The Visit

Last month, for my birthday, my mum visited me and my sister here in Melbourne, which was wonderful. It was great to be able to show her where and how I live: my home, and my lovely big back yard. We cooked a lot, and sat in the living room in front of the 'fire' (gas heater) chatting and knitting. Sarah came over and we went out to lunch in my favourite local cafe. We went op-shopping at the marvellous op-shops on Sydney road.

And we spent a day out in the garden. My mum is a biodynamic farmer and a permaculture wiz and as we wandered around the garden, secateurs in hand, she had a wealth of advice for what to plant where, how to manage the gore wasp in the lemon, how to prune the peach in time for spring.

I love my mother's approach to gardening -- it's very practical and direct. We were replanting some seedlings: I, gingerly pulling them free, delicately placing them in a hole as if they were precious (and they are!), softly tucking them in. Mum would unceremoniously push them into the ground with her thumb.

'I used to think like you do, but now I plant out so many seedlings that I haven't got the time or patience,' she said burying up to its leaves a tiny, out-of-season tomato seedling that had grown in the compost. 'It probably wont survive the rest of winter,' she warned.

For me, who, for all my cyclical enthusiasm has never been much of a green thumb, took heart in her approach -- clearly these fragile things are hardier than they look. Maybe it wont matter so much if I get a few things wrong. Its all the encouragement I need to dive right in!

And then, she boarded the train and went back to the farm.

Yarn Along

Once, quite a few years ago now, I had finished working for a man in a kilt who lived on the west coast of Scotland. I planned to head South again, perhaps back into England, and told him so.

'Oh no, you can't!' he said in a voice like Sean Connery's. 'Not when you've come so close.'

The balcony on the front of his house looked out over the harbour, and every day, just at the same morning hour, a very large ferry left for the Outer Hebrides.

'You must see the Islands while you are here. They're amazing.'

And he was right. Such wild, treeless islands of wind and ghosts. I stood on a bluff and looked out over the sea and hills and could see nothing made by man. I could have been standing there at any point in history. It broke my heart and healed it all at once.

So I stayed with the daughter of the man in a kilt with the voice of Sean Connery, in her cottage attached to a haunted manor. And we cooked rustic meals of produce bought from farmers, and went looking for ghosts, and fended off Jehovah's Witnesses who knocked on our door-at-the-edge-of-the-world, and we sat around and knitted. There was a book there, too, all about an island even further out in the uncaring sea, which had once had inhabitants who had more in common with the Norse, than they did with the Scotts (although they still had to pay the Laird their taxes). I didn't read all of this book, I left before I could finish, back to a part of the world just a little less magical.

This is not that book, but it is about that furthest-flung island, St Kilda. It is a fictionalised account of the time that a missionary and his wife went to save the natives from themselves, much to the detriment of everyone concerned. It's not a bad book, but it's not that good either. Mostly I keep reading it because it is about my favourite part of the world. And my knitting skills have progressed somewhat since sitting in that cottage too. This is the first of a pair of legwarmers, lace stitch, knitted in the round. The wool came from a jumper I bought at the op-shop and unravelled. It's going well.

Kitting and reading: two of my most favourite things. Joining in with Ginny (and Mum) for Yarn Along this week.

While I wasn't here...

While I wasn't here, I:

turned 30

And had a surprise dress up party (good thing I always have lots of dress-ups)

received outrageously expensive gifts (thats a Macbook Pro in there)

and had a lovely time.

I also had visits from

friends

and family

from far away.

I got a new job. I no longer work at the kindergarten; I now work for a company were I lay out horse-racing form guides for the newspapers. It's a step in the right direction.

I have been living happily:

gardening,

and crafting

and reading

Hopefully, I wont be away so long next time.

See you soon.

Around the Farm (Or, in our case, the Yard)

After seeing this on my mum's new blog, I've decided to join in with Farmama on her 'Around the Farm' posts. Every Thursday, Sara from Farmama posts a series of photos of the week's happenings on the farm. Now, I have a suburban backyard, not a farm, but I thought I'd share what's happening around as we develop our little urban renter's croft.

This is our new back yard, in all it's undeveloped glory. When we're done with it, it'll be a fantastic food producing garden!

This is one of the glorious, large veggie beds we've inherited...

And this is the other. Clearly, I need to dig some weeds out, fix some retaining walls and get planting!

The great big awesome compost system needs a little lovin'...

Our back fence and behind the compost is overrun with this noxious weed. I don't know what it is, but I know its hard to kill! Here Dom gives it a what-for.

All my herbs, chillies and strawberries rescued from our courtyard at the previous place, waiting patiently to be transplanted into our (forthcoming) kitchen garden. The chamomile especially is lovin' its new location.

The last month and a half have been a bit crazy round here. First there was the move, and cleaning up around the old place, including dismantling some rather nice garden beds we'd installed there and trucking the railway sleepers and soil over here. We were happy enough to leave them for the next tenants, but apparently the landlord was unimpressed that we'd had the initiative to better the courtyard. Clearly, she's not interested in creating community and sustainability. But never mind! Despite the hard slog (which, I'll admit was almost completely undertaken by Dom as I toiled on my uni assignments), having the materials here for a new kitchen garden is pretty good (and this time, we've gotten express permission from the landlord to install it, so we don't have to move it again when we go!)

After the move, I was pretty overwhelmed with uni assignments for a few weeks. Thank goodness that's over and, after spending a weekend or two interviewing potential new housemates (and welcoming the wonderful Alice into our home), I now have some time to put into projects around the place. Like getting the garden really crankin', and finishing off some dying projects. Ah, its good to be on (uni) holidays!

Odd.

I felt a bit strange as I was packing a particular box in the kitchen today, cleaning out underneath the kitchen sink. I was carefully wrapping in newspaper all these empty jars -- olive jars and pickle jars and jam jars. I was thinking that it was a little weird to be treating as 'so precious' what was essentially rubbish or junk.

But to us, they are a little bit precious; we'll have a use for them -- sauces, and salad dressing, and pesto and pickles. One of these days, I really want to try and make tomato sauce, and I think I'm going to have to make green tomato chutney, because all those vines I planted too-late after Christmas have fruited, but they won't redden.

So, neatly, I wrapped in newspaper all the jars from under the sink and arranged them carefully in a box and taped it shut.

And then, I found all this basil, and made pesto, and all the jars came out again.

A House of our Own

We finally got a house! Huzzah!
Wonderful art deco style house.

With a great big back yard. Up there behind the little fence are two HUGE raised garden beds, just ready for all our veggies, a large compost set-up, and two fruit trees -- a peach and a citrus of some sort. The citrus is a little unwell, but we'll give it heaps of lovin' just as soon as we move in.

It's got a quirky little kitchen with lots of cupboards and a cute little diner-esque dining nook, and a gas oven justing waiting for all the cakes and bread I'm going to bake in there.

And gas heating to keep us snug and warm!

The only down-fall is that the toilet is outside, not inside (yelp!) not good for mid-night pee-dashes mid-winter. But I'm already coming up with ideas for composting indoor pee-buckets to save me from the cold.

In fact, we're coming up with all sorts of ideas for the space. The shed on this property is so big. Plenty of room for Dom's workshop (with work-benches and shelves all ready to go) with enough room left over to create some sort of community/ living space with couches and rugs and tables so we can run a brew-club, and work shops and crafternoons. Because we don't have a car, and what else would you do with a garage, anyway?

We went to visit it yesterday (we wont get the keys until next week) and I was so excited, with plans for rhubarb and passionfruit vines and herb-spirals and worm-farms, a barbecue and outdoor arrangements. We're hoping to get one, maybe two other people to live with us, hopefully of the Transition/permaculture persuasion. I'm really looking forward to living there!

House-Hunting

I haven't written here for a little while, sorry about that. This is, partly, because I am so easily distracted -- but to be fair, there is so much happening to be distracted by!

For starters, uni is in full swing (well and truly, first term is practically over now!) and there's been all the usual lectures and excursions and assignments demanding my time. All my classes are in the evenings now, so I find it hard to find a little time to sit and write. Often, too, the last thing I want to do with my free time is sit in front of the computer again.

Transition Darebin (TD) has been keeping me busy of late. There have been meetings, and training sessions and crafternoons. Its all going very well, and I'm really enjoying being involved.

And we've been looking for a new house. My flatmate, Kitty, has moved out with her boyfriend into their first home together, and after some consideration, Dom and I have decided that instead of getting another person to move into Kitty's old room, we'd rather move and get another person to join us there. There are two main reasons for this: we'd really like a house, instead of a unit, with a little bit of privacy and a back yard, and this unit is full of mould and damp and is making us sick.

We'd like a nice big back yard where we can grow our own veggies, and fruit trees and herbs, and have a bit of room to move, and Dom would love a shed where he can store his tools and build things. And I'd love a nice big kitchen to bake in, and a study in which to ponder and potter and create.

We've been looking for over two months now. A whole mix of reasons as to why it's taken us so long, from being too fussy to dealing with less-than-scupulous real estate agents. Every weekend of open-for-inspections that goes by we get a little more relaxed on our specifications (number of rooms, location, etc) but the things that don't change are shed, garden, study and gas heating. I know something will turn up soon. Here's hoping we don't have to wait too much longer! And I'll try to post a little more often.