Book Pay it Forward

Firstly a big thank you to Tricia for the give away prize she sent me. The bib and flannel are very cute and soft too, just right for a little one and the refashioned demin pouch is fantastic. I have thought of quite a few uses for it already. Tricia's packaging was environmentally conscious too. Recycled paper envelope and compostible plastic wrapping. I am going to reuse the packaging to send my book pay-it-forward. If you are looking for something special for a new baby Flannel Fings come highly recommended.

Now, to the pay-it-forward. A while ago Kez sent me a the book The Party's Over byRichard Heinberg as part of a pay-it-forward. It is now my turn to pass the book on. If you are interested in a book that discusses oil depletion and peak oil then leave a comment and I will randomly choose a recipient. This offer is only for Australian readers for cost cutting and book mile cutting reasons.

Finally just a picture of one of the kookaburras that call Sunny Corner Farm home. When the kids are at school, the play equipment still gets some use.

Tracy

Winter At Last

The weather this season has been mild. There have been a few cold days, but on the whole it has been more like autumn. A couple of days ago, it even felt like spring the sky was so clear and the sun so warm but today it has soured. Rain, wind and sleet.

We have lived at Sunny Corner Farm for over ten years and for those ten years, I have had some concerns about a couple of trees that are close to the house. Today those trees came down. We had to have a professional crew take them down and it was amazing to see them at work. The trees were in the vegetable garden and although the trees were 15 to 20 metres high and heavily branched, not one vegetable was damaged. Fences either.

I'm so glad the vegetables were unharmed as I am really looking forward to these snowpeas. It is a pity to have had to remove the trees but they were too close to the house and posed a threat if they fell. To lessen the impact of taking out the trees, I received 5 new fruit trees today which will be in the orchard this weekend. We now have 2 more cherry trees, 2 nectarines and a greengage plum from Thistlebrook Nursery. This company have provided great service and the prices are reasonable and the trees lovely and healthy looking.

My girls have enjoyed the colder weather and have restricted their farming exploits to plasticine animals.

I'm off to stoke up the fire and make some soup.

Tracy

Anniversary Break

Tim and I have been away for a weekend for our sixteenth wedding anniversary. We travelled about three hours from home to Kings Plains Castle and had a relaxing weekend. No cooking or cleaning for two days straight but I missed the kids, the animals and the gardens too.

However if I could pack up my kids and animals and move in I would. I don't want to live in a McMansion but the real thing would be nice. I'm not sure about all of the cleaning and maintenance though. My little cottage is a much more practical and suitable homestead for us.

Back to regular blogging when I catch up on the weekends laundry. Three kids staying with their grandparents bring home a lot of dirty clothes.

Tracy

Feathered Friends

One of the resident kookaburrs has taken to perching on the micro-bat box that my daughter made last year at an environment health workshop.

We have two new additions to the poultry pen. They are a pair of Silver Sebright bantams which were deemed not show worthy by the breeder but are welcome additions to our menagerie. They are very timid birds but are starting to calm down and get used to the activity around the farm.

Over the past week all of the English lavenders have been planted and instead of having left over plants, I actually need about four more to complete my row.

More soon,

Tracy

Lovely Weather

The long weekend was cold, wet and lovely. Ofcourse cold, windy wet days are not good when you have outside work to do but they are great for snuggling up by the fire and taking stock. Reading, sewing, thinking and maybe some snoozing too.
They are also great for impromptu tea parties when the whole family is at home together. For some reason the coffe, tea and cake taste sweeter and more filling than a quick cuppa on the run.

I have noticed on my site meter, that I get a bit of traffic from Down---to---Earth via a budgeting link so I am going to include a few budget/frugal type of posts in the next few days. Ofcourse with most frugal and simple living posts, they won't be innovative or fancy, just things that work for us and might work for others too.

Tracy

5th June

The 5th of June is World Environment Day. I must admit that I didn't know until I saw a link on Hills and Plains Seedsavers blog, I just don't seem to be able to keep up with the different themed days that there are. I have 80 English lavender plants to pot on or plant out so hopefully that is good for the environment. They will certainly be a welcome addition to my home. About 60 will be planted along the drive way bordering the orchard and the other twenty will take up residence in various spots around the yard including in the new herb garden to be.

Three of our young Suffolk rams have been keeping the lawn trimmed around the washing line. These boys are going to be advertised for sale next week and I will miss them.Come September there will be new lambs to take their place.

I'll especially miss Gilbert, he is the friendliest of the three and the leader of the pack. We will also be selling 6 ewes too so hopefully there is some buyers out there for spoilt pure bred Suffolk sheep.

Best wishes

Tracy

Turkish Turban Taste Test

Turkish Turban Pumpkin

Our harvest of Turkish Turban pumpkins have weighed in at about 30kg. Today being a cold, wet day I decided to use the largest pumpkin for some soup. This pumpkin weighed 6kg and looked a lovely vibrant orange with green on the bottom. The pleasure of looking at it was short lived because the struggle to cut it was frustrating. The skin was very tough.

The skin was so tough that instead of peeling it and chopping it before roasting, I cut it in half and put it in the oven drizzled in olive oil. The resulting roasted pumpkin was quite fibrous and dry. I prefer sweeter pumpkins.

The soup was ok. A little bland but edible. I think the Turkish Turban would be better for making pumpkin gnocchi which I will try tomorrow when my husband is at home because he really loves it.

To sum up, the seed catalogue is probably right, it is mostly an ornamental pumpkin. The sheep like to eat it though so if we don't like it, it won't go to waste. I'm going to let the seeds dry out and try roasting some and save some for swapping and maybe growing a vine next year.

Tracy