Getting rid of the grossness...

We are overrun by flies! Urgh!

I even resorted to using flyspray during the week but it didn't make a difference. Probably didn't help that the doors remain open (without screens). Nevermind.

So today my parents came over for a visit and something my stepdad said (totally unrelated to flies!) brought back a strong visual memory of a disgusting contraption that my granddad had outside their house. I visualised a bottle-full of half dead flies. Blech.

Anyway, after questioning further, we got the instructions on how to construct our own - apparently they will attract flies from a wee distance away, so figured even if it was set up down in the garden it may deal to the houseflies too and I wouldn't need to look at it daily (or freaking any visitors out).

I suspect the bottle really needs to be clear (but this was the only one in our recycling bin, so had to do for now) since the flies are attracted to the sunlight when trying to escape out the inverted funnel but can't quite figure it out and fly around until exhausted. For bait, Simon put some sweet stuff in there along with some chicken poo (I know that attracts the flies coz I get assaulted by them when I go down to feed them!). So if this works, we may put another up nearer the house.

Sunny Days

We've had some gorgeous weather again after continual all-day rain on Christmas day and for part days afterwards. Then it went cold for a few days...

The sunflowers are either all flowering or have done their thing and lost their petals (it was fun watching them rotate as the day went on to follow the sun). I really want to harvest the seeds and store them for eating. We have pulled away the remains of the flower (the one that has lost all it's petals) and exposed the seeds underneath. We are going to leave the head on the stem until the seeds plump out some more before cutting the head off to dry before gently rubbing them out (apparently when they literally fall out it is the best way to tell when they are ready). They will then be dried on trays or roasted and stored.

Some more firsts for my garden!

I had a few lovely surprises today when I was down in the garden digging over two of the beds which we have fully harvested.

Actually, Nathan made a couple of discoveries, it was like they appeared overnight...

Corn

Beans (ok, so they're tiny, but they've been a long time coming since they were knocked with a frost and have taken SO long to get a hold again!)

Courgettes (these were a surprise, coz I thought I'd lost my one plant at the front of my house and forgot I had another - I thought it was another pumpkin until we saw these).

Tomatoes (just coz!) Oops, close up photo makes these look like they're covered in white spots, but it's just the late afternoon sunlight reflecting on the hairs.

Summer meal #2

This afternoon after a browse of the fridge and wondering if I'd made the right decision to cancel the vege delivery box I had a burst of inspiration. The fridge was looking rather sad with only a few different things in it (more to the point, they weren't things I would usually use all together, so had to think a bit!). I've been making polenta pie for about 6mths now as a now-and-again meal, but thought I could make a tasty dinner from what we had.

Cook 1 cup polenta (cornmeal) in 3 cups of water, about 50gms butter and some salt/pepper and simmer for about 20mins (if it goes lumpy, do what I do and put the stick-whizz into it to get it smooth again).

I sauteed up halved cherry tomatoes, leek, courgette and silverbeet.

Once polenta is cooked, put it into a greased pie/flan dish (it kind of sets into a firm porridge type texture). Place the sauteed veges over the top, add some grated cheese or parmesan (or both!) and bake for 20mins.

The kids picked it over - but Simon and I enjoyed it.

There are many variations you can do for this - chopped up eggs, feta, pre-roasted cubed potatoes/pumpkin, mushrooms or whatever you have available!

My annual decluttering

It seems to be around this time of year I feel a need to purge and go through our stuff. Maybe it is because Simon works through this time when other families are usually having family holidays and time together or perhaps it is because we've received more "stuff" with Christmas, or maybe it's because the kids seem to go through a developmental change with the types of things that are played with and no longer used.

So today I felt energised to get stuck into it (one of those spontaneous things that happens to me sometimes). It ended up being a lovely day and kids had a great time. Despite the day being sunny and warm after a few cold days, we just didn't feel the need to get out of the house.

We started off doing the usual chores of tidying the kitchen and picking up the bedrooms before starting for the day.

It felt like a long, peaceful day that just had such a good flow...the kids played well ALL day without a hint of a fight, they handwashed the big dishes for me (making plenty of mess in the process lol) while I went through the kitchen, then we had a break for morning tea, read some stories, they painted and then went on to playing with lego while I pottered around sorting the bathroom out. I then saw them moving towards the TV wanting to watch a DVD, so off we went to make playdough which took them through to lunchtime. All afternoon they made up crazy games using the couch cushions, played in the double-doored wardrobe in Danielle's room for ages (pretending to go to Narnia and back - who knew that would be a game for a 1/2 hr), played with all the old toys and baby gear I was trying to sort out that had been tossed in there (so I left them to it while I moved on to sorting out our bedroom before going back to it once they moved on to some other game). Tended to a few wounds and injuries, made dinner and then went down to the beach for some fresh air and a swim before home for a bath and both crashed out asleep while having stories read to them.

Summer meals

Well, I feel that we've finally finished with any last winter-y type meals here. It took a while, but I can feel the switch has been made. I am finding it a little more challenging this summer coming up with enough options, since we are only eating meat once or twice a week (especially since there are heaps of our all year round meals we could still be eating - but quite honestly - I feel the need for a change anyway). Some dishes (which allow for a huge variation) we have so far been enjoying (both vegetarian and meat) include: pizza, taco's, polenta pie and bbq's (of course).

Tonight we had pizza - yum!

I made the pizza base using gluten free flour mix; made a tomato sauce with tinned tomatoes, thyme and garlic; roasted up available veges: potatoes and capsicum/sweet peppers (but often use eggplant, courgette/zucchini or whatever else is available to bulk it out); sauteed some silverbeet, spinach and leeks - threw it all on, added some jarred feta and sundried tomatoes we received in a gift box for Christmas and voila! Often I will make a pesto as well, but wasn't particularly in the mood tonight.

Eating seasonally

We've been truly eating seasonally for 18 mths now. That's how long we have been receiving our weekly organic vegetable and fruit box packed full of fresh in-season produce. During that time I have not bought a single supermarket vegetable aside from supplementing what we use a lot of (potatoes and occasionally apples) - and then I stick with buying organic. This week is the first week we have decided to put the order on hold and try and see how far our vege garden gets us. I was finding the box was loaded with spinach, silverbeet, plums, potatoes - things we don't need yet were getting heaps of!

It hasn't been without challenge though!

A few things I've noted along the way...

We gorge ourselves on the new season produce until we can't eat anymore and the surplus is at risk of going to waste - interesting how the "value" of an item is reduced when it is no longer a scarcity or not regulated. Plums have been the focus here - in the first few weeks we ate and ate the plums all day - over the last week - no one has touched a single plum! Today I am making jam from the last 6-7 kgs before they go off. The birds are finally moving in on the tree from the top lot which we can't pick and they have all turned almost black from ripeness.

Fruit and vegetables the kids ate and enjoyed last season take a few days for them to get their taste for it again (probably because they don't remember eating them last year but I'm sure this will change as they get older).

I find myself wanting to find a use for every little morsel so there is no wastage. Even if it means freezing them so we can enjoy the produce out of season. Maybe this is more related to having grown it myself? I'm thinking of things like stems from silverbeet/chard and brocolli - maybe on lean weeks when the veges are looking a bit thin on the ground I could throw some of these (surely still nutrient packed?) off cuts from the freezer into things like soups or casseroles?

It was challenging in the beginning cooking based on the box that arrived. But it didn't take long to get my head around replacing or supplementing from available vegetables rather than trying to find an exact match for what I had. Kale and spinach have became good reliables for adding to almost any dish

But...the above point has made me a bit nervous about entertaining and inviting others over for dinner. What if they didn't like the look of our meals which do tend to look thrown together? I do need to get over this and branch out from my usual standbys that I feel OK about sharing with others.

What favourites do you cook for others?

Complete!

Well, I finally finished digging out and mulching the paths between the garden beds today. It looks lovely and afterwards I spent a good half hour lying in the hammock under the trees in the shade gazing at it with a nice cup of tea. It's looking full and lush and I'm amazed at the work gone into it (without it feeling like a chore), the lack of knowledge I had when I embarked on the project and yet it's been really successful so far. I've learnt a lot that I will try and improve on for next year (with more lessons to be learned along the way I'm sure!). I'm not sure how the weed control method will hold up (ie thick newspaper and mulch*), but hopefully it will give me a break from the constant weeds creeping in from the borders. Notice in the 2nd picture the apple tree branch lying (but still attached) on the ground...it looks like the apples are continuing to grow, so I'm pretty happy about that.

I've realised too that I don't need to rely on the garden beds to be harvested on a timeframe now that I've capped the number of beds I'll be planting out. I orginally was going to arrange it so the chicken tractor could be moved around as the beds were harvested (which I will still do), but now that I will stick with only 9 beds, it leaves me with plenty of spare space to have the chickens rotating on without running out of fresh greenery to put them on before the harvested beds are ready for them.

And, just coz, here is a picture of my first garden which I created in December last year - it all started from here...

* I wanted to make note of what my mulch comprised of: leaves from various trees (mixed with sand since that part of the property is fully sand with a bit of sparse grass growing on it), sawdust and partly composed grass clippings/leaves/twigs. It felt all very "permaculture-y" as I scrounged around my property finding appropriate materials to use as mulch. Today I was literally needing to move things to scrape underneath them to get together enough.

It was lovely...now it's over

We had a lovely, relaxed and very low key Christmas day here. This year it was just our little family and my grandmother around to celebrate together. We started off the day with friends coming over for breakfast and then picked my nana up for a simple roast meal for lunch. So although I hosted and set the lot up - it was so relaxed and non-stressful that it was a very nice day.

A vegetarian version

I used to make a really yummy fish pie - then we stopped eating fish
Then, I substituted the fish to make a really yummy chicken pie - but we only buy chicken about once a month

So, tonight I felt like "the pie" but wasn't sure what to use in place of chicken or fish - but thought chickpeas might make a nice alternative. It was a success! And the kids ate it. We'll be having this one again.

600gm potatoes
2-3 eggs
3 Tbspns butter
3 Tbspns flour
1 cup milk
300gm cooked chickpeas
1/2 cup water
1/4 cup chopped parsley
2 spring onions (I used the equivalent in leeks)
1 cup frozen corn (I used chopped up kale)
Grated cheese for the top

Boil the potatoes (I add extra veges in here), add the eggs to the same pot for hardboiling.

Mash the vegetables.

In a pan melt the butter, add the flour and mix in, add milk to make a thick sauce. Add in the onions, other veges, parsley and chickpeas. Pour in the water and chopped up boiled eggs. Stir till cooked through.

Put chickpea sauce into a casserole dish, cover with the mashed potato and top with grated cheese.

Bake for 15mins at 180 degrees.

Plum Ice Cream

More back breaking work

Today I decided to get cracking and stop procrastinating about getting those weeds on my paths under control.

I started by digging out the worst of the weeds (mainly creeping buttercup and convolvulus) and laid down the weed mat. When that lot ran out (not far into the job lol) I decided to switch to a different method (and will use it as a comparison for my project!). I dug out the weeds, laid wet newspaper thickly over the soil and covered with mulch. I will also cover the weedmat with mulch as well. I'll just methodically work my way up the grid to do all paths and depending on my motivation and energy I will work my way around the grid as well.

I had Simon use the line trimmer on the entire lower section (where the vege patches are) - what am improvement it makes and looks really tidy and like a *real* garden now. I have decided to stick with the current 9 vege patches (plus the 2 adjacent ones which aren't really near by) since a few of the original plots are almost fully harvested and one potato patch will be dug out in the next few weeks I think which allows the chooks to move back onto those areas. By stopping with that number of patches it leaves heaps of room for the kids to get to the pear tree for climbing and another upper area for playing on. Looks a bit square, but makes me smile to see it so tidy.

Today was so hot, but it was great that the bathtub (aka water trough) was right there and available for standing in while my legs cooled off!

Processin' the Plums

We've been busy up that tree picking the plums over the past few days since they have well and truely ripened. But oh, what to do with them all! We have probably picked a good 14kgs so far (one heaped basket = 2.5kg) and still more to go that are still in the process of ripening.

I have given away a few bags, but that still leaves heaps.

On Saturday I decided to use the dehydrator and attempted fruit leathers. Not so much because I want my kids to eat them as snacks (uh uh, don't need cavaties here) but just to reduce them down and decide what to do with them later whether to make jam or just to add to yoghurt over winter when there is less other fruit to be eaten.

I also froze some of the puree in ice cubes.

Then tonight I decided to bite the bullet and make some jam. What usually puts me off is the whole steralizing process. But I did it, and got these lovely 4 jars for all my effort.

Simon even got to eat fresh jam on some toast and announced it wonderful.

I still have a jar of fresh puree that I will use tomorrow when I attempt to make some Plum Ice Cream - yum, yum!

Eating locally

I think out of all the *big* environmental things I'm currently working on to make a difference is trying to eliminate imported food. Since we're a small country, it isn't really possible to say "I will only eat food produced within 200km of my home" otherwise we'd be eating no food except local produce (because all the food manufacturers are mostly located up north and more like 600km away)! So for me, eating local means eating food produced in New Zealand - and even that's tricky. Particularly for our family eating gluten free - it makes it SO tricky finding alternative grains to eat that would be local. Rice is not grown in NZ, nor things like chickpeas (as far as I know) etc. Rice makes up a large part of alternative grains for the gluten free diet - even though Australia grow rice, from what I understand it's not a particularly environmentally friendly way to produce it because of the high use of water which Australia just does not have.

So for now, I am working on sticking with NZ and Australian products and see how I go. I still have work to do on that.

It's not just about cutting back on food miles that is driving my desire to do this - but the fact that food prices are rising (and becoming quite noticeable), the thought of how we would access foods that our family are used to if we are no longer able to afford some of those Australian products and having the security and knowledge on how to work with local products (so the idea is to phase them out now so it is less of a problem later).

Basically, I want to make eating local "the normal thing to do" for our family without a second thought. The more we eat locally, the less I miss the imported products. We no longer eat canned fish and we no longer eat banana's. Two biggies for us to have given away, but I don't (and the kids don't) even think about it any longer (Simon buys himself banana's still for his lunches, but hey, I can't control what he does).

I have been much more mindful when preparing a meal and thinking about just what has gone into it, the top picture was lunch last Monday - homemade guacomole (using NZ made chili sauce which made no mention of sourcing products from overseas), homemade hummus (unfortunately using imported chickpeas, but I intend on growing some sort of white beans next year to substitute in here), home grown potatoes sprinkled with NZ made (very expensive!) cheese.

What a difference it made!

Back at the start of spring I was needing to dispose of our woodfire ash and plonked some in my compost bin and sprinkled quite liberally across the garden bed which I had reserved for my tomatoes. Only half the length of the garden received the ash. I really wasn't *too* sure I was doing the right thing. This was the trench which was completely sand before I worked on it. I dug it out to about a foot deep and layered the sand with my own compost and a store-bought compost to try and build up the nutritional value of it. However, it can't have been the compost that made a huge difference - but the ash sure has and it's now quite evident. When I first planted my seedlings out into this bed the ones on the left hand side were stronger and larger with the weaklings down the other end. Well, now it has become obvious that the plants on the left are struggling, straggley, pale coloured and just not of the same health, dark green, bushiness of the other side.

(the struggling left side)

(the booming side)
Wood ash provides phosphorus, potassium, calcium, magnesium and sulphur. It is great for neutralising acid soils - and several websites noted specifically that tomatoes love it!

So there you go - here is the living proof.

Down in the garden...

I seem to do a major gardening session one week and then have a few weeks off where I do zip. Works well for me. It means I don't need to worry about getting down there frequently to do chunks of work if I'm really not in the mood, or it's too hot, or we're busy doing other things or it's raining (ha!).

I was surprised to finally see some peapods growing yesterday, not sure how long they'll take to plump up, but hopefully the strange fungi/virus that the plants have won't affect the produce? The lower leaves have all turned white and transparent and quite thin - not too sure what it is though!

I harvested three baby beets the other day too, so looking forward to using them in some salads with my lettuces that have started to boom.

I've ceased growing seedlings, and sowing the seeds directly into the garden beds and they are booming - cuts the double handling which I was finding a bit of a drag earlier in spring.

I'm continuing to harvest new potatoes and one bed have reached a decent size.

The chickens seem to have cut back their laying, one of them was clucky for a few days I noticed and had to kick her out of the nest but she seems to be back to normal now.

Oh, and in the front garden my tallest sunflower has opened and currently about 6.5 feet high.

At last

Some rain...it did a great job too - not too hard, and went on for hours...

Shame the New roof didn't cut it. Actually, the roof is fine, we're waiting on the skylight dude to re-prioritise our job of replacing the seals around the glass or at least do a patch job until he can come and fix things properly in February! Last night there was literally a waterfall of water flowing in. The new roof has obviously just shifted things around more and made the problem worse.

The rain must have also been too much for our apple tree - I found it on the ground this morning. There was only one large, very old, half rotten limb left on the tree growing horizontally and with the fruit loading it down - it (not surprisingly) gave way...boohooo...I'm hoping the apples will still grow since the branch is still attached for now, I can remain wishful anyway.

Just cruisin'

While the mummies yakked and discussed gardens, vegetables, weed elimination, herbs and the lack of rain...the kids ate fresh fruit and hung out.

Where is the rain?!

It seems the rest of the country has been bombarded with rain - we haven't seen a drop for about a month. Things are SOOOO dry! I'm busy out there every few days dipping my watering can into the water trough...but, I'd really like a tiny break, please? On the plus side, it's good exercise for me and my arm muscles are increasing in size as I lug a good 25 x 15 litres of water across the garden every few days...

The weakest is flowering...

Strangely (or maybe not!) the smallest sunflower plant has produced a flower already. The other 3 plants are standing much taller (past my short 5' height anyway). I suspect they are a little too closely planted and perhaps this struggling plant decided it better reproduce while it can...

The kids have been fascinated with the rapid growth that the plants have done in the past few weeks - only a couple of weeks ago one plant was up to the middle of Nathan's forehead and now it is taller than me. I'd be amazed even if they weren't lol.

First plums!

The kids have been picking plums for most of this week and munching away at their leisure. Today (after spotting a blackbird eyeing them up from a nearby branch), I decided that there were enough ripe ones to get out the ladder and fill our basket (hehe, note the cute basket I just *had* to get from the op shop last weekend so I could fulfill my romatic dreams of placing freshly harvested produce/eggs into it as I wander around admiring my garden lol). These are only *just* ripe, and heaps more are up there still to even turn red, so I'm pleased I'm not going to have a sudden onslaught of fruit to do something with.

The start of the weed elimination project...

I may as well take notes on here for easy compiling (and gets my photo's in a place I can find them for printing for handing in as a part of my assignment). I've initially decided to focus on an area of 4 vege patches and the paths in between.

My dilemma with weed control has been how to manage the paths and the fact they continue to creep in. I can't raise my garden beds due to the chicken tractor, so need to work within these limits. I have decided to get some weedmat down and cover the paths with it and then add a mulch cover.

This is the first area I will work on and depending on how it goes I may change tactic further down the track (the photo really doesn't do justice).

This bag contains all the convolvulus and creeping buttercup which will hopefully break down over the next 6wks.

De-weeded!

Just to show my efforts from the last few days!

A new month

I wanted to post this yesterday, but we got busy, then had company for dinner and then I couldn't be bothered downloading pics blah blah...

Being the 1st of December yesterday we put our Christmas tree up as is our family tradition. For Nathan this was almost as exciting as Christmas day for him (in fact I think he kept thinking it was and was getting confused about it all) since he woke up at 5.50am (about an hour too early) and came into our room saying "can we put the tree up today?"

So, up it went (only a little fake tree so didn't take long). As I was putting the decorations on, I thought about how I had made the majority of them over the past 3 years.

Last years' effort was making felted balls from varying coloured wools and some of them I added beading to. I also made some some balls using entirely beads threaded onto twisty ties - they were fun and quite effective. (Unfortunately the photo came out a bit glary).

The year before I made some from driftwood and added beads and glitter glue.

I haven't made any this year, the tree's not really big enough to take anymore anyway!