and of her teaching me to knit. I am left handed and she was so very patient reversing everything and explaining the stitches to me, picking up my slipped stitches and providing me with endless amounts of wool.

Washing day was Monday. The clothes would be washed, hung to dry, brought inside to air, ironed and folded all on Monday. As the washing machine emptied into the laundry tub she would collect this water in buckets and water her plants with it. Not a drop of water went to waste. Even the left overs from the teapot went onto the garden.

Wrapping paper form present was recycled. We were encouraged to open the presents carefully by unsticking the sticky tape so as not to tear the paper. The paper was ironed to get rid ofthe creases and stored until needed for another present. Same with ribbons. This is something I do, as did my mum.

Nan lived in suburbia and over 3/4 of the yard was garden or fruit trees. There were apple trees, peaches and apricots, plums and lemons, raspberries, loganberries. And many, many vegetables. What she couldn't use was given to neighbours or family.

Leftover foods or scraps were composted in an old metal drum. Egg shells were placed on a tray and when she had been cooking she would place them int he oven, then when dry she would crush them and put around the vegetable garden to stop snails eating her veges.

Old clothes were reused and reused. And when they were threadbear she would use them as rags for dusting, cleaning windows, scrubbing the bath etc. Before using them all buttons, zips, lace or ric rac would be removed and reused in other sewing projects.

She made tomatoe and plum sauces to last all year, her own jams, relishes, biscuits and cakes. Visitors never ever left Nannas house empty handed. They were always given homemade food to take with them.

There are so many other things she did that I will share in another post. There is so many things I have learnt because of my Nanna, things that I do today not because I have to like my Nanna did but because I choose to.

M xx

FOOD WASTE CHALLENGE UPDATE

2008-10-09T21:11:00.002+11:00

I am a week and a half into the challenge I gave myself to not waste food. So time for an update. I was so good at the beginning of this challenge and wrote out a weekly menu and then a shopping list of what I would need. But the problem was that I never actually got to the supermarket - see post below about car. So I had to rely on Mr Gadget stopping at the shops to buy what I wanted (roll eyes here please). He doesn't exactly stick to lists! So what came home and what was on the list varied considerably. And the other issue has been the kids being home on school holidays - hungry kids, extra kids, food being eaten that was planned for a meal . Excuses, excuses, excuses!
Well you get the drift. There is definately room for improvement.
So now my car is back (and with the amount it cost to get repaired it is a wonder we can shop this week at all.) and armed with a new weekly menu plan and shopping list I hit the shops and brought exactly what was on the list. Even allowed for very hungry kids this time.
I have had a good look at what is in the fridge, freezer and pantry.
I have planned meals around using up older items first.
I have cleaned fridge, and threw into the compost some mouldy, stuff.
Have some meat I found in the recesses of the freezer defrosted, it has been there way too long and will go to the dog.
Hopefully next update will be a more postitive and successful one.

MORE HERBS

2008-10-06T20:19:00.003+11:00

Today it has rained and even hailed much to Zippy and Super Boys delight! Very exciting - the rain that is! As you would realize if you had read a few posts below about my dumb, aaaghh moment of leaving the hose on and forgetting about it until the tank was empty. The tank is only a small 1000 litre one but it gets lots of use and I rely on it to water the back of the yard where the town water hose won't reach. It is used just for the garden. I really want another one, preferably bigger, for the other end of the yard. Just don't know where I would site it yet.

Thought I would share a few more herbs from the garden.

There is oregano (Greek oregano I think). It is a great ground cover and gets a fair bit of shade where I have planted it yet it seems to really thrive. I use it heaps it cooking. It is delicious in meat dishes and perfect for Italian and Greek recipes.

It has some fantastic health benifits too. Infuse the leaves to make a tea and drink when you have a fever to induce perspiration, relieve colds, cramps , digestive problems and stomach pains. A strong tea of the leaves can be cooled and used as a final rinse on the hair. It is supposed to help darken the hair of brunettes.

Mint- I think this one is spearmint. I make mint iceblocks for drinks on hot sunny days. I also use mint in lots of meat dishes too - sausage rolls, dolmades, meatballs etc. Mint also makes a refreshing tea, brew the tea and then chill. It is good for stomach upsets. MIne is grown in post becasue otherwise it would take over the garden.

Curry plant, not to be confused with curry leaves used in Indian cooking. I started off with one of these plants and then grew more and more from cuttings. Now I grow them as a low hedge along both sides of the pathway. The leaves smell like curry spice. Unfortunately when used in cooking they don't taste as wonderful as you would think they should from the smell. The taste is very subtle but they make a good seasoning for soups, salads and stews. Evidently the flower heads (which are yellow) and the leaves can be made into tea to soothe abdo pains.

Outside it is raining again -yippee the tank will be full again in no time.

M xx

WANDER

2008-10-04T12:15:00.003+10:00

The weather is getting warm and the garden is coming alive. I just thought I would share some snapshops I took on a wander around my garden.

This is a lemon verbena tree. The tree has been moved two times previously and this is the third. All the leaves fell off and just when I thought it had died and was all set to remove it, we had rain and a few days later it had new growth.

Lavender is my favourite flower. I have a few different varieties. I find that if I don't give them a severe pruning they grow too woody. This plant of lavender is so easy to grow from cuttings. The bees love it and the scent is gorgeous.

The Bay tree is a year old and is in a pot. I was told when I brought it that it is a slow grower and would still be pot size by the time Super Boy reached high school - he hasn't started school yet so that gives me a few years. There is plenty of new growth on it and it seems to be growing rather quickly. It needs a bigger pot.

Rosemary is in a pot by the back door. Sometimes it gets knocked by the kids or dog and bits fall of. I bung them into pots and they always grow. From this one plant I now have 6 rosemary bushes around the place. Great for cooking and for roasts or marinades.

Chocolate mint - smells divine. I am ashamed to say I have never actually used the mint in anything. But I am thinking it would be good to add a few sprigs to iced lemon drinks or in herbal tea.

I will share some more photos next post of wanderings around the garden.

SCAVENGE

2008-09-30T17:17:00.003+10:00

In my neighbourhood it is that time of the year when everyone goes through their home, garden and garage and throws away a lot of junk but also a lot of items just ready to be reclaimed. Utes drive up and down the suburb filling the back with metal items and others with secondhand goods - I think they must have second hand shops. I am always happy to see things get picked up and reused - sure beats going to landfill at the dump!.

But I am always amazed at some peoples attitude to bulk council clean ups. Comments such as

"but why would you scavenge through other peoples junk?"

"I'd hate to see their houses", referring to the people who reclaim the items.

"I refuse to put anything out because I hate people rifling through the stuff and messing it up".

Guitar Dude and friend have been on the prowl for pieces suitable for making a billy cart from. They have dragged home two bikes and taken the wheels off, a backseat of a car, a few metal bars for axils and a steering wheel. And the great building of the cart is progressing well. It is school holidays so it is keeping them entertained.

I have had a few wanderings around the neighbourhood and ventured home with some large black pots for the garden, a cane cat bed for my friends cat and a hose reel.

Zippy came home with a toy lawn mower for Super Boy and a sunflower pot as a present for me.

The prize for the best find goes to Guitar Dude and friend who reclaimed a trampoline. We already have one so the trampoline has found a home with a family with three boys. I know they will get heaps of jumping pleasure out of it.

Yesterday I set out with my shopping list after working out a meal plan for the fortnight. But unfortunately I didn't make it to the shops. I got to a busy roundabout and my car cut out as I was giving way. I got it going again and decided to head to the mechanics further up the road as the car was making a funny noise. But when I stopped to give way again it cut out. After blocking traffic for a little while I finally got it going again and this time it cut out while I was driving. Luckily I was able to cruise into a bus stop and off the road. The car needed towing away and the report from the mechanics isn't great - expensive. I have only brocken down a few times before - once in Sydney where I was partly blocking traffic and was in the car with two little ones. Not one person stopped to help me push the car over or offer help. Plenty of horns beeping me, even though my hazard lights were on and it was obvious I was broken down.

Well yesterdays experience was very different from that one. I called the NRMA and while waiting a lovely man came over and pushed the car further up the road out of the bus stop zone. It was midday and Superboy was with me. A man walking by stopped and had a look under the bonnet and then continued walking further up the road to the shops. He came back a short while later with a bottle of water for us and a cupcake for Superboy from the bakery. After NRMA had come and declared the car dead we had to wait for the tow truck. Superboy was very sick of waiting around in the heat by then and a lovely lady with her kids stopped to see if I was okay. She offered to wait by the car in case the tow truck came while I went up the road to the bakery(bribery food for Super) and to take him to the toilet.

Today I took Superboy to Dora The Explorer concert and normally I would have driven but for the first time since living here I took the bus there and back. We had to walk a little way on the way home and wait for a while for a bus but it worked out okay. Now we will be using public transport and walking more often for a while, it is the spur I needed!

Half way through the concert I sudenly had this aaaght moment! Did I turn off the hose form the water tank? The water tank hasn't got a pump so I usually hand water from the tap and before leaving I had it under a tree while pulling out some weeds. Turns out that I didn't turn it off. And now the tank is empty. I can't believe how stupid I am! And that poor tree will probably die from root rot or something! I am so annoyed with myself. Just have to hope it rains soon.

M xx

I CHALLENGE ME

2008-09-28T13:05:00.003+10:00

I challenge myself to not waste food. Yesterday I read that 1 in every 5 bags of food brought into the home in australia ends up as waste. That is absolutely disgraceful! Notebook magazine are promoting a Stop Food Waste! Campaign, http://www.homehints.com.au/my+journey/1268/reading/stop+food+waste They also have a competition to send in a hint http://www.homehints.com.au/competitions/competition.php?cid=138 and you could win a Tupperware Fridgesmart Set. I use this tupperware in my fridge for veges and fruit and they make a huge difference to the freshness of foods. Love them.
I am guilty of throwing food away. I go shopping and buy too many vegetables or fruits and they go off before we get to use them. Yesterday I cleaned out the fridge. I threw out (into the compost but still waste) 3 sweet potoatoes, grapes, 1/4 rockmelon, part of a pumpkin and some left over rice. Food that was perfectly alright when brought and it sat too long in the fridge until it was no good to eat. Ideally I want to grow the majority of my vegetables and not have to buy them. But when I do grow them I want to be able to eat or preserve or give away all excess. My aim is that all food that enters this house is eaten not disposed of.

So starting tomorrow I am going to plan a fortnightly meal plan. Fortnightly so hopefully I only need to grocery shop once each fortnight. I hate food shopping, so the less the better. At the moment I usually go to Aldi and then to a fruit and vegetable market. I try to avoid the bigger supermarkets unless there are specials that I can't ignore.
My local supermarket is Coles but I try not to do a main shop there. But every now and then they have great specials. Like last week they had Seventh Generation washing powder marked down to $4.00 from $8.50 and they had toilet paper under 50 cents a roll too ( I have a thing about spending more than 50 cents on a roll of loo paper).
So I will be making a menu and making a shopping list and sticking to it.
I will cook to use up foods that I already have in the fridge, freezer and pantry. At the moment I have 4 zuchinnis sitting in the fridge so tonights tea will be zucchini slice.

M xx

PRESENTS

2008-09-24T20:56:00.003+10:00

It is only 13 weeks to Christmas. We don't go overboard in our house with Christmas buying/giving. Mr. Gadget and I usually get something for each other that is practical or for the house or garden. This year I am after a water tank.

The boys get one main pressie and then smaller ones we have usually brought on sale and put away during the year. I always spoil the kids, mine and my nieces and nephews!

But I love giving presents and making presents. Usually I give my family and friends something handmade. I go to great lengths to make something that I know the recipitent will use or value. Giving presents is a talent, to know what a person wants, what suits their personality, what they will appreciate. I love it!

I also encourage Guitar Dude, Zippy and Super Boy to make and give presents to us, to one another and to grandparents or special friends.

So I have made a start on some presents. Some covered diarys for the kids to give to their teachers.

Milo tin decorated for a nephew. The tin will be filled with toy wild animals - he is animal mad. I am currently decorating another milo tin for my Aunt who is a gardener. Her decorated tin will be full of seeds, gardening gloves etc. And when the next tin of milo is empty I will decorate it for my niece and fill it full of hairclips, make up, lip gloss etc. These are so fun and quick to make.

Bookmarks with quotes and beautiful rose photos on them. These ones are for my reader friends.

M xx

HEY DARL.

2008-09-22T20:09:00.004+10:00

Actually Dahl, Channa Dahl - that delicious Indian, yellow split pea, spicy and very filling meal.

This is my version of the recipe:

2 tsp butter /ghee
1 onion
2 garlic cloves
coriander seeds
3 cardamon pods
1/2 tsp turmeric
cinnamon
garam marsala
curry paste ( sometimes red, tonight green)
1 1/2 cups yellow split peas (soak in water at least one hour and drain)
500g tomatoes (I use my homemade tomatoe puree/pasta sauce)
2 cups water

Heat butter/ghee and fry onion, garlic until soft.
Stir in ground coriander, caramon pods and other spices and curry paste.
Add tomatoes and stir well.
Add split peas and and bring to boil.
Simmer uncovered for 40 minutes.
In the last five minutes I often add green herbs or celery or other greenery from the garden.

I usually sllightly blend mine for a smoother consistency but this is entirely up to your preference.

Mmmmm - so delicious!

Today Superboy and I planted corn seeds and sunflower seeds, weeded part of the front garden and watered the veges and front garden.

I was all set for getting garden soil delivered for the new vege patch but Mr Gadget said he would borrow a trailer and get a few loads. Didn't happen. I think tomorrow I will just go ahead and get the soil delivered. I need somewhere to plant all my seeds! I have coriander, beetroot, chives, rhubarb, thyme spinach and lettuce all waiting to be planted out.

In the garden my Port Wine Magnolia is in flower. The fragrance from this tree is glorious, just heavenly. Funny because the tree itself isn't anything amazing and the flowers are little, hidden amongst the foliage and hard to see on the tree. I have planted it outside the bathroom window. It is my natural deodorises. I leave the window open and the bathroom always smells so fresh.
Close up the flowers are pretty little things, shame they aren't noticable. You can see the pollen that has dropped onto the bottom petal.

I am investigating gardening by the moon.

And I am going to make ginger beer this week too.

Off to Bunnings tomorrow to suss out water options for either another tank or some other sort of rainwater collection/diversion/storage option.

M xx

BULK WASTE

2008-09-16T20:33:00.004+10:00

Our area has council bulk waste collections twice a year. People put things out on the kerb for the local council’s bulk waste collection. They’ll recycle any white goods and furniture, green waste gets mulched and dispose of the rest.
But that’s only if the stuff lasts long enough for the council to pick it up. Reseller cruise around the areas in their utes, and there are many cars going for drive bys and people wandering around to check out what is on offer. A 70 year old grandma of a friend used to go out in her van each week to collect and then do things up and resell at the Trading Centre. It was a great way for her to supplement her pension.
Anything worth salvaging usually gets snavelled up before the council trucks come around. Householders purposely put good items they want recycled out in the hope that they go to a new home.
Many people I talk to about my love of bulk waste days say they are happier contributing to the ‘donating’ side rather than the scavenging side. I like the salvaging, I get rather excited about it! I love a good bargain!
I have found this wonderful old chair.

Pots, I especially like the large terracotta ones.
Plant stands.
shelving for the garage.
step machine excercise machine thingy
dog bed
garden ornaments
old wheelbarrows like the one below which is my strawberry patch.

The council here advertises where and when the collection dates are and if they are close by Super boy and I go for a walk or drive, park the car and stroll the streets to check for useful items. Next one is coming up very soon in this area and I for one can't wait.
M xx

LITTLE FROG

2008-09-13T18:20:00.008+10:00

How cute is this little frog! Zippy found him while pruning the plant he is sitting on - not sure what it is (the plant that is, but I think it related to the ginger plant somehow).

Zippy and Superboy helped me in the garden today. They pruned for a while then made swords from the prunings. Then they helped me build up the no dig garden for the pumpkins and to plant them out. They helped water the pumpkins and then made up this funny game with a bucket of water - they asked each other questions and if they answered wrongly they had to dunk their head into the bucket. It was hot today - 29 degrees so perfect way for them to cool down. They even went for a brief swim in the pool in the afternoon too (along with 4 other boys from the neighbourhood).

I really haven't got anywhere for the pumpkins to grow in my garden. So I decided to try growing the pumpkins outside our boundary. There is a walkway betwween our house and our neighbours running along around two sides of our house. The land is never used and is maintained by us. We mow the grass/weeds and have planted natives out there. The soil is clay so the only way I can see them growing is in a raised patch. There is plenty of space for pumpkins to ramble out there. I will just have to remember to water them -hose wont reach so will need to bucket water them.

While Zippy, Superboy and I were doing this, Mr Gadget and Guitar Dude were around the back finishing off the raised vege patch. I posted about the dilemma of the treated wood for the raised garden a few posts ago. We decided to seal the wood on the inside and then also covered it with black plastic. As a further safety measure I wont be growing any root veges there. But I am much happier now with using this garden as a vegetable patch.

M xx

More Of The Room

2008-09-11T14:16:00.005+10:00

I have had these two bedside lamps for a while too and just because I am in the mood for a change I personalised them to suit the new look shabby chic bedroom.

Simply added some satin roses and beading glued around the edge.

I have only one lemon left on my meyer lemon tree now. But lots of new flowers on both lemon bushes. For the first itme this year I had wasp galls on the meyer lemons. I cut them off a few weeks ago and disposed of them so hopefully wont be a problem

With the last of the lemons I made lemon icing for this very delicious carrot cake. It is waiting on the bench for Guitar Dude and Zippy to get home from school.

CARROT CAKE

2 carrots

3 eggs

175mls olive oil

200g castor sugar

100g pecans or wlamuts or almonds

200g plain flour

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1 1/2 tsp bicarbonate soda

ground cinnamon and ginger

1/2 tsp salt

Heat oven to 180 c, line tin. Beat eggs in a bowl and add oil and sugar. Add grated carrots and chopped nuts. Sift in flour and other ingredients and fold together. Spoon mixture into a tin and bake for 45 minutes.

Icing is made with 50g icing sugar, 200g cream cheese, lemon juice and vanilla essence.

M xx

FURNITURE RESTYLE

2008-09-10T13:16:00.007+10:00

I have recently painted and decorated our bedroom. Gone are the two tone pink wallpaper with border - it was probably very in vogue once but we were definately in need of a change. Poor Mr. Gadget has been surrounded by pink for way too long!

So now the room is green - dulux fortune. Mr Gadget made and installed a picture rail for me. He is a good man!

Then I decided I was sick of the pine furniture that we have had forever. But I couldn't justify gettign rid of it and buying new since it was still in good condition. So instead I painted it. Firstly painted it with this very cool paint (it has probably been around for ages but I have only just found it) that can be painted onto oil or varnished and there is no need to sand beforehand. After that was dry I painted the main colour (antique white USA) and then sanded off around edges etc to give the furniture a distressed look. Brought some new knobs for the drawers to replace the wooden ones and all complete. Love how they turned out.

Very shabby chic - very me.

M xx

FRONT GARDEN

2008-09-08T20:42:00.005+10:00

In the suburb where I live front yards are neat and showy. Manicured lawns, ordered shrubs and bushes neatly enclosed in garden beds, paved driveways leading to the garage. There is this unwritten code that front gardens are for show.

When I go walking around the neighbourhood with Zippy we play this game - guess what sort of people live here. According to Zippy the super neat gardens and houses belong to fussy, posh people, the messier gardens to lazy people. I guess the front garden of a home is a statement to the whole neighbourhood of what the people who live in the house are like.

So that got me thinking of what first impressions I want to give people when they come to my front garden. I want people to know that I love gardening, that I am concerned about the enviroment and that everyone can grow vegetables and fruits.

Mr. Gadget and I have just redone our front yard. We have paved the driveway, dug up all the lawn and replaced it with larger gardens and reduced the amount of lawn at the front. I was all for making the whole front garden and no lawn but Mr. Gadget was a tad horrified with this suggestion - he is far more conservative than me and has a desire to impress the neighbours with an ordered front yard. So we compromised. Since I am the gardener I got the job of choosing and planting the gardens out.

Our front yard is facing north and the best place for growing veges. It is a lovely size too and off the road. The front hedge (to the right of the photo is plumbago).

Below is the larger part of the garden. Over that brick wall is our pool. In front of the wall I have planted photinia to form a hedge. I want the pool area to be nice and private so want the photinia to be a foot higher than the brick wall. The weeping tree at the front is a black mulberry. There are 5 standard roses, 3 blue mooon roses, apaganthus and clivia bulbs.

On the other side of the hedge is a public walkway. I have replaced the grass with agapanthus and further along grevilleas for privacy. I am going to plant pumpkins and other veges out there this year - between our fence and the grevilleas. It is council land but not used by anyone and gets lots of sun.Looking up the driveway I have a teardrop garden bed with a small magnolia tree, three lavendar plants and a border of parsley planted. The dirt is where the turf will be layed (hopefully next week).This is the path leading to the front garden. The garden has been extended. The greenery is the original garden - mondo grass, hydrangeas, some sort of ginger, and manfern. In the front I have planted tomatoes, eggplants and edged with more parsley. I had intended on planting mondo grass and more hydrangeas in front.Towards the side is a smaller garden bed. There is a coffee tree (coffea Arabica), star jasmine and thyme in this garden.

The agapanthus were all given to me and are great fillers. But now I am realizing that I am going to be space poor to fit in all the veges and fruit trees on my wish list so thinking that they may have to go to make room for more productive plants. But that job will be for another day!

M xx

VEGE PATCH DILEMMA

2008-09-06T14:47:00.005+10:00

I have been asking Mr. Gadget to build me a raised vege patch for a while, not weeks, not months, more like years. A few weeks ago I saw a colourbond raised veg patch http://www.greywaterreuse.com.au/index.php/Greywater-Reuse-Systems/Steel-Vegie-/-Garden-Beds.html and told MrR Gadget that I was seriously thinking of getting one or two for the garden. The mere thought of me buying one spurred him on because last week I came home to find he had brought the wood and started. He has even designed it with a higher section at the back and it goes another few metres around the corner than the photo shows.
Very happy as now I will have a dedicated place to put my veges and herbs. Up until now I have just planted them where ever there is a space in the garden. And the place with the most space doesn't get nearly enough sunlight. This new corner where the raised patch is going gets heaps of sun.

But the big problem is that Mr Gadget has brought treated pine sleepers for the vege patch. The thought of what will be leeching out of the timbers into the soil where veges are going to be grown distreses me. What to do! Mr Gadget will not be impressed if I don't use it and it won't be good for marriagal harmony for me to make a huge fuss (even a little fuss will cause friction).

Does anyone know if sealing the timber by painting it will work or lining it with black plastic? Might do both. I have also read that root veges should be avoided where there is treated timber.

Oh what to do?? Help!

M xx

ORANGES AND LEMONS

2008-09-05T09:57:00.005+10:00

My little mandarin tree which is only 1.5 metres tall has had a fantastic crop, as has the meyer lemon tree. I made some marmalade with some and with the rest decided on making some cordial. Found a few different cordial recipes and so far have made two batches using different recipes.

Guitar Dude, Zippy and Super Boy have voted the cordial recipe below the best.

Homemade Cordial

3 cups sugar

1 litre water

1 litre orange/lemon/mandarin juice

2 teaspoons citric acid

In a saucepan mix together sugar and water. Heat until sugar dissolves and mixture is gently boiling. Turn off heat and add juice and citric acid and mix together.

Pour into sterilised screw top glass bottles. Store in the refrigerator.

Dilute 1:10 with chilled water or to taste.

Adding the citric acid is optional.

The cordial will keep for 1 week without the citric acid or 1 month with it.

It is so delicious and refreshing and the best thing is that the boys love it! I added some rind and pulp to my mixture too which gave it a bit more body. I was a bit concerned about using citric acid, thinking it was some nasty additive but it is natural and is just the natural acid from lemons. You can get it from supermarkets in the baking section.

Will be making more of this for sure.

M xx

COUNTRY GIRL WANNABE

2008-09-04T19:28:00.003+10:00

I'm a country girl at heart living in the suburbs. Our family lives in a suburb in Newcastle, Austalia on a slightly larger than average suburban block. Our house is slam dunked on the middle of the block and is a large, stretched out single story place. This suburb is a tidy and neat - everyone has manicured front lawns, ornamental neat front garden beds. Each weekend the revving of mowers, whipper snippers and blowers can be heard as the neighbourhood battle for the neatest, low maintenance garden swings into full force.

I am after more. I want to turn my little yard (front and back) into a more productive, useful enviroment. So this blog is to document my journey in gardening, vege and fruit growing, reducing wastes, becoming more frugal and more self sufficient.
It will be somewhat of an uphill struggle convincing Mr Gadget to support me - he is much more at home on the computer or tinkering with his latest techno gadgets.
I will have more success with our three boys - Guitar Dude, Zippy and Super Boy.

What fun it will be though! May the gardening force be with me.

M xx