Thursday, April 30, 2009

Back to normal operations soon...

Bear with me as I give my blog a new template. I'm importing one from outside Blogger, so there are going to be a few HTML issues to sort - but thankfully I haven't lost my widgets.

I've been looking around a while for a template that's easy to read and uncluttered. I hope to be back to normal operations soon.

I've built another coop, so yay - want to report on that as soon as I sort the formatting out.

Thanks for your patience.

Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Good morning Sunshine...

...and welcome to a brand new day!




I was up early this morning and happy to see the sunshine out and about, warming up the garden. To my surprise I had discovered our pigeon pea trees started flowering. I had no idea they could be so beautiful.

Because of all the wet weather we've been having lately all the wild fungi and even mushrooms have popped up everywhere. I know where the edible mushrooms came from though, all the mushroom compost we put down recently. Could I possibly get any more wonderful surprises!!

Well the answer of course is yes...with some new seeds that have sprouted recently. What's so special about these seeds?




They're the Bok Choy seeds I was given by Emily at Little Farm in the City. She wrote on the packet that it was good chicken food. With the amount which has successfully germinated around the place, I reckon the chooks will be getting some too! As much as we like Bok Choy, there's definitely enough to go around.

The white stuff you can see on the surface is from the mushroom compost. With all the moisture that's been around lately, it's coming back to life. Which is one more reason I'm happy to see the sun about today. Time to dry out the ground a bit before everything turns to mush!

I can now appreciate how difficult it must be for people living in the wet tropics to grow vegetables. No wonder the best time of year for them is in the dry season. So true!!

I hope you all have a wonderful time in your gardens today, or whatever you happen to be doing. If you're in Queensland - enjoy the sunshine and let's hope it gives the swollen waterways time to recede.

Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Reflections, April 2009

My last "Reflections" post was back in December 2008, but now it seems a good place to write about our exciting news this year. Probably about the most exciting news for our family since we moved here, two years ago.


The wet weather has brought out the wild fungi...a sign of changes in the garden...


Changes...changes - everywhere!! The most significant change came of late, with a new job offer for Dave. He applied for what seemed like a very generic position as a "chef", and it turned out to be an on-site Catering Manager position. Not just for a small business though, it was for a well known catering company with contracts all over Queensland for hospitals, building sites and the like. And they happened to have the contract for the new prison being built 30 minutes drive away.

What does this mean for our little family at the Bushland project though? We get a husband and father back again!!

He will be home every afternoon and evenings during the week, he'll have weekends off and if that wasn't already enough- he'll get ALL those public holidays off too. We will be that family eating out or lazy about in the garden when there's a public holiday to be had. No more working on those days...no more working on weekends...and no more putting our daughter to bed by myself nearly every night.

Dave gets to have those special moments with his growing daughter again, which I could only tell him about later. He would often pop his head in her bedroom door when he got home from work, and say he can see how fast she's growing - and he's missing it.

I'm sure the job will have it's down sides too, but for now we're celebrating the thought of 8 hour working days instead of 14 hour ones. He starts next week...yay!!

I must confess as the end is nearly in sight though, this week has been the hardest for us all. Dave worked all during the Easter holidays, so we've missed him and he us. In the past I would've just put my head down and said this is what pays the bills. So would Dave, and our daughter has just come to accept this is the way things were. We all knew this week however, that working in this manner WAS something to feel uncomfortable about.

It's been a few weeks of extremes here. Old job new job. Happiness and frustrations. Finishing loose ends, starting others. School holidays and rain, rain, RAIN! Sunshine today thankfully. As hard and challenging as it's all been though, I guess it's about renewal. From old things come new things, but it's all what we make of it.

This family has suddenly got a lot more time to make things together!

Thursday, April 9, 2009

Easter Surprise

Oh gee, wasn't I excited when I did my usual rounds of the garden this afternoon. What did I spy but a special little egg...the one I have been waiting for!!




I know it's small but it's the first egg they've laid for me. It's my much anticipated Araucana egg!! Being their first egg it's bound to be so small, but I can expect bigger ones in future. To give a comparison of colour though, I had to resort to a supermarket whooper of an egg.




Isn't it cute!! I had to stop myself from dancing around the garden. I even have to contain myself before my daughter and husband return from the shops. I'm sure our little girl will be just as excited as I am. I've been telling her for weeks that the Araucana's lay GREEN eggs.

So that's my little Easter surprise...just in time for Good Friday tomorrow too. I've got some more exciting news to share later on. Now I've built up your anticipation you're going to think I'm pregnant or something - but it's not that kind of exciting news. More later.