tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22958725091861287242024-03-16T12:09:52.560+11:00 pearl & elspethmaking, sewing, building, cooking, growing, crafting, thinking, talking, learning....anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.comBlogger325125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-34071836459617030882016-07-11T20:07:00.001+10:002016-07-11T20:07:12.649+10:00Gettin' crafty-for-a-party!Wow. So I'm writing a blog post for the first time in over a year. The reason? Because I'm having a craft-sale and it's too hard to explain it all on Instagram, that's why!<br />
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The low-down is this:<br />
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In September, my totally hot, intelligent and inspirational girlfriend is turning 40. I want to throw her an awesomely unforgettable celebration, and I need some funds to do so, so I'm hoping to flog off some sewing/crochet/wooden spoons to some nice folk who'd like some handmade goodness in their lives.<br />
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A while back, I had a by-donation skirt sale. It was awesome, and you can read about it <a href="http://pearlandelspeth.blogspot.com.au/2014/07/its-time-for-p-by-donation-skirt-clear.html" target="_blank">here</a>. I liked its style because it kind of defied the normal capitalist cash-for-goods equation. Obviously, it's still a cash-for-goods equation, but with a twist. The "by-donation" part means that negotiation and a relationship between buyer and seller is established, which I think is more appropriate for an intimate crafty-for-a-party type situation, don't you?<br />
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In these situations I ask buyers to nominate a price based on <strong>what the item is worth to you</strong> and <strong>how much you can afford to pay</strong>. You send me an email, and we take it from there.<br />
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Basically, this sale is a free for all. Anything you've ever seen on the <a href="https://www.instagram.com/autumnfarmpastured/" target="_blank">Autumn Farm Instagram feed</a>, or on this blog (feel free to peruse the tabs at the right) is fair game. Seriously. Dresses, skirts, booties, stubby holders, bunting, tops, baby quilts, crocheted little creatures, hand-carved-spoons etcetera. It will all be made <em>just for you</em>. One of a kind. Bespoke, if you will.<br />
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So what are you waiting for? Pick out that Autumn Farm/Pearl & Elspeth created treasure and send me an email. <br />
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Don't be shy. <br />
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You'll be contributing to an awesome chick's birthday celebration, after all.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgl8Si0QlWt6pCFAAi0agjYbklQ_TnuNwoxQPgMILOe3A8grm-2NjIJ53bU-UPJVr8Vipjn7-oTrk1ExLEspBod8CzbF-Q3t2gpKUcOzTKr4VYlv1PxZp9Fx9ULmO1aIcw9wVsHPkJc2jE/s1600/pearl+olive+dress.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgl8Si0QlWt6pCFAAi0agjYbklQ_TnuNwoxQPgMILOe3A8grm-2NjIJ53bU-UPJVr8Vipjn7-oTrk1ExLEspBod8CzbF-Q3t2gpKUcOzTKr4VYlv1PxZp9Fx9ULmO1aIcw9wVsHPkJc2jE/s1600/pearl+olive+dress.PNG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The birthday girl, sporting the dress I made her for her birthday last year.</td></tr>
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<br />anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-23901115576616198572015-04-10T19:44:00.001+10:002015-04-10T19:44:48.465+10:00Autumn Farmers wanted!!!We Autumn Farmers would really love to enable and educate anyone at all who is interested in learning the ins and outs of pastured-chicken farming. So we're very excited to announce 2 opportunities right here on our farm, for all you budding chook farmers.<br />
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The first is Autumn Farm Chook School, which is a one day intensive held right here on the farm on Sunday the 14th of June. We'll introduce participants to all aspects of our CSA, from day old chicks to slaughtering and marketing. There'll be a tour of our little community abattoir and a delicious farm lunch, as well as theory and practical hands on activities. Spaces are limited, so please email us if you're interested.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Chief farming lady Pearl, in one of her many delightful floral aprons</td></tr>
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The second exciting thing is that we are looking for a passionate, engaged, hard-working intern to join us for 3 months of learning, working, and chicken-wrangling. We are also in the process of hand building a strawbale home, so there is also an opportunity for you to participate in and learn about natural and strawbale building, if you’d like.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Tiny offgrid strawbale house</td></tr>
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As an Autumn Farm intern, we would anticipate that you would work an average of 4 hours per day, 6 days per week, at tasks including (but definitely not limited to!)<br />
-all aspects of chicken farming, from caring for day old chicks, moving the pasture houses, feeding, watering, transporting, slaughtering and marketing<br />
- construction: there’s always something being built, whether it’s a composting toilet, a brooder house, a chicken tractor or a strawbale home<br />
- vegetable-growing: we grow food for ourselves, and occasionally sell excess to local cafes and shops<br />
- compost-making: we make hot compost using waste from the abattoir<br />
- bee-keeping: we have a Kenyan top-bar hive<br />
- cooking and preserving<br />
- this year at Autumn Farm we will also be running a pasture cropping trial, planting a food forest, and introducing sheep into our pastured farm enterprise, so it’s likely you’ll get a taste of all of these fun things too.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkRkOcYc1kCh_C12Dy7ih29-6tuKKIDREfHtw4XxPD8mvaCqm5oNkGExPX_MvFKH8WfhdQSblOZBw5OUxfpxQHmH0NvyKpNY1s1-1JC2zN15Togb5Ev50av0i2ohK197ZC72qAyzlYqHw/s1600/0J8A0254.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkRkOcYc1kCh_C12Dy7ih29-6tuKKIDREfHtw4XxPD8mvaCqm5oNkGExPX_MvFKH8WfhdQSblOZBw5OUxfpxQHmH0NvyKpNY1s1-1JC2zN15Togb5Ev50av0i2ohK197ZC72qAyzlYqHw/s1600/0J8A0254.jpg" height="266" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The view down the valley</td></tr>
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We will provide you with a rich learning environment, with opportunities to learn everything you need to know about running a pastured poultry CSA and a small community abattoir. We have a cozy caravan for you to sleep in, and will provide you with healthy and delicious omnivorous meals. Bathing infrastructure at Autumn Farm is fairly rudimentary, so if you’re not going to be happy with an outdoor solar shower and the odd fire-bath, this probably isn’t the right job for you.<br />
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We ask that you are<br />
-self-motivated<br />
- aligned ethically with the ideals of sustainable, regenerative agriculture and/or permaculture principles<br />
-prepared to do the work that needs doing<br />
-willing to agree to a one-week trial on our farm<br />
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We are willing to consider couples and/or families, though the caravan is equipped only with a double bed. We are also happy to support writers, artists or other creative people who would like a peaceful place to live and work in exchange for helping on the farm.<br />
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If you are interested in coming and sharing in our farm, please send us an email – autumnfarmbega@gmail.com - telling us why you’d like to come to Autumn Farm. What are your inspirations and aspirations? You don’t need to have any experience, but you do need to be willing to learn and work hard.<br />
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How exciting is that? We're super excited about meeting some new people and sharing in our knowledge, so if you or someone you know is interested, please please PLEASE send us a message!<br />
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Photos of our farm by <a href="http://www.andthetrees.blogspot.com.au/" target="_blank">Jay</a></div>
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anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-87167943187013025892015-03-08T11:34:00.000+11:002015-03-08T11:34:03.889+11:00A tiny mouse house for a bee suit<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">While I'm reasonably happy with my current 'crazy person' bee outfit, (cobbled together using various pieces of clothing, pants tucked into socks, and an old insect net which I found at the markets), now that we've got our beehive full of bees, I feel like I need to upgrade.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Not that my current getup doesn't do the job - I haven't had too many stings - but it makes me nervous, which means I tend to check the hive VERY quickly, and perhaps not as thoroughly as I should.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">So I've decided to buy a proper bee suit. With a proper hat, and proper gloves. Exciting.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">To raise funds for this purchase, I'm silently auctioning off the tiny mouse in a tiny house I crocheted at the beginning of this year. It's adorable, and won first prize in the handmade toy section at the Bega show! </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgCFDrmB1JR7r6GvZQLU-qP9r9996qq3EzCyfYwWYZ1uQmCtyLlw4MI2wByAxpTl7iQstGbsdUn3cEhYLibvJgqtf49H5YbeVxOWvbe93gFMQvnS4h-6zv8cHYmKW_LrIgks9IxVqSWug/s640/blogger-image--2118185240.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgCFDrmB1JR7r6GvZQLU-qP9r9996qq3EzCyfYwWYZ1uQmCtyLlw4MI2wByAxpTl7iQstGbsdUn3cEhYLibvJgqtf49H5YbeVxOWvbe93gFMQvnS4h-6zv8cHYmKW_LrIgks9IxVqSWug/s400/blogger-image--2118185240.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The mouse, house and blanket are all crocheted using 100%wool. The house is lined in polka dot fabric, and the lid/roof zips on and off so you can get your mousie out to play and then tuck it up in bed when it needs a rest.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">To be in the running to win this little mousie house, you just need to send me a message - pearlandelspeth at gmail dot com - with your offer. In a week's time I'll announce the winner. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Of course, if you've got a bee suit lying around, we can just do a direct trade...</span></div>
anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-48170877045615424682015-02-07T13:20:00.001+11:002015-02-07T13:20:31.629+11:00The next big adventure<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Almost 3 years ago, <a href="http://pearlandelspeth.blogspot.com.au/2012/03/dirt-dirt-some-big-rocks-some-really.html" target="_blank">we broke ground to make way for the tiny handmade strawbale house we currently call home</a>. It was a momentous occasion for us, full of mixed feelings, and it was the beginning of a journey that basically consumed us for the following couple of years.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><a href="http://www.pearlandelspeth.blogspot.com.au/search/label/strawbale%20building%20workshop" target="_blank">Building the tiny house</a> was always a bit of a 'suck it and see' kind of exercise - to find out if we could really build our own house. Turns out we could! It was really hard at times, but it was <i>always</i> rewarding. And we so thoroughly enjoyed the experience of building, and have so thoroughly enjoyed living on our land, in our little handmade home, we're doing it again.</span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">4 year old barefooted pirates are invaluable on the building site</td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">In the last few months we've begun to slowly make moves towards building a second, slightly less tiny, slightly more luxuriously appointed (internal plumbing!!) handmade strawbale house. We don't have heaps of money, and we certainly don't want to go into debt, so things will be slow-going, as we plan to save a bit, build a bit, over the next few years.</span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Shadow of a shovelling lady</td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Building the tiny house has given us an excellent perspective on what we really want and need from a home, and what we can and can't manage to build by ourselves. We've discovered a few things we're going to do differently second time around (45 degree pitch roof? No thank you!), and a few things we're definitely going to do the same (strawbale? Most certainly!). If you're thinking of building your own home, it's something to seriously consider: I believe that building this place was the single best thing we've done in the last 5 years. The knowledge, skills and perspective it's given us - not to mention the savings in rent and bills! - have been absolutely invaluable, and we're very grateful to have had the opportunity.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">So what are we planning to build next?</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">It's pretty basic: a strawbale rectangle with a skillion roof, containing 3 very small bedrooms, a fully strawbale-enclosed cool pantry (bigger than the bedrooms - food storage takes priority over sleeping space in this family!), a nice, open, functional kitchen, a beautiful warm eating area, and a lounge space with a wood fire that doubles as an oven and stove. </span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Oscar and my dad laying the pipe that will carry our greywater directly to an absorption trench in our zone 1 garden</td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">External walls will be rendered strawbale, internal walls will be framed using recycled wood pallets, clad with reclaimed corrugated iron and fence palings. Our experiences over the last few years of bathing outside have prompted us to forego an internal bathroom in preference of more kitchen space, with a primitive, outside greenhouse/shower-room combo to complement our existing firebath, which we love so much! We're also going to have another outside, composting toilet.</span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Footings full of water, which our dogs think of as purpose-built doggy-lap-pools, much to the detriment of the footings themselves</td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">But for now, all we have is a kind of muddy area with some footings full of water, and pier-holes full of frogs, and occasionally children. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Oh and a 110 000L tank that is collecting water off its own roof until we get it hooked up to the house. Not terribly appealing or inspiring, but it's a start, and our minds and hearts are busy and full, as we dream of this next big building adventure.</span></div>
anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-68890605646182721302015-01-24T13:32:00.000+11:002015-01-24T13:32:18.462+11:00We're back!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Well. That was the biggest break from blogging I've had since I started the blog some years back. There have been times in the last 6 weeks where I've wondered if I was going to come back to it. But hey: this thing is a record of our adventures, and the adventuring ain't stopping here. It's a place for us to rant about the things we're passionate about, and we're passionate about a <i>lot</i>. It's a place for us to share stuff and (hopefully) teach or inspire people, and there's a lot to learn. So we're back.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">What have we been up to since the <a href="http://pearlandelspeth.blogspot.com.au/2014/12/blessings-on-helpers.html" target="_blank">canceled party debacle</a>?</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Heaps of stuff! And also heaps of relaxing!</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">We have a little break from chicken farming over the summer because we find the chickens really struggle with the hot weather. Also, chicken farming is <i>bloody</i> exhausting, especially after the year we've had, so we need a break!</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Life without chickens is roomy and free and relaxing. There's space for new friends, foraging (blackberries! plums! raspberries! oh my!), baking, crocheting, quilting Australiana-themed baby-quilts, reading, swimming, eating, old friends, bee-swarm-catching, a trip to the big-smoke for circus shows and visiting, and general merry-making.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">After processing our last batch of chickens for the year and (happily) providing delicious chicken Christmas dinners to the people of the Bega Valley (and one lady who comes all the way from the Snowy Mountains for our chicken!) we headed out to the coast for a luxurious 2 week holiday with some of our nearest and dearest. It. Was. Amazing. Eating, swimming, reading, crocheting. Repeat. Oh, and we harvested a bucketload of native wild raspberries, which we dumped onto a baked ricotta for New Year's dinner. </span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDTQck8Z4lGFbyUMscrVE6fSE28SVmst6LRigDqcFdqN7-NB6bLD29c4L79u_TR9CLoMtsqM8L8NmB48_bq3XT0MNwLjjm8_0UPIxDPXSNpPMjFHtNMlMzblYw2A8Z_WYq_mhGyjDu414/s1600/IMG_1054.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDTQck8Z4lGFbyUMscrVE6fSE28SVmst6LRigDqcFdqN7-NB6bLD29c4L79u_TR9CLoMtsqM8L8NmB48_bq3XT0MNwLjjm8_0UPIxDPXSNpPMjFHtNMlMzblYw2A8Z_WYq_mhGyjDu414/s1600/IMG_1054.jpg" height="400" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Not a bad spot for an afternoon of foraging</td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">There are no words to describe the deliciousness, but here's a picture...</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">When we came home to the farm the garden was ridiculously overgrown, but we didn't mind. We harvested and made merry.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Our neighbour called to say there was a late swarm of bees at his place, so we caught it in an esky and installed it in our top-bar hive. We've been waiting for a swarm for 2 years since <a href="http://pearlandelspeth.blogspot.com.au/2012/12/coming-down.html" target="_blank">our last lot of bees got hive beetle and evacuated</a>, so that was a happy day.</span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Me in my "crazy person" beekeeping 'suit' and Gunnar in his proper suit.</td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The roadside plums came on, and we had a harvest-and-preserve party with some new lovely friends.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I finished a custom baby-quilt order for an Australiana fan in Sydney. Love this quilting bizzo...</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The blackberries have come on, so we're harvesting and freezing daily. When the season's over and we've got our haul, we'll have a massive jam cook up. In the meantime, we pick and pick and eat our fill.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7CRuw-5_cZRNv2DckJh8TQRcJJbNgW5p0pnsTEUS6-wWzPRu5Yn8IhCfNA1gUj2sh3jofolT2vesHW2F6e8Peaf65v373lIuyrzO7ltvNzpftKK4jNTCc5qMua0-0UoURjJT4OPgHx-g/s1600/IMG_1533.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7CRuw-5_cZRNv2DckJh8TQRcJJbNgW5p0pnsTEUS6-wWzPRu5Yn8IhCfNA1gUj2sh3jofolT2vesHW2F6e8Peaf65v373lIuyrzO7ltvNzpftKK4jNTCc5qMua0-0UoURjJT4OPgHx-g/s1600/IMG_1533.jpg" height="400" width="300" /></a></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Locavore dinner parties with friends, including plum cakes with Jersey cream!</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">And in between it all we've been working at our off-farm jobs. I've started a new job at the <a href="https://www.facebook.com/candelobulkwholefoods" target="_blank">local wholefoods co-op</a>, which is AWESOME, and of course we've been running and working at our <a href="http://www.begasmallspeciesabattoir.com/" target="_blank">little abattoir</a>, which continues to process for small-scale chicken and duck farmers and backyard growers around the traps. Sometimes, the abattoir cleaning (not processing!!) is a family affair. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBfIpmZhwJh8mlJubKnyzYr0NfKpkKCBLJp4rMLW2pTQcImDqPId4HvpgBqcSYeqQ-C9E9Uxmyl2Xxw_VzNr8Q9rvI34ppD9Ul6_ffl_iEeSnILXPsQZVevj6dTyLiPvCab2IbZHlAcJI/s1600/IMG_0913.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBfIpmZhwJh8mlJubKnyzYr0NfKpkKCBLJp4rMLW2pTQcImDqPId4HvpgBqcSYeqQ-C9E9Uxmyl2Xxw_VzNr8Q9rvI34ppD9Ul6_ffl_iEeSnILXPsQZVevj6dTyLiPvCab2IbZHlAcJI/s1600/IMG_0913.JPG" height="400" width="400" /></a></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The kids don't mind at all (it's an excuse for us all to hang out together playing with high-pressure hoses, after all), and we feel it's important for them to see us (and share in) working hard for the things we believe in.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Oh and I've been thoroughly enjoying exploring the instagram world. Never thought I would, but there you go. Life's full of surprises, right? </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">On the immediate horizon we have another little break and then we dive head first into building and chook-enterprise-expansion and abattoir overhauling and school and uni and show season and roadside-apple-and-peach season and all the other busy-ness that comes with this life we're living. I'm excited.</span></div>
anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-67646058250612780412014-12-11T21:20:00.000+11:002014-12-11T21:20:02.439+11:00Blessings on the helpers<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">When I was <a href="http://pearlandelspeth.blogspot.com.au/2014/07/the-ravages-or-what-its-really-like.html" target="_blank">having chemo</a>, part of my healing-through-gratitude regime involved making plans and daydreaming about the massive thank you feast we would throw for all the people who helped us out during that supremely crappy time. I felt that even though things were not that awesome for us during those months of treatment, I still had so much to be grateful for, and I still felt super lucky. Maybe even more lucky than I feel normally. It's true I <i>did</i> have cancer, and I <i>did</i> have one of my boobs removed, and I <i>did</i> go through chemo, which <i>was</i> gross. But I have an incredible, strong, kind, compassionate and loving partner, and 2 beautiful kids. I have an extended family who love me. I had an amazing day-bed out the front of our beautiful little house on which to rest, overlooking a sweet little valley farm which I love. I live in a country with (kind of) free health care, which meant I was able to have the treatment I needed to give myself the best chance of survival. I have access to an abundance of all kinds of nutritious foods to heal body and spirit. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">And I found myself among a community of people who helped out in all kinds of ways. There were people who came and helped Pearl move the chicken houses, and to help load chickens on processing day. There were the people who brought us meals. There were the people who put money into our bank account to pay for herbs and vitamins and medical bills. There were the people who processed our chickens the night I had to unexpectedly go to hospital with <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neutropenia" target="_blank">neutropenia</a>. There were people who bought us massages. There were people who knitted things for me. There were people who gave me Reiki, and people who gave me acupuncture. There were people who brought us firewood. There were people who lent us their showers and spare bedrooms. Awesome, right?</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The party planning started off with me emailing one of my favourite artists, <a href="http://www.phoebewahl.com/" target="_blank">Phoebe Wahl</a>, to see if I could buy one of her images to use for the invite. What I love about Phoebe's art is it's warmth and vigour and heart - all the things I wanted for our party. Because she's lovely, she happily obliged.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghvU1IRXd9xTZ8of1cjYLWhmU8lPOQPn6KIM77TfwicM7NYkL845ZT0CnXnV-TAMQzFr5khHV48fA4z1FomfBOmLE3l3Bwps-vzKe_tZovWqpTRVI0GSwRYWSUQyDS9IjyrSyitVQsE9E/s1600/IMG_0770.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghvU1IRXd9xTZ8of1cjYLWhmU8lPOQPn6KIM77TfwicM7NYkL845ZT0CnXnV-TAMQzFr5khHV48fA4z1FomfBOmLE3l3Bwps-vzKe_tZovWqpTRVI0GSwRYWSUQyDS9IjyrSyitVQsE9E/s1600/IMG_0770.jpg" height="261" width="400" /></a></div>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Food planning involved the procurement, fattening, killing and processing of a lamb, which our friend David took care of for us, other than the boerwurst sausage-making, which was a team effort.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">We bought veggies and salad greens from all our friends with market gardens. I, with the help of 2 very special ladies, made 25 litres of rhubarb and strawberry champagne.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">For party favours, I lino-cut a 'thank you' stamp and stamped it onto serviettes I'd made, for people to use at the party then take home and use over and over.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKI3rnbJoVE3Q42icWe8U3V40I-B9MnMQBR7AioEgdo9zLGMMSMMfcfATcxjlm94c4oIs_LMKTq1TcNn4sQ9OLRkYl8d45nbMw32ibfmcYC9WBq2QKRlHvBKqMnFO6DcFqcQTgtNUR2ww/s1600/IMG_0651.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKI3rnbJoVE3Q42icWe8U3V40I-B9MnMQBR7AioEgdo9zLGMMSMMfcfATcxjlm94c4oIs_LMKTq1TcNn4sQ9OLRkYl8d45nbMw32ibfmcYC9WBq2QKRlHvBKqMnFO6DcFqcQTgtNUR2ww/s1600/IMG_0651.JPG" height="345" width="400" /></a></div>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">My mum and her partner made a dessert, my nana made her signature custard kisses and a 'thank you' fruitcake, and Pearl's mum made brownies.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Everything was set.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">And then it started to rain.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Plan B for Bad weather was to move the party to the incredibly beautiful Quaama Hall. Ain't no way 60 people were fitting in the tiny house.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Saturday morning, the hall was booked, as it seemed like the rain would never let up. And it didn't. In fact, by sunday morning, the day of the party, we, along with food enough for 70 people, got flooded in as the river broke it's bank and covered our main road to town with over 2 metres of fast-flowing water.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQZTMJqbvQ4pIQVcz4c7bGdsXLzZQVpjo324kQAlt1x8foaFsgY8pTGExuQSPZUTf04ji8GFSnGtnvDNI7UKQ76aow4frgwq5hqT3670fxl0nLdZP-l0rnMCtnBmiCD3qQBkqBBV9TQgA/s1600/IMG_0677.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQZTMJqbvQ4pIQVcz4c7bGdsXLzZQVpjo324kQAlt1x8foaFsgY8pTGExuQSPZUTf04ji8GFSnGtnvDNI7UKQ76aow4frgwq5hqT3670fxl0nLdZP-l0rnMCtnBmiCD3qQBkqBBV9TQgA/s1600/IMG_0677.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The give way sign at the bottom of our road, on the morning of the party</td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Not really the kind of development you want on the day you've been planning for months.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">So we sent out texts and facebook messages telling people the party was off. Ironically, sunday turned into a beautiful sunny day, and we cheered ourselves by cracking jokes about it being a beautiful day for a party. My brother, who was visiting from WA got to spend some quality, flooded-in time with the kids. Some also-flooded-in-neighbours dropped by, and we had roast lamb for dinner.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgR95_WA-z8EOdtOTmcmYLep6Au7NozdcyBBgel4nizJSMKmZJPEtF1fn-LgY1tVeZ60VKaSnwXsjr9y6h0vf6gNjOmXk4LDExxtIQiawdN9C6WAMHalvL-fUrKmck6zz-416n434miYAs/s1600/IMG_0674.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgR95_WA-z8EOdtOTmcmYLep6Au7NozdcyBBgel4nizJSMKmZJPEtF1fn-LgY1tVeZ60VKaSnwXsjr9y6h0vf6gNjOmXk4LDExxtIQiawdN9C6WAMHalvL-fUrKmck6zz-416n434miYAs/s1600/IMG_0674.jpg" height="400" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Nice day for a party. Shame that 'lake' is covering the road to party-town</td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The next day we made 'Canceled Party Pickle' with all the zucchinis, squash and capsicums we'd bought. We preserved most of the harissa we'd made and froze the marinades.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtgIs5KwW5uiIuEXbYiOLwreMhQid_YTPFLvjYe6cQ8lcmu7r4Qrzx35El3ZA0zD8gBeJbd1PUJ6tdd-L5NgvdZy5GLWotFawZoTOHwsmF5txNszp6nXMtXhNE79TNo7OanBM8-3TkAzk/s1600/IMG_0758.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtgIs5KwW5uiIuEXbYiOLwreMhQid_YTPFLvjYe6cQ8lcmu7r4Qrzx35El3ZA0zD8gBeJbd1PUJ6tdd-L5NgvdZy5GLWotFawZoTOHwsmF5txNszp6nXMtXhNE79TNo7OanBM8-3TkAzk/s1600/IMG_0758.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></div>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">We breakfasted on harissa and labne and cucumber and lettuce and asparagus and roast beetroot for days. It was actually divine.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8qGP6jGsjNEuhKwWN3oQTOyUHkRIRefIQnke5_7sZPAuqlUwawxrbKtfCI2J55RRDv6CYmcmBCiZQPkc0RUGVbfCuZMvjW9FF_FFZ_mIe014TqPLyrbLPfk-WrlXH5ixpDR3BWWW5DqA/s1600/IMG_0700.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8qGP6jGsjNEuhKwWN3oQTOyUHkRIRefIQnke5_7sZPAuqlUwawxrbKtfCI2J55RRDv6CYmcmBCiZQPkc0RUGVbfCuZMvjW9FF_FFZ_mIe014TqPLyrbLPfk-WrlXH5ixpDR3BWWW5DqA/s1600/IMG_0700.jpg" height="300" width="400" /></a></div>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Luckily, no food went to waste, between the freezing, the preserving, the eating and giving things away to all and sundry. And Oscar was thrilled to have Thank You fruitcake in his lunchbox today.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">So what's the moral of this rather long-winded post? There're probably a few. One moral is that flooding waits for no man, and the river and rain don't give a crap about your plans for thanking people.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Another is that a jar of Canceled Party Pickle and a lovingly hand-made serviette, while <i>not</i> the same as an awesome party, is also quite a nice way to say thank you. And yet another is that all exercises in feeling grateful, whether the plans eventuate or not, are good for the soul. Even though we were sad our party didn't happen, we still feel grateful for all our friends, and the things they do for us. One day, that party's gonna happen, and we'll all be glad.</span><br />
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anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-4211809616698969872014-12-01T09:03:00.001+11:002014-12-01T09:03:35.939+11:00Handmade delights for giving<div class="separator" style="clear: both;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7uqvJ5UKbSMb29FXrLsUrZ5mjidjIVzk14d6m1ldka8fCWSriH5L4W8uruSNdo5INWNVc0sdl12-UbbxHKzggypRcb_SJTY8hAfKkkFvSDhZH1Znr46aXPCOEIQLWmva2rHbcSfMGIV0/s640/blogger-image--1891507617.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7uqvJ5UKbSMb29FXrLsUrZ5mjidjIVzk14d6m1ldka8fCWSriH5L4W8uruSNdo5INWNVc0sdl12-UbbxHKzggypRcb_SJTY8hAfKkkFvSDhZH1Znr46aXPCOEIQLWmva2rHbcSfMGIV0/s640/blogger-image--1891507617.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgd37ZIuFDBnF0whb3wSqJJiXfducKvFVLF8UnGgHn6Og4rhOE1glZVJcHAQzkFXDBnDMpdlavMCw6Es7J9PHk2JO8_wjk9pc2RxHecDseg2yhbSJGy8ISU9CkSM2ePVwTocusnJTdiWno/s640/blogger-image--1975616634.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgd37ZIuFDBnF0whb3wSqJJiXfducKvFVLF8UnGgHn6Og4rhOE1glZVJcHAQzkFXDBnDMpdlavMCw6Es7J9PHk2JO8_wjk9pc2RxHecDseg2yhbSJGy8ISU9CkSM2ePVwTocusnJTdiWno/s640/blogger-image--1975616634.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2dJKrLL_q4iA804kVVf28hHYYSoVahVclBKe8FvDL4RRY5ecLJ5gEJDnaqrZ4y0fuxETt9OcXu79LOOQNeqxTNX61BjTg6XCI69LuX7G7AVfDjDofUgc-QmKEJNeJP0L_GAL4AwqfCfo/s640/blogger-image-1405922274.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2dJKrLL_q4iA804kVVf28hHYYSoVahVclBKe8FvDL4RRY5ecLJ5gEJDnaqrZ4y0fuxETt9OcXu79LOOQNeqxTNX61BjTg6XCI69LuX7G7AVfDjDofUgc-QmKEJNeJP0L_GAL4AwqfCfo/s640/blogger-image-1405922274.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiry4oocj4Hof2CWKgROHyWSiIp2mXQVI-7QHqy0vT63jMcZH6jrUvcqXwdNm2nb_gOt4a8Nki7D9JsGYZAr3TWdvfTuBenrSSIS9CZOgMKBSiS5bWHrNw7kafVKhmifmdnoNz6cP03mY/s640/blogger-image--1546079109.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiry4oocj4Hof2CWKgROHyWSiIp2mXQVI-7QHqy0vT63jMcZH6jrUvcqXwdNm2nb_gOt4a8Nki7D9JsGYZAr3TWdvfTuBenrSSIS9CZOgMKBSiS5bWHrNw7kafVKhmifmdnoNz6cP03mY/s640/blogger-image--1546079109.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a>Are you by any chance looking for some delightful handmades to give to a loved one this Christmas? If you are, I may just have something for you, but you'll have to order this week, especially if you want something custom made to arrive in time for Christmas. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Here's what I've got for you:</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">P&E gift certificates - these are handmade by me (of course!) using reclaimed kids' books and cereal boxes (lovingly saved for me by my nana). You give them to your friend/lover/mum/sister/daughter, they feel happy, email me, and we have a chat about fabric and colour choices then I make them a skirt. Just for them. They feel good in it, it fits them perfectly, because it was custom made, and it's special, I tell you. $70 (this includes postage of the card <i>and</i> the finished </span>skirt)</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYJ91ax8zhGNcYtTc0v68oNMyXeIXK_9p7BAqg4NlN3KUMik_hiG_JMy2s3r6qh8pM5I3Dkbu_pubs0772iVR9G_j3laW5VCb8RqZhBW6RlQTCyEqk7OlSkzUoeU4Nvp-h8Ts1Y6Mk_UM/s640/blogger-image-2104606794.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue Light', HelveticaNeue-Light, helvetica, arial, sans-serif; margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYJ91ax8zhGNcYtTc0v68oNMyXeIXK_9p7BAqg4NlN3KUMik_hiG_JMy2s3r6qh8pM5I3Dkbu_pubs0772iVR9G_j3laW5VCb8RqZhBW6RlQTCyEqk7OlSkzUoeU4Nvp-h8Ts1Y6Mk_UM/s400/blogger-image-2104606794.jpg" width="300" /></a></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">If you want to buy someone a ready made skirt all I have left at present is this beautiful turquoise Birds of Tasmania wrap 'n go. It's about a 12-14, and it's awesome. $50</span></div>
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<img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiry4oocj4Hof2CWKgROHyWSiIp2mXQVI-7QHqy0vT63jMcZH6jrUvcqXwdNm2nb_gOt4a8Nki7D9JsGYZAr3TWdvfTuBenrSSIS9CZOgMKBSiS5bWHrNw7kafVKhmifmdnoNz6cP03mY/s400/blogger-image--1546079109.jpg" width="400" /></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Crocheted stubby holders are crazy good, handy and <i>pretty</i> unique. I'm into granny-ing them at the moment but I can do whatever. $12 each</span></div>
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<img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2dJKrLL_q4iA804kVVf28hHYYSoVahVclBKe8FvDL4RRY5ecLJ5gEJDnaqrZ4y0fuxETt9OcXu79LOOQNeqxTNX61BjTg6XCI69LuX7G7AVfDjDofUgc-QmKEJNeJP0L_GAL4AwqfCfo/s400/blogger-image-1405922274.jpg" width="400" /></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Crocheted heart hair clips. Sweet as! $10/pair</span></div>
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<img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgd37ZIuFDBnF0whb3wSqJJiXfducKvFVLF8UnGgHn6Og4rhOE1glZVJcHAQzkFXDBnDMpdlavMCw6Es7J9PHk2JO8_wjk9pc2RxHecDseg2yhbSJGy8ISU9CkSM2ePVwTocusnJTdiWno/s400/blogger-image--1975616634.jpg" width="400" /></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Crocheted flower bangles. These are made using the rings that come off yoghurt and Vegemite jars and 100% hand-spun, hand-dyed wool. And they look awesome with some <a href="https://www.facebook.com/RedPegEcoStudio" target="_blank">redpeg ecostudio</a> recycled silver bangles too! (Dirty gardening hands optional). $15 for a set of 3</span></div>
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<img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7uqvJ5UKbSMb29FXrLsUrZ5mjidjIVzk14d6m1ldka8fCWSriH5L4W8uruSNdo5INWNVc0sdl12-UbbxHKzggypRcb_SJTY8hAfKkkFvSDhZH1Znr46aXPCOEIQLWmva2rHbcSfMGIV0/s400/blogger-image--1891507617.jpg" width="400" /></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">That's what I've got in stock, which I can send out tomorrow. If you email a custom order to me this week I could probably get it to you in time for Christmas, but you'll have to act fast! </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I hope your Christmas/holiday/gift-giving time is a handmade extravaganza!!!</span></div>
anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-45865324566504563272014-11-29T20:13:00.000+11:002014-11-29T20:13:40.794+11:00Fruit, music and brand new babiesToday I finished off a baby quilt I've been working on for a few days now. It's the first baby quilt I've ever made that's not been for a dear friend.<br />
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Normally when I'm making a baby quilt I channel a lot of energy and love into imagining the little person whose quilt I'm making, thinking of their parents, the life that's beginning, as I select the fabric and make the stitches. It's a beautiful process and I absolutely love it.<br />
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When I was asked recently by our friend <a href="http://www.kateandruth.com/" target="_blank">Kate</a> if I could make something for a dear friend of hers who's soon to have a baby, I was super-keen to make a quilt for her. And it came together beautifully.<br />
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Even though I've never met the soon-to-be parents, or their soon-to-be bubba, I <i>still</i> imagined and channeled love and joy as I stitched, musing on what adventures were in store for the new little family, and imagining how the quilt might figure in their daily lives.<br />
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Selecting fabrics and laying it all out, making pockets and tassels and mini-bunting, and then stitching it all together while meditating on life and love and growth and change is <i>such</i> a fun way to spend some hours. I love the process, and I love knowing that my craft is involved in a whole cycle of giving and receiving that's founded in love and a respect for handmade goodness.<br />
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Oh, and the quilt is part of a trade: you know how much I love bartering. So in exchange for the love stitched up in the quilt, Kate's providing me with music and fruit. How awesome is that?<br />
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Happy life, little bubba. May it be filled with heartfelt music, warm sunshine and sweet fruit.<br />
<br />anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-66717335468016812922014-11-23T19:57:00.001+11:002014-11-23T19:57:24.246+11:00Autumn Farm Chook School Part 2: 4 days old<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
In <a href="http://www.pearlandelspeth.blogspot.com.au/2014/11/autumn-farm-chook-school.html" target="_blank">the last little Autumn Farm Chook School video</a> you had a peek inside the brooder house, at the day old chicks.</div>
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In this video, you'll see the same chicks at 4 days old, on their first day outside of the brooder house, enjoying the sunshine and grass that makes them the tastiest, healthiest chickens around.</div>
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<br />anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-12088666138538889782014-11-12T14:34:00.000+11:002014-11-12T14:34:05.998+11:00Hello sailor!As I mentioned in <a href="http://www.pearlandelspeth.blogspot.com.au/2014/05/craft-really-is-answer-to-everything.html" target="_blank">my post about Edie's reading gloves</a>, I've got a bit of thing for sailing. I've never actually <i>been</i> on a sailing ship (or any kind of boat really, other than a ferry... and a kayak), but I <i>seriously</i> dig the romance of all things seafaring. Possibly because of (or maybe the cause of??) my infatuation with <a href="http://www.biography.com/people/herman-melville-9405239" target="_blank">Herman Melville</a>. And the <a href="http://www.decemberists.com/" target="_blank">Decemberists</a>.<br />
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So you can imagine my excitement when my real live seafaring friend Vanessa (she <i>actually</i> lived on a <i>real</i> boat!!!!) announced she was pregnant - nautical-themed-baby-quilt-time!!!<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">What would a sea-baby quilt be without some ribbon 'seaweed', a pirate ship and a cormorant?</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Bryn hanging out on deck. Custom-made 'let's not have overboard babies' netting can be seen in the background.</td></tr>
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Little Bryn's baby quilt has a bit of boat applique (including a little tiny anchor on a 'rope'), a map (of the far south coast!), some sea-birds and other oceanic paraphernalia, all in a colour theme of blues and greens, of course. </div>
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I was <i>pretty</i> in love with it when it was done, and <i>pretty</i> miffed that I didn't at least get an encouragement award when I entered it in the Bega show. But, as the kids say, 'whatevs'. Because this quilt got to go sailing.<br />
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That's right: Vanessa and Ian took little Bryn on a 3 month sailing trip when he was a few months old and the quilt got to go with them. AWESOME.<br />
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Ships ahoy!<br />
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anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-6295638802602243732014-11-01T11:44:00.001+11:002014-11-01T11:44:55.678+11:00Autumn Farm Chook School<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
It's been a little over a year now since the first Autumn Farm pasture raised chickens graced the dinner tables of the Bega Valley.</div>
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In the last 15 months or so we have learned an INSANE amount, including, but definitely not limited to, 'Dogs are way better than electric mesh fencing' and 'How to run a farm single-handedly while your partner suffers through cancer treatment'. While the learning definitely isn't over (though hopefully we're done with that last lesson), I feel like we've got a good handle on things and we're now pretty comfortable with our operation and all it entails.</div>
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A big part of our Autumn Farm vision has been education: educating people about food systems, educating people about sustainable agriculture, educating people about good food and nutrition. It's awesome to be able to share knowledge with people, and to empower people to make positive changes in their relationship with the food they eat. We love love LOVE answering questions and sharing information, hosting farm tours and taking people through the abattoir.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Pearl talking to the group of Making a Buck from a Beetroot course, run by Bega Tafe.</td></tr>
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We also get lots of inquiries from people who are interested in our chicken farming methods, which is why we're looking to run some 'chook school' tours from around April next year.</div>
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At this stage (we're still planning) chook school will probably consist of a day (6 hours?) at Autumn Farm, where we'll take you through all the components of our chicken system from managing the day old chicks, to growing the chickens, to slaughtering, to legal requirements, and marketing. And a big local lunch to boot!</div>
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We're pretty excited, because we love growing chickens, and we think other people should grow chickens too. It's an awesome way to improve your pasture, make a small income from even a small acreage (we only have 7 acres) and feed your community. </div>
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In the meantime, though, I'm going to be posting some little videos about our system, and about the way we run things.</div>
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And here's the first video! This one is called 'Day old chicks in the brooder house', and there will be more coming! So if you're interested in growing chickens, or you know someone who might be interested, please forward this on to them, and/or let them know about chook school.</div>
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We're looking forward to seeing some of you at Autumn Farm Chook School next year!</div>
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<br />anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-10391035479951262842014-10-28T03:09:00.001+11:002014-10-28T03:09:27.537+11:00A day<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Today was an exceptionally average day. I don't mean average in the way that it's often used to mean "not great" (quite the opposite in fact) but in the sense that today was a day like so many of our days here on the farm. When I think of today, I feel peaceful and full of joy.</div>
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Lots of people - friends, family, and strangers alike - often comment on how hard our life seems. It's true that we do forego many of the creature comforts most people in the west take for granted, like internal plumbing, for example. But these 'sacrifices', for us, generally have a flip side, like experiencing the surprising and immense joy of things like <a href="http://pearlandelspeth.blogspot.com.au/2013/04/hurrah-for-non-smokey-firebaths.html" target="_blank">bathing</a> and <a href="http://milkwood.net/2014/08/22/time-is-all-we-have/" target="_blank">doing the dishes outside</a>. It's also true that many of the things we <i>do</i> take for granted, like carrying 20kg barrels of water and bags of feed over several hundred metres, several times a day, may seem a lot like hard work, but the work keeps us strong, and means we don't have to go to a gym to get our daily exercise.</div>
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So what does an exceptionally average day on Autumn Farm look like?</div>
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Pearl, Oski and I rose at around 6.30 (a little later than usual) and set to work tending to the animals - letting the chickens out, letting the dogs off, making sure everyone has food and water. It was an overcast morning, but we could see the sun trying to bust through the clouds. We cheered it on, for the chickens' sake - they've had enough dampness these last few days.</div>
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When we returned to the homestead, Olive had woken up and was reading in bed in the loft. We made tea and hot water with lemon, and the kids had spelt pikelets with the last of the preserved blackberries from last summer for their breakfast. We packed lunchboxes (leftover veggie dumplings, more pikelets and fruit) and Pearl headed off for her day's work cooking at a cafe in town.</div>
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The kids played wild games with the dogs as I did the dishes, and then Olive got the bus to school.</div>
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With the 'morning rush' over and done with, Oski and I set to work on the important business of sewing and harvesting and preparing food, which took up the rest of the day.</div>
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I made 3 skirts for the Mumbulla spring fair, and a bolero for my friend <a href="http://howdoyoulikethemgreenapples.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">Genna</a> (she's making me a hat as a trade!), sitting at the big table outside where we do pretty much everything, while Oski played around me, making 'jam' from some mulberries he'd picked. </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdM08t6K6nuirUFm_kGIwo1wHT_RE2yhdULapvcqt1ZuykBsVz47QSG-7GPq2Lar_EHjWnWdMlegcJYV8mJP19Y_Yrw6QeIHLGZUEyYxGzNRm-EFYWrXMyLWSEAoatwa5nO8xgpONx7qQ/s1600/IMG_5001.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdM08t6K6nuirUFm_kGIwo1wHT_RE2yhdULapvcqt1ZuykBsVz47QSG-7GPq2Lar_EHjWnWdMlegcJYV8mJP19Y_Yrw6QeIHLGZUEyYxGzNRm-EFYWrXMyLWSEAoatwa5nO8xgpONx7qQ/s1600/IMG_5001.JPG" height="320" width="320" /></a></div>
My dad came over to chop up some firewood for us, and we chatted, he played with Oski, and helped me to move the chicken houses and top up food and water before heading off.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNXgk_NA-uMQy2u_Oqel9_4IV1RSU5C_xB3b2lHcoK_VeJ0dYD1U_s5AX-KyIdzUl5O_7pkKKDeeeNb2IS8qARrBjsxB6F-Zr68UoQa2EhiPRfJ5g9cPqZ3LNpNwTsy0cQ_IcDeJD6VXg/s1600/IMG_4899.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNXgk_NA-uMQy2u_Oqel9_4IV1RSU5C_xB3b2lHcoK_VeJ0dYD1U_s5AX-KyIdzUl5O_7pkKKDeeeNb2IS8qARrBjsxB6F-Zr68UoQa2EhiPRfJ5g9cPqZ3LNpNwTsy0cQ_IcDeJD6VXg/s1600/IMG_4899.jpg" height="400" width="318" /></a></div>
Around lunch time, Oski and I harvested 2 massive bowls of broad beans. We sat together at the table and shelled them, then blended half of them with garlic, olive oil, lemon juice, grated parmesan and mint to make a broad bean pesto, one of our favourite springtime treats, which will provide snacks and lunches for the next few days. The other half we reserved for our dinner. We then dined on a pretty random but delicious luncheon of broad bean pesto, leftover chicken, kimchi straight from the jar, fruit, nuts and the last of the pikelets.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZ8OKaZnGin7T-gsqRiid2ta4_vpfXN_9icEMDynzQ3qK_fEpawLSY5jLGyVhOU723tV5uNTzdtCx4HfVWz8FbgtwCrErX32sZovrVfR8VQ921kLNrsSrvQmBjZAvYdqMvBgUMVUcggQM/s1600/IMG_4983.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZ8OKaZnGin7T-gsqRiid2ta4_vpfXN_9icEMDynzQ3qK_fEpawLSY5jLGyVhOU723tV5uNTzdtCx4HfVWz8FbgtwCrErX32sZovrVfR8VQ921kLNrsSrvQmBjZAvYdqMvBgUMVUcggQM/s1600/IMG_4983.JPG" height="320" width="320" /></a></div>
Our appetites sated, we once again did the rounds of the chickens, played with the dogs, admired the new ducklings in the orchard, and tended to the 5 day old chicks in the brooder house.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAjwINI8objRbN_2cs6zljVoeNqNaQXjWXegJzdi59snQqseokJI3yXQgNJDBjuXbEhWcJ5Wjf38fY5edCS_68gjvZ4FAeCdScaCTnFIP2wzThi07-XCwkqwC_7Hl5g5Y064oW5PEaQA4/s1600/IMG_5019.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAjwINI8objRbN_2cs6zljVoeNqNaQXjWXegJzdi59snQqseokJI3yXQgNJDBjuXbEhWcJ5Wjf38fY5edCS_68gjvZ4FAeCdScaCTnFIP2wzThi07-XCwkqwC_7Hl5g5Y064oW5PEaQA4/s1600/IMG_5019.JPG" height="320" width="400" /></a></div>
A few days ago Pearl's dad had caught us a massive salmon, which was to be our dinner. Inspired by one of our favourite cookbooks, <a href="http://www.moro.co.uk/shop.php#" target="_blank">Moro East</a>, we stuffed it with fennel, lemon and parsley, wrapped it in foil, and set it on the barbecue to cook. As the most delicious smells started wafting from the cooking fish, we headed into the orchard to take out the compost, admire the babies <i>again</i>, and collect many many eggs.<br />
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The afternoon is maybe my favourite time of the day for wandering and looking, and it was especially beautiful today given the weird mix of sunshine, big black clouds and enormous, intermittent raindrops.<br />
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And then Pearl and Olive came home, and much catching-up and storytelling, pesto-tasting, kissing and cuddling ensued. Final dinner preparations (cous cous with broad beans and yoghurt dressing and a simple cabbage coleslaw) were made as children played and water was delivered to the chickens.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHk7BfkQaV-RChowT_o0ODkIx_ZnyWUxFcvzO-of-Qmi43_w5aZeWppzJQemZGoqAnYZ0T60M_b9Ejjt8QT-2txxEHnI1rOyLhlMmakj4Lh0X8CWhZG9jsNhzltshclOLQKVsDBmQaksM/s1600/IMG_5027.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHk7BfkQaV-RChowT_o0ODkIx_ZnyWUxFcvzO-of-Qmi43_w5aZeWppzJQemZGoqAnYZ0T60M_b9Ejjt8QT-2txxEHnI1rOyLhlMmakj4Lh0X8CWhZG9jsNhzltshclOLQKVsDBmQaksM/s1600/IMG_5027.jpg" height="291" width="400" /></a></div>
Dinner was, as always, chaotic and rowdy and delicious. We're all pretty exhausted by this time of the day, but it's also a joyful catch-up time, especially on days like today where we've each been doing our own things. Meal times are possibly the times we feel most rich, because we feast so well on a bounty of home-made and home-grown goodness that is almost ridiculous, looking out over our beautiful valley, listening to the birds and, tonight, watching the kangaroos. It's hard not to feel blessed when your meal-times look like that and home made chicken liver pâté and fresh broad bean pesto are your go-to staples.<br />
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After dinner was Oski's 'pretend birthday', complete with a sand cake and pass the parcel presents.<br />
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The light was starting to fade as we got Oski ready for bed, and he and I retired to the loft for stories and cuddles and sleep, while Pearl and Olive locked up all the chickens and delivered the dogs to their night-time chook-guarding posts.<br />
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In all, I'd say that from wake-up time to sleep time, we spent a total of about 15 minutes inside the house. It was a lovely, average day, and I wouldn't swap the hard work for all the creature comforts in the world.<br />
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How was your day?anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-5198162568772974212014-10-25T11:58:00.001+11:002014-10-25T11:58:27.264+11:00So we barter<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
When I was young and idealistic I entertained various fantasies of being self-sufficient: Building my own house, growing my own food, and basically being a hermit. No environmental footprint for me.</div>
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Now that I'm older (though still idealistic) my feelings about self-sufficiency have changed. For starters, I now have a family who don't necessarily share my hermit plans. But more significantly, now that we've really and whole-heartedly embarked upon a life where we are attempting to provide for ourselves in as many ways as we possibly can, we've realised how bloody hard it would be to <i>actually</i> produce everything you need by your own hands. Not to say that kind of life wouldn't be rewarding - I'm sure it would - but my feelings about 'how to save the world' have ripened a bit now, and my ideology has ultimately found a home in community-building.</div>
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What do I mean by that? Well, I mean talking to people. I mean valuing the work people do. I mean supporting people who are creating and growing things <i>in our local area</i>. I mean sharing and providing food for people. I mean sharing knowledge and information and encouraging people. And maybe more than anything else, I mean swapping and bartering as much as possible. </div>
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One thing that <i>hasn't</i> changed for me since those heady early days of ideological veganism and <a href="https://www.facebook.com/GrassRootsAust" target="_blank">Grass Roots</a> idolatry, is my belief that money is pretty much the root of all evil. Unfortunately for us, (and even <i>more</i> unfortunately for the billions of impoverished and enslaved peoples around the world) we live under capitalism, which means that, short of the aforementioned hermit lifestyle, you <i>kinda</i> need to participate, at least a little bit, in the money economy. So what can you do about it? Well, you can be super-hyper vigilant about who you give your money to. Yes folks, it's true that under capitalism, one of your most powerful weapons is what you do and do not choose to spend your money on. Ask yourself: What kinds of things is this purchase supporting? Child labour? Slave labour? Crapy living conditions for factory workers? Environmental destruction? Cultural destruction? If you're answering yes to any of these questions, find an alternative, or go without.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivfBnbIv0j-gWNL1ewHbjqNrThKyBTtBFengpF5hvlcnfrLViSjGZuxhjQHY-oCW0FzzTtbm12lMbyjKf-Z4IRIuvLdJFkEEa-3CHfY3gWbiUNizzNHaa7aBnKsdIaUC-CjfUs2ltdQLc/s1600/IMG_4105.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivfBnbIv0j-gWNL1ewHbjqNrThKyBTtBFengpF5hvlcnfrLViSjGZuxhjQHY-oCW0FzzTtbm12lMbyjKf-Z4IRIuvLdJFkEEa-3CHfY3gWbiUNizzNHaa7aBnKsdIaUC-CjfUs2ltdQLc/s1600/IMG_4105.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Springvale community food swap at Linda and Paul's, down the road. What the heck kind of shop comes with these views, cups of tea, cake and friendly advice about gardening and craft???</td></tr>
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While that may seem like a kind of crazily austere or strict regime to adhere to, let me tell you that it's actually a ton of <i>fun, </i>because in the process of seeking alternatives, you'll probably meet people and make connections you wouldn't otherwise make, and you will strengthen your sense of community. By supporting local people you will build resilience in your community, and you will help people find alternatives to the confines of capitalism, even if just for a little bit. Liiiiike.... you might start or participate in your local food swap, or you might think of some other way you can barter for the things you need. </div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGqZIJ0RpixEEidGE33Hfm0j8vzgP9I1ZzqP1acYlUnP2JNiH4VJG9OMMc4jVNQfHF7z8GUZIi1QVgCziZnyUkfe-TyRinH86iS91SZwSm9f1vcPJBsKT9eyZYJC95nLP4qGJh1IhZubU/s1600/IMG_4616.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGqZIJ0RpixEEidGE33Hfm0j8vzgP9I1ZzqP1acYlUnP2JNiH4VJG9OMMc4jVNQfHF7z8GUZIi1QVgCziZnyUkfe-TyRinH86iS91SZwSm9f1vcPJBsKT9eyZYJC95nLP4qGJh1IhZubU/s1600/IMG_4616.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">And more food swap action at Autumn Farm</td></tr>
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You might get involved with a local food co-op, or you might start buying your produce (and I mean <i>all</i> of your produce) direct from the person who grew it. You might start growing more of your own, and sharing it with a neighbour!</div>
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We are pretty much massive bartering devotees these days, bartering our chickens and craft for as much as we possibly can including acupuncture, veggies, fermented foods, art therapy, spoon carving lessons, pork, art classes, lamb, hand-knitted gloves and bread. Yes, many of these things we could produce ourselves, it's true. But you know what? Our friends Thea and Tim have the most amazing market garden. But they don't have the time and inclination to also grow chickens, just like we don't have the time or inclination (or watering prowess) to grow massive beautiful bunches of coriander and celery. So we barter.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3QUgpooj0E477JhoYdhX1KkaqnD_8WWzUOaHdrZrRBF_wstPM8un8CI_F7HHn36XSN30n0YqVRAQ7-bZj00gZDsM0llZnSvrvKfiyGC1Cv_nMx5JxgY2YzZEYFimuuKgOJTaO2mvf3CE/s1600/IMG_4077.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3QUgpooj0E477JhoYdhX1KkaqnD_8WWzUOaHdrZrRBF_wstPM8un8CI_F7HHn36XSN30n0YqVRAQ7-bZj00gZDsM0llZnSvrvKfiyGC1Cv_nMx5JxgY2YzZEYFimuuKgOJTaO2mvf3CE/s1600/IMG_4077.JPG" height="300" style="cursor: move;" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;">Bartered veggie box from Thea and Tim's Fish Bone Farm<br /></td></tr>
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Similarly, our friend <a href="http://thesacredcookfire.com/" target="_blank">Emily</a> makes incredible sauerkraut, kefir and kimchi. Yes of course we could make these for ourselves, but that's <i>her thing</i>, so she's really good at it, just like we're really good at growing delicious chickens. So we barter.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhB9_fcyyw25KOidOoA5sabPXZLYFYci1aw0I6JqzvzRMMoXGxfdzQCjZo_00sAb8TgDgB8Yn-aT1ea2F09qYPKD9ya8Q8iz1-PJJ9zS4maJhNEiKCwpi-091RQQym7gQDrsdwGWtRa2ZE/s1600/IMG_3975.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhB9_fcyyw25KOidOoA5sabPXZLYFYci1aw0I6JqzvzRMMoXGxfdzQCjZo_00sAb8TgDgB8Yn-aT1ea2F09qYPKD9ya8Q8iz1-PJJ9zS4maJhNEiKCwpi-091RQQym7gQDrsdwGWtRa2ZE/s1600/IMG_3975.JPG" height="300" style="cursor: move;" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;">Bartered fermented awesomeness courtesy of Emily<br /></td></tr>
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I can't knit, but I really wanted a pair of rainbow-hand-dyed fingerless gloves for riding my bike in the early morning chill, and <a href="http://www.veeseasyvegan.com/" target="_blank">Vee</a> really wanted one of my skirts. Her handy man Grimm knits beautiful fingerless gloves. So we barter.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVaCXoREA23YF7OcDGq1TD9NiUSEfzwLQ-d351DICal_REXTjk_sOIrcZhc4ZTHwyj-U-QR2zu9Aj9AMgIwowWd62DBeOeA-Bu_wggQmZLV67sbpyx4-DJ4ZOtnM5_inkwWZWsazn0jAU/s1600/IMG_4936.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVaCXoREA23YF7OcDGq1TD9NiUSEfzwLQ-d351DICal_REXTjk_sOIrcZhc4ZTHwyj-U-QR2zu9Aj9AMgIwowWd62DBeOeA-Bu_wggQmZLV67sbpyx4-DJ4ZOtnM5_inkwWZWsazn0jAU/s1600/IMG_4936.jpg" height="352" style="cursor: move;" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;">Awesomely awesome riding gloves knitted by Grimm, bartered for a skirt<br /></td></tr>
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You see what I'm getting at? By valuing other people's skills and interests, you don't have to be super-skilled at <i>everything</i> yourself. And besides which, sharing the love just feels plain old awesome.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6QIX-ioBEtH_fpfK3oRhHxV0V8_V0T0VqWW9Mjz7zA5c5t4EtMJriTvCac8Ke4e7IQF57ISMGSGxkReXvR5l_4Pc2pfP5fqbrdk75e_qr_g8t5NXa7P2874F41X257N-_sG_01HT36eY/s1600/IMG_4832.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6QIX-ioBEtH_fpfK3oRhHxV0V8_V0T0VqWW9Mjz7zA5c5t4EtMJriTvCac8Ke4e7IQF57ISMGSGxkReXvR5l_4Pc2pfP5fqbrdk75e_qr_g8t5NXa7P2874F41X257N-_sG_01HT36eY/s1600/IMG_4832.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Fish Bone Farm abundance gracing the Autumn Farm kitchen. Happy days..</td></tr>
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anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-72973558084497038202014-10-18T08:37:00.000+11:002014-10-18T08:37:44.439+11:00The vagaries <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
It's been a little over a year since the first batch of 100 day old chicks arrived at Autumn Farm. It's been a massive year of learning, surviving, nourishing our community, learning some more, working <i>hard</i>, crying, laughing, asking ourselves (and being asked by others) "why the hell are we doing this??" and "is this really worth it??" and then realising that yes, it is what we really want to be doing with our little piece of land - feeding people.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixnYYIDXKjMXCTIoIVyfqmByD2NTJXEUFFufOPhTVN1gCv1esPWJ-PlNwVOapoz2VVhc3PB_9VTD-X8IlSNdlYHIQ59V3veEQr9wQL9xLOs1CC_NvMa12z41nS1B6wZv6rI2EEVOeT7eg/s1600/0J8A0633.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixnYYIDXKjMXCTIoIVyfqmByD2NTJXEUFFufOPhTVN1gCv1esPWJ-PlNwVOapoz2VVhc3PB_9VTD-X8IlSNdlYHIQ59V3veEQr9wQL9xLOs1CC_NvMa12z41nS1B6wZv6rI2EEVOeT7eg/s1600/0J8A0633.jpg" height="266" width="400" /></a></div>
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And while it is tremendously rewarding and for me, at least, the fulfilment of a childhood dream of wanting to be a farmer, there have been times when we've had a tiny taste of the tragedy and heartbreak that also comes with trying to make a living from the land, where you're ultimately <i>always</i> at the mercy of Nature. Like my 3rd-generation-dairy-and-sheep-farmer neighbour said: "some days you wouldn't give it up for ten million bucks, the next day you'd give it all up for 10 cents". It is <i>really</i> like that.</div>
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In my mind, The Hardships of Farming always kind of took the shape of drought and flood - images of sheep lying dead in a desert-like paddock, old gnarled farmers in check shirts and akubras with their faces in their hands, murmuring desperately about being forced from their land. Or the other extreme of cattle being lifted in helicopter-slings to save them from being drowned.</div>
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We, in our extremely small-fry operation will never be vulnerable to these kinds of desperate extremes. But that doesn't mean that we don't experience a little of the rollercoaster. </div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; padding-bottom: 6px; padding-left: 6px; padding-right: 6px; padding-top: 6px; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaSzeEodL_4tKZ2skbk-lQd_6FXR4daEOsxE_oJ9AkTG9kZmxn40YI6QAShB_fyxLZbVpdCwc7LsFC6CnN4RohZ5ocf5uzAK87Hp6FVhxj0yO8ettdT0q8SiJ2Fc1qZb45xVztYmOE3_w/s1600/IMG_2586.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaSzeEodL_4tKZ2skbk-lQd_6FXR4daEOsxE_oJ9AkTG9kZmxn40YI6QAShB_fyxLZbVpdCwc7LsFC6CnN4RohZ5ocf5uzAK87Hp6FVhxj0yO8ettdT0q8SiJ2Fc1qZb45xVztYmOE3_w/s1600/IMG_2586.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;">On hot days, we spray the chickens with water every hour or so, to stop them from overheating<br /></td></tr>
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Take the last 2 weeks. A fortnight ago, the weather was sunshiny spring. The chicks were loving it, the big chickens were loving it. Everyone was happy and healthy and growing well on the beautiful spring pasture. Pearl's and my moods (inextricably linked to the health and happiness of our chickens) were high. It was a 10 million dollar kind of a time.</div>
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And then we had a cold rainy snap. What does a cold rainy snap mean for a little pastured poultry enterprise? First of all, it means that we need to buy straw. There's no point moving the chicken houses onto wet ground, so the daily house move is replaced by houses filled daily (sometimes twice daily) with dry straw, to keep the chickens healthy, if not happy. Buying straw means our (already slim) profit margins go down, so while we love and need the rain, it's always in the back of our mind.</div>
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It means days of trudging around in raincoats at all hours of the day and night, tending to feed and water and straw, making sure the chickens are managing to stay dry. It means slipping over in the wet grass.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIARiBzyw55o22RQrmHWnfTSHbfzp9YogvDYwNuh4iCSXR6e1SIFlNCwKBJuRS-TfTQf6lqnWrQIMggt-uP4Q4ZYWVSv7-fuYSveEDIBwb-iVolKB53FDPZP2k3cH1-Iqp9uiPLkDh3O0/s1600/IMG_2623.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIARiBzyw55o22RQrmHWnfTSHbfzp9YogvDYwNuh4iCSXR6e1SIFlNCwKBJuRS-TfTQf6lqnWrQIMggt-uP4Q4ZYWVSv7-fuYSveEDIBwb-iVolKB53FDPZP2k3cH1-Iqp9uiPLkDh3O0/s1600/IMG_2623.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></div>
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And, sometimes, it means death. This last cold rainy snap came at an unfortunate time for our chicks in the brooder house, who'd been happily acclimatising to the warm spring weather. They'd been born during mild weather, arrived on our farm during warm weather, and we'd been slowly lowering the heat in the brooder house in preparation for their move to pasture. So when the temperature dropped 20 degrees literally overnight, they had no preparation or resilience for cool weather and, in spite of the heat lamp in the brooder house, they piled up and crushed, out of desperation to keep warm.</div>
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The temperature, at 10 degrees, was nowhere near as cold as our winter chicks tolerated. But they were used to it. Not so these springtime chicks.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjtAtUbvy8JhyphenhyphenS9yNtIC22xDgp6dtGmBDMTvREjOR7pjkqXlRaciEgBN0ZlHLRap4viyZZevgMw4gq8RP4OAsImaP2M3y8EY8sOyNd4TPmf4rUkEZkw8aHuMqLnzMAjCiBpoeTvtqSi1w/s1600/0J8A0635.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjtAtUbvy8JhyphenhyphenS9yNtIC22xDgp6dtGmBDMTvREjOR7pjkqXlRaciEgBN0ZlHLRap4viyZZevgMw4gq8RP4OAsImaP2M3y8EY8sOyNd4TPmf4rUkEZkw8aHuMqLnzMAjCiBpoeTvtqSi1w/s1600/0J8A0635.jpg" height="266" width="400" /></a></div>
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It is really sad. As the peeps at <a href="http://innerpickle.com.au/" target="_blank">Buena Vista Farm</a> put it, "Who'd be a farmer, eh?" (they have an excellent post with that title, and I strongly recommend you read it if you'd like to understand a little more about the human energy goes into producing your food). Those are the 10 cent days.</div>
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But now here we are in the sunshine. The chickens and chicks are all happy again. Yesterday we sold 120 chickens to some very happy local people, who hopefully feasted well last night. Today, across the Valley, people are cooking up bone broths and chicken soups. And <i>that</i> is what makes us keep going. But it's hard - no bones about it.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsTHejbFDp91J8t7w0FOKYP3-Eu4JC-3xi1v_iLwACMwRbC5GYjAe-hudStprm__K1uG5r2deY-RCU64JXjK_acrhXnayiQNGeWvWiN6fQV1ZD2TYdzPCKuSBQhNQv7fOdUtN7omkuK0c/s1600/0J8A0478.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsTHejbFDp91J8t7w0FOKYP3-Eu4JC-3xi1v_iLwACMwRbC5GYjAe-hudStprm__K1uG5r2deY-RCU64JXjK_acrhXnayiQNGeWvWiN6fQV1ZD2TYdzPCKuSBQhNQv7fOdUtN7omkuK0c/s1600/0J8A0478.jpg" height="400" width="266" /></a></div>
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* Thank you <a href="http://www.andthetrees.blogspot.com.au/" target="_blank">Jay</a> for taking beautiful photos of our chickensanniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-339948337519274262014-10-12T03:12:00.001+11:002014-10-12T03:12:46.727+11:00For the love of Niki and David<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Last weekend I had the absolute honour of being present at the wedding of my beautiful friend Niki and her beloved David. As you may know, I'm <i>quite</i> partial to the old wedding celebration, but this one was extra-super-special and extra-super-loved-up, partly because Niki's one of the most beautiful people I've ever met, and partly because Niki and David have waded through a ton of <a href="http://pearlandelspeth.blogspot.com.au/2014/05/grief-and-gratitude.html" target="_blank">heartbreak and tragedy</a> this year, so a celebration of their enduring love was a pretty special thing to be a part of.</span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKB9XnUotRZLZyoQZ1TV7R79q-jlH-3Y0M6eqiD8EpgC20doxb0KBROpA-NhOp2Hw_z0ZdYIQOSHH3TDbKxPgKMZUbUl_-jL2gRcogVScWZMzH9fpnhmkRK7VQchamKeTfwXsVZgOQM0I/s1600/10544205_10152461079296911_2280537825725058074_o.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKB9XnUotRZLZyoQZ1TV7R79q-jlH-3Y0M6eqiD8EpgC20doxb0KBROpA-NhOp2Hw_z0ZdYIQOSHH3TDbKxPgKMZUbUl_-jL2gRcogVScWZMzH9fpnhmkRK7VQchamKeTfwXsVZgOQM0I/s1600/10544205_10152461079296911_2280537825725058074_o.jpg" height="400" width="285" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">David in classic tux, Annie in brand-new hair and Niki in vintage pink</td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">But what to make for such an amazing occasion? To be honest, I actually suffered from quite extreme crafter's block on this one. It seemed like there was nothing I could possibly make that could convey my feelings about their wedding and about them as individuals and how much I love them. I was stumped.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">But I kept coming back to an image I had from a story Niki had told me about how much Lucien loved watching birds and leaves moving in the sunlight. While Niki and David's wedding was obviously about Niki and David, it was also beautifully and oh so poignantly about their little Lucien, so my wedding gift to them needed to honour him in some way.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">And so I set to work crocheting them a little Lucien-love-bird, and I thought of him, and them, with every stitch I made and yes, many tears were shed.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirec_ZeChyw5W3wa3vL1RVGOzIdR8f5xNqh4ObnziEHFsguCEhKVmqMtBhs8-KpVKf7ArWlw9tJPq-WnRt6_qjD5iubNyl025wI-tgnudejGIDcW5zUeWUTICY0bMF_rU8RMohdHQULZY/s1600/IMG_4837.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirec_ZeChyw5W3wa3vL1RVGOzIdR8f5xNqh4ObnziEHFsguCEhKVmqMtBhs8-KpVKf7ArWlw9tJPq-WnRt6_qjD5iubNyl025wI-tgnudejGIDcW5zUeWUTICY0bMF_rU8RMohdHQULZY/s1600/IMG_4837.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The yarn was bought from an awesome "<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #3d3b3b; line-height: 18px;">one-woman, one-cat" yarn and fibre studio based in Melbourne</span> called <a href="http://yarnvszombies.bigcartel.com/about" target="_blank">Yarn vs Zombies </a>and is hand-</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">dyed in a colour scheme called 'outback rainbow', which just <i>totally</i> reminded me of Niki.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The lichen twig is from our land, and the heart was cut from a piece of wool felt which was shorn, dyed and felted by our friend <a href="https://www.facebook.com/Tabandyfarmtabitha" target="_blank">Tabitha</a>, using wool from her sheep.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">It was important for me to not only hand make them a gift, but to include lots of things that had a personal connection to us and our land. I don't see Niki nearly as much as I'd like to, on account of the combined tyranny of distance and busy lives, so I like to give her little bits and pieces of 'me'. Also, Niki and I spent some super-fun and super-treasured times camping on the land (and hanging farm-gates in the rain with nothing more than a bush-saw and a ton of determination) long before we'd even moved to Bega.</span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I also made them a little crochet-monogram-wedding-cushion, like <a href="http://pearlandelspeth.blogspot.com.au/2014/10/happy-happy-wedding-day.html" target="_blank">Jemima and Bhavani's </a>(to be honest, I think this is going to be a wedding gift tradition from me from here on in) but I strangely forgot to take a photo of it before I gave it to them. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">But let's face it: the bird is really the main event, though it's only a <i>teeny-tiny</i> and, quite frankly, <i>profoundly inadequate </i>representation of the immense love and admiration I have for Niki and David: YOU. GUYS. ROCK. And I love you to bits.</span></div>
anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-49345343623155459552014-10-05T07:41:00.000+11:002014-10-05T07:41:15.267+11:00And happy happy birthday crochet<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
There's been a bit of a flurry of birthdays of late, and, in celebration, I've been crocheting up a storm. </div>
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The first crocheted gifts to emerge from the bonanza were these 2 little dragons for 2 of the sweetest little boys I know, Max and Evan, who recently turned 7. It's hard to get a sense of the size of them (the dragons, not the boys. The boys are normal 7 year old size) from the picture (when I found <a href="http://lucyravenscar.blogspot.com.au/2011/05/fierce-little-dragon.html" target="_blank">the pattern online</a> I thought they'd turn out to be quite big), so I should say that these little fellas pretty much fit in the palm of your hand, which is pretty darn cute. I was really happy with how they turned out, and was relieved to hear that there was no issue with the fact that the green dragon was a little smaller, on account of me using different yarn. They were both 8 ply, made form the same pattern, using the same hook, but I guess the fluffiness of the blue mohair made it a bit bigger. The boys love their dragons, and have been sleeping with them every night. Success.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTS_m_rQV0PIoHiHWFu5CZ-KYVb8fwSz_Va36BLCrUfrmBeOCAX_fpeH53EegMQEsGpMLfcE7vwgr6mCfzFu6pzH1Xa5pEuwDJA4myeEB8BhjoSE12_irLu7Ana_XKVKRYuwqAsRUTxiA/s1600/IMG_4637.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTS_m_rQV0PIoHiHWFu5CZ-KYVb8fwSz_Va36BLCrUfrmBeOCAX_fpeH53EegMQEsGpMLfcE7vwgr6mCfzFu6pzH1Xa5pEuwDJA4myeEB8BhjoSE12_irLu7Ana_XKVKRYuwqAsRUTxiA/s1600/IMG_4637.jpg" height="215" width="400" /></a></div>
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Next up was this giraffe for a little person called Iris, who, according to Olive has "sensational hair". Iris loves soft toys and giraffes, and has named this crocheted friend Gingerbread. Awesome. <a href="http://ilovebuttonsbyemma.blogspot.com.au/2013/01/crochet-giraffe-pattern.html" target="_blank">The pattern for this giraffe</a> is pretty simple (good for a beginner), and turns out a pretty cute, cuddly little gift, though someone <i>really</i> needs to tell the lady who wrote it how to use apostrophes correctly.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-0bK_B06cbiJc4RuqEFnE_vsM8h2wut3YfUr-3TSx_GUuENRwf38QEc53aGYR0uImBZyPcPciAYoHuzGLjDwreqe-rVfGTORbgrMbaenq9_Q49PafcHNuPzhGpAEBnZhDRXjqrgtLiQ8/s1600/IMG_4705.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-0bK_B06cbiJc4RuqEFnE_vsM8h2wut3YfUr-3TSx_GUuENRwf38QEc53aGYR0uImBZyPcPciAYoHuzGLjDwreqe-rVfGTORbgrMbaenq9_Q49PafcHNuPzhGpAEBnZhDRXjqrgtLiQ8/s1600/IMG_4705.JPG" height="240" width="320" /></a></div>
Last, but definitely not least, I made a frog dissection model for my brother.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhz9ZXRPTIDjrWbuGrmKVnPmWfgQmtinssnQxMB87TZdLJZkHXFRGRRADpIXN2CiN67K1G5FTzBkw4shj_8CzfjGBcqxKV6mbGHs8gOU9t7CEWiBVQWndjhz8sXeAGJotb8B1Nu1W2Qvlg/s1600/IMG_4763.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhz9ZXRPTIDjrWbuGrmKVnPmWfgQmtinssnQxMB87TZdLJZkHXFRGRRADpIXN2CiN67K1G5FTzBkw4shj_8CzfjGBcqxKV6mbGHs8gOU9t7CEWiBVQWndjhz8sXeAGJotb8B1Nu1W2Qvlg/s1600/IMG_4763.jpg" height="373" width="400" /></a></div>
When I found <a href="http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/frog-dissection-101" target="_blank">this pattern</a>, I was super excited. What's not to love about a crocheted frog that you can open up and take the guts out of?? But I knew that not just any old person would appreciate such a gift, so I chose my target carefully, knowing full well that my bro is as much of a sicko as me when it comes to this stuff, so would give the frog the reverence it deserved.<br />
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The frog, and its innards, were a little more complex than the giraffe and the dragons, but I believe the result was well worth it. I even labeled all the guts so my bro could properly identify everything when he 'dissected' the frog. It's true that a crocheted spleen may not be immediately recognisable, even to the most seasoned biological scientist.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUKH42870CMwWZb0iOC4_mEdi2-Nk6EDkrNweA9ra4FwiadBuMqUb2JJg8cDuZr1kgg4BF-euxtjoELrZATTqAyRAPXGiOFmH3KbjeUal6ZwRMF5N-5AbTe86COf3K26FlchgcrZrxyOw/s1600/IMG_4766.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUKH42870CMwWZb0iOC4_mEdi2-Nk6EDkrNweA9ra4FwiadBuMqUb2JJg8cDuZr1kgg4BF-euxtjoELrZATTqAyRAPXGiOFmH3KbjeUal6ZwRMF5N-5AbTe86COf3K26FlchgcrZrxyOw/s1600/IMG_4766.jpg" height="400" width="340" /></a></div>
As I said in my card to him "if spending hours crocheting tiny frog innards doesn't say 'I love you', I don't know what does".<br />
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But even if it's not frog innards you're inclined to crochet, spending hours making anything for someone always says 'I love you' in a way a bought present just can't. Go forth and create, people!<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEix0fUN-lNEbUzcHFPA3ciaCgsHWI8B10G96qsvgrZQemgRu1WvzZODCF60WUSDTrado_8idqgcUCXTO3pkDrpz32oEUiI8h_TeUZwN2PrPtkM59YhX7EBYQAF2TXOpLS78FTuxjWPbv7I/s1600/IMG_4772.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEix0fUN-lNEbUzcHFPA3ciaCgsHWI8B10G96qsvgrZQemgRu1WvzZODCF60WUSDTrado_8idqgcUCXTO3pkDrpz32oEUiI8h_TeUZwN2PrPtkM59YhX7EBYQAF2TXOpLS78FTuxjWPbv7I/s1600/IMG_4772.JPG" height="231" width="400" /></a></div>
anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-56036585806890095432014-10-04T08:41:00.000+10:002014-10-04T08:41:49.676+10:00Happy happy wedding day<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
One of the things I love love love about this blogging bizzo is the connections that can be made with people from all over the place. Sometimes, what may seem like 'random' connections, then turn out to be kind of crazy coincidence types, as in the case of <a href="http://storiesfromthebabelair.wordpress.com/about/" target="_blank">Jemima and Bhavani</a>. Turns out Bhavani had been quietly reading our blog for quite some time from the comfort of their babe lair in Melbourne. Then, when we started writing about our chickens, she realised that her partner Jemima's dad actually helped set up our little abattoir! Kooky and cool!</div>
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So we started a little email back and forth friendship, and when I was sick, they made and sent the most beautiful apron, lovingly hand-embroidered with the words 'get well' on the inside of the waist band. </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV6s16IZAu5P5E3CuE1u-zQGaP9rlt_7TvxbGZ1uF0IOBrkFVwoo9KKYSDzlclo1Bvhn4I5Ay4knsp9uQPYaVhMA3GllNMq2uOC4jPelfeNc3OAlZLo2HOIQ1KXEwcXuvPyJP6eDAsgTw/s1600/IMG_4110.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV6s16IZAu5P5E3CuE1u-zQGaP9rlt_7TvxbGZ1uF0IOBrkFVwoo9KKYSDzlclo1Bvhn4I5Ay4knsp9uQPYaVhMA3GllNMq2uOC4jPelfeNc3OAlZLo2HOIQ1KXEwcXuvPyJP6eDAsgTw/s1600/IMG_4110.jpg" height="400" style="cursor: move;" width="381" /></a></div>
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It is seriously the best apron - sunshiny, giant ric-rac, cute buttons, looks great with legwarmers and dogs - and with the most massive big pocket in front. When I wear it, which is often, it's filled with all kinds of things - scissors, bits of yarn and thread, things I've harvested from the garden (banana passionfruits make an excellent snack for keeping in the apron pocket, let me tell you). It makes me SO HAPPY to wear it because it's beautiful, practical, and was made for me, by hand, with love, by 2 people I'd never even met before. Restores a bit of the faith in human kindness, that kind of thing...</div>
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When Jemima and Bhavani contacted us to see if we'd supply chickens for their wedding feast, we were thrilled! I love weddings! And I especially love weddings for people who care enough about the providence of their food that they'll get their wedding-feast-chook from our little farm. Go girls!</div>
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So we grew the chickens nice and fat for them, and then Jemima came up to visit the chickens and we finally met, and she brought me the most amazing hat (immediately a firm favourite), which had been knitted for me by her mum. Wow! And yay for making friends through blog-world!</div>
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The chickens, just so you know, were processed and portioned at the abattoir, with Jemima's dad watching over the proceedings. When they'd been portioned (cut into drumsticks, breasts etc) they were vac-bagged with some of Jemima's special marinade, so when the day came, they could just be squeezed out onto the barbecque. Neat idea, eh?</div>
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Because I love craft, and I love weddings, I of course had to make these lovely girls a little something for their day. The answer, (as always, these days) came in the form of some crochet. A <a href="http://www.mooglyblog.com/the-moogly-crochet-alphabet/" target="_blank">Moogly Alphabet</a> monogrammed cushion with pom-pom trim, to be precise. (Though less than one minute after this photo was taken, Violet Tiny-Dog Von Hungry-Face pulled off 2 of the pom-poms. Grrr...)</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjN3WwmoCwEu5seSNqFN1_6kDRqiuy55Mbgq5ywg781ulw_5hOVBoX6w1N0b_wvM9YZ1If2uXXsYUfS_GuLHI4RLYj0Tl-GDmDUESYzRCDJE6yx0BVsFmkA1SFEBHRd3q30mfdb9iXabwU/s1600/IMG_4738.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjN3WwmoCwEu5seSNqFN1_6kDRqiuy55Mbgq5ywg781ulw_5hOVBoX6w1N0b_wvM9YZ1If2uXXsYUfS_GuLHI4RLYj0Tl-GDmDUESYzRCDJE6yx0BVsFmkA1SFEBHRd3q30mfdb9iXabwU/s1600/IMG_4738.jpg" height="261" style="cursor: move;" width="400" /></a></div>
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And I can tell you now there's likely to be a whole lot more crochet monogramming going on - those little guys are SO FUN to make! The little love heart came from Meet Me at Mike's.</div>
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I also made them a mix CD of (in my opinion) super-cool love songs, also monogrammed with pink glitter letters. Why not?</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiz7w3M3UZFn3NhkJwsEBUXIgeimgssZUKE9X_dv0ZhQhnMop2NbfVUlyqkkxcQvdQADk2Q_yzvpbDeyjoa8vnQZoaRrY_P2Z2ptj8wz_QwyDgi75jg9slAcFwdHbR3ptIQ-rH6nt8dIQE/s1600/IMG_4743.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiz7w3M3UZFn3NhkJwsEBUXIgeimgssZUKE9X_dv0ZhQhnMop2NbfVUlyqkkxcQvdQADk2Q_yzvpbDeyjoa8vnQZoaRrY_P2Z2ptj8wz_QwyDgi75jg9slAcFwdHbR3ptIQ-rH6nt8dIQE/s1600/IMG_4743.jpg" height="398" width="400" /></a></div>
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So here's to you Jemima and Bhavani - I hope your day today and your life forever is magical and special and ridiculously loved-up.</div>
anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-90918108279629864442014-09-29T16:06:00.000+10:002014-09-29T16:06:00.516+10:00Mystery Berries<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Do any of you know what these are?</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjx0IhWHIzTwm0UYzKtwWjLC22fy3fB8O7cD3yPhqmr2Kmh6_9yz2h0g3sIVYZV_km-mNRa6q5nucxw2URErSCEgjwJoejSI09BAQSnJ_qm_ZNg-HJg9hajgUcQgHYCp5RDac4VSdR05ls/s1600/IMG_4719.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjx0IhWHIzTwm0UYzKtwWjLC22fy3fB8O7cD3yPhqmr2Kmh6_9yz2h0g3sIVYZV_km-mNRa6q5nucxw2URErSCEgjwJoejSI09BAQSnJ_qm_ZNg-HJg9hajgUcQgHYCp5RDac4VSdR05ls/s1600/IMG_4719.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></div>
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When we first moved onto our land and started getting the garden established, we accepted plant donations from anyone and everyone. Berry canes were an especially sought-after item, being as we are berry-loving fiends, and lots of people shared and we also got them from freecycle. Happy times!<br />
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But you see, I am dreadfully disorganised, and I didn't label anything, so now we have some plants we aren't quite sure of, including the berry that we are enjoying by the handful on these glorious spring days.<br />
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The plant is pretty big, at around 1m tall, and is spreading out quite happily. It started flowering in early winter, and these berries are now daily fare, when no other berries are around. Cool!<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcw2M4xB-YagWDufNfnOJ9r3zr3qPh9HYaWu_Hj6j6XqfwaVqtM5b3wKTd8Hly2lg_9giEWy_U1sFJ7Ae14d6X9GZzyreczDA0LSbKq_jf2HVnu7kAMKYOdPZijeKEqMboNE5Jeb06ofg/s1600/IMG_4715.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcw2M4xB-YagWDufNfnOJ9r3zr3qPh9HYaWu_Hj6j6XqfwaVqtM5b3wKTd8Hly2lg_9giEWy_U1sFJ7Ae14d6X9GZzyreczDA0LSbKq_jf2HVnu7kAMKYOdPZijeKEqMboNE5Jeb06ofg/s1600/IMG_4715.JPG" height="246" width="400" /></a></div>
They're certainly raspberry-like, though they're definitely not raspberries - the little 'globes' (if you know what I mean) are way smaller than a raspberry's, and there are heaps more of them. They're also a lot firmer than a raspberry, and they have lots of little tiny crunchy seeds.<br />
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The flavour is somewhere between a raspberry and a strawberry, and they're definitely delicious, though ever-so-slightly more on the tart side than the sweet side.<br />
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Any ideas?<br />
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We don't really mind if we never find out what they are - we're happily munching them, and the birds don't seem to notice them (<i>or</i> are confused by all the bright red kennedia flowers on the vine that is sprawling all over the berry bush). But of course we're always curious!<br />
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<br />anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-4572400390808404012014-09-26T13:02:00.004+10:002014-09-26T13:08:44.564+10:00Banana passionfruits are rocking our world right now <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Several years ago, at <a href="http://www.alfalfahouse.org/" target="_blank">Alfalfa House</a>, our beautiful friend <a href="http://www.andthetrees.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">Jay</a> introduced Olive and I to <a href="http://www.fruitfinds.com/pmollisima.html" target="_blank">banana passionfruits</a>. Jay was super-enthusiastic, having grown up eating them. I was less enthusiastic, having had a disastrous encounter with some passion pop around the age of 15.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghvT2tkdwl_2Hy8gY28eWQWn6n7avdHrLzuwqV7ZaD0EqyMAJ8Y7ULnUF8VA49IZHDneSieSRP8p95MvPcND23YYnFbWldg_TuYB_XEf8TGNyQFVw8Anm01bagAJg9XhOlQHK1GUOR-SA/s1600/IMG_4692.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghvT2tkdwl_2Hy8gY28eWQWn6n7avdHrLzuwqV7ZaD0EqyMAJ8Y7ULnUF8VA49IZHDneSieSRP8p95MvPcND23YYnFbWldg_TuYB_XEf8TGNyQFVw8Anm01bagAJg9XhOlQHK1GUOR-SA/s1600/IMG_4692.jpg" height="400" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Banana passionfruit inside. According to Oski, they're "just like little lollies!"</td></tr>
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In spite of my passionfruit aversion, however, I could still see the appeal (most significantly that they have more pulp and are easier to eat than a normal passionfruit) and planted one about a year ago, here on Autumn Farm.</div>
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The thing went beserk.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJKZDSVUNJU-PJvUm9Q7eL3_1ZAjld0ikqAp0pGoNbqLinn2Wu2vWohrhtp72MGxnmTGjy0bVL-R3fXJeLiANgasIjS8tPaBZQRpREp5wJaFVnGzHlMtPvuyY1LcAHhiejYUVFVhvL9d0/s1600/IMG_4575.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJKZDSVUNJU-PJvUm9Q7eL3_1ZAjld0ikqAp0pGoNbqLinn2Wu2vWohrhtp72MGxnmTGjy0bVL-R3fXJeLiANgasIjS8tPaBZQRpREp5wJaFVnGzHlMtPvuyY1LcAHhiejYUVFVhvL9d0/s1600/IMG_4575.JPG" height="300" style="cursor: move;" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;">The vine, along with a bit of fluoro pink geranium and a hardenbergia</td></tr>
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So much so that I began to think that the weedy rootstock (which most commercially-grown passionfruits are grafted onto) had taken over. Just when I was beginning to think I had a really really tedious and enormous weeding job on my hands, some flowers appeared, and a quick Google consult confirmed that they were indeed the flowers of a banana passionfruit. Yay! The best thing about this discovery was that we had HEAPS of flowers on our vine, which we hoped would translate into HEAPS of fruit.</div>
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And they did. Right before winter.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEju_1XfA8r62Liq2iDHzSE3x9KCZ9GGCXT8He8rTEEPXbcXlEXnVgCvaiH3KHzO3APAMwaCe4gPCRZ_VXhLlXkJB8KOaYos6SwhORCVA4Sk1OdYg5l6uvsA8Qnz_lkMQ99f72I32YipkYM/s1600/IMG_4581.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEju_1XfA8r62Liq2iDHzSE3x9KCZ9GGCXT8He8rTEEPXbcXlEXnVgCvaiH3KHzO3APAMwaCe4gPCRZ_VXhLlXkJB8KOaYos6SwhORCVA4Sk1OdYg5l6uvsA8Qnz_lkMQ99f72I32YipkYM/s1600/IMG_4581.JPG" height="300" style="cursor: move;" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;">Green banana passionfruits on a mattress spring fence in winter, getting ready for their spring flush</td></tr>
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I couldn't quite work out how this would work. Do they just hang there, green, over the winter? Through frosts? Then ripen up when the weather warms? It seemed unlikely, but it turns out this is exactly what they did. The first glimpses of spring brought the first glimpses of yellow fruit on the vine, and we're now reaping the bounty.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhER9yly9A2eUJmVABxD_w004npPNxC6mS53hkxP5fUL9yTVqEkb6eJCBYiaVx4BV8Y62TjjvD4o6RP6y3Q6av6YKIt7bAtoxBCoNjIctqOEgaOeglq2MCoWeIVB8E3N68hkOT8Dj0RVB0/s1600/IMG_4689.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhER9yly9A2eUJmVABxD_w004npPNxC6mS53hkxP5fUL9yTVqEkb6eJCBYiaVx4BV8Y62TjjvD4o6RP6y3Q6av6YKIt7bAtoxBCoNjIctqOEgaOeglq2MCoWeIVB8E3N68hkOT8Dj0RVB0/s1600/IMG_4689.JPG" height="300" style="cursor: move;" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;">Easy and delicious for kids! Oski demands one in his lunch box, always</td></tr>
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Yes, even I am enjoying several of these little beauties every day. It seems my passionfruit aversion (and my very dramatic and vehement dislike of peanut butter) was 'cured' by chemo. When I read on the chemo side effects lists that my "taste buds might change", I was sceptical. Especially when it came to peanut butter, which I couldn't even stand being in a room with. But here I am, eating passionfruit and peanut butter like there's no tomorrow. Amazing! Delicious!</div>
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So if you're thinking of planting a passionfruit, or a climbing vine, or a shade-supplier with edible side benefits, have a go at a banana passionfruit. They're ridiculously vigorous (ours covered a 3-mattress-springs-long fence in a little over a year) and will supply you with beautiful, delicious fruit at a time of year when you might need a little break from the citrus. What more could you ask for?</div>
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anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-75883171863878290702014-09-16T09:32:00.000+10:002014-09-16T09:32:37.198+10:00The first days of spring, oh how we're loving you<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
How exciting that it's spring! Given that we've just experienced what we hope will be <a href="http://pearlandelspeth.blogspot.com.au/2014/07/the-ravages-or-what-its-really-like.html" target="_blank">The Crappest Winter Ever</a>, the springtime this year is more welcome than ever - bring on the new growth, both literal and metaphorical, I say! My hair's growing back (it feels like a little baby lamb!), we're slowly recovering our energies after the exhaustion-inducing chemo regime, and everything is looking extra sunshiny and new given the deepened gratitude we're experiencing as a result of the last 6 months or so. We've been absolutely revelling in the warm sunny days, picking early raspberries, resting, enjoying spring rains, watching our chickens loving the new shoots of grass, smiling at rosellas in the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kennedia_rubicunda" target="_blank">kennedia</a>, and working working working on the garden - weeding, mulching, harvesting and spring planting yay!</div>
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We've also been...</div>
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Crocheting veggie tea cozies for lovely gardening sisters,</div>
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Debuting new birthday frocks and devouring the goodness (mushrooms! Honey! Profiteroles! Jersey milkshakes! Crazy amounts of beautiful, bountiful veg! Fresh and smoked fish!) at the <a href="http://moruyafarmersmarket.org.au/" target="_blank">Moruya Farmers' Markets</a>,<br />
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Being thrilled by big digging and dreaming about another little strawbale house growing from the mud over the next couple of years,<br />
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Crocheting around jar-lid-rings to make bangles for the <a href="http://www2b.abc.net.au/EventCentral/View/event.aspx?p=23&e=11687641" target="_blank">Mumbulla School Spring Fair</a>,</div>
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Eating duck egg omelettes with greens from the garden and bartered kimchi in the sunshine almost <i>every</i> morning, and loving our life.<br />
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How about you? How are you heralding the warmer days?anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-76132230706629246882014-08-31T13:49:00.000+10:002014-08-31T13:49:55.891+10:00Happy spring!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I do believe that my favourite thing about living in our tiny house is the way it makes us super aware of and in tune with the seasons. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">For most of the year, we eat our meals outside at our big hardwood table. It's beautiful, being as it is almost in our vegetable garden, and we can see what's growing, we can watch the birds and the wildlife and the changing sky.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">But when the weather's cold (Bega gets cold in winter!), and darkness comes before dinner time, we retreat inside for our evening meals. This is pleasing in its own cozy way, but by the time the days lengthen and the weather warms up, we're busting to get back outside.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">2 nights ago, it was warm and light enough to eat outside, so we made the transition. Just like that. And it was delightful! The kids did their thing of flitting back and forth between the cubby, trampoline and table, shovelling in mouthfuls as they passed us, as Pearl and I sat and enjoyed our dinner.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">To celebrate this minor but also significant seasonal turning, I'm going to share the recipe for the dinner we had. I'm calling it Autumn Farm Fried Rice, and it's loosely based on the fried rice my mum made for us when I was growing up, though with a more seasonal, use-what-you've-got kind of ethic. It's a great meal for using up bits and pieces of veggies from your garden or the fridge, and you can adapt it in many sundry ways - go wild! Have a go! It's super delicious and nutritious, and you can make it with pretty much whatever you've got hanging around, like I said. Peas are nice, as is corn, in summer... This recipe is basically the quantities I used to make dinner for the 4 of us, with no leftovers.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">First, you'll need to put your rice on to cook. We use rain-fed Australian brown rice, which is quite delicious! Cook 2 cups of rice in 4 cups of water until all the water is absorbed. Set it aside, with the lid off, so that the rice kind of dries out. Of course, if you've got it, you could use leftover rice too!</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Next, make an omelette. I used 6 duck eggs, a little bit of salt and 1 shallot, chopped up. Whisk this all together, then pour into a frypan with very hot oil in it. When it's cooked through, set it aside.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">In the same pan, cook 2 chicken breasts, so they're nice and crispy on the outside. Set these aside with the omelette.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Now, in a big wok, heat a few tablespoons of oil (I used sesame oil). Add a couple of tablespoons of grated or minced garlic, and the same of grated or minced ginger. If you have shallots or something like that they can also go in now. I also added 3 smallish carrots, finely diced. Just fry them for a little minute til they start to cook.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Then I added the rice! Stir it all around, and add a bit more oil if you need/want to. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I then chucked in the omelette and the chicken, which I'd kind of torn up into small pieces, and some sunflower seeds. Almonds are also nice if you have them.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Keep stirring!</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Then I doused the whole lot in tamari. I have no idea how much - just til it tasted nice.</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Right before it was served, I stirred through about 3 bunches of tatsoi that were grown by our awesome friends Thea and Tim who grow the most amazing veggies around. Luckily for us, they're happy to trade awesome veg for chicken. Yeah!</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">And that's it! We served ours (the grown-ups) with <a href="http://pearlandelspeth.blogspot.com.au/2013/05/green-tomato-and-chilli-jam-its-knockout.html" target="_blank">green tomato chilli jam</a>, which just takes it to another level of deliciousness.</span></div>
anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-75840812143544116632014-08-27T22:28:00.000+10:002014-08-27T22:28:03.263+10:00A Bell and a Sock and a Violet Von Hungry-Face<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">One of the ambitions of a sustainable system is that it should be a 'closed loop'. This means that things entering the system (eg resources, energy etc) and leaving the system (eg waste) should be reduced as much as possible. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">We are still a ways off a closed loop system. Honestly, I don't believe we'll ever achieve it because there will always be things we want/need that we can't produce for ourselves. As farmers, we are bringing nutrients onto our land (in the form of chicken feed) and taking nutrients off our land (in the form of chickens for our community to eat). No closed loop there. But that doesn't mean that we can't do everything possible to reduce what we bring onto and take off our land in other ways. And most of it's pretty easy - we compost our waste (yes, even our humanure); we buy food in bulk, using our own packaging, so we don't generate much rubbish; we grow as much food as we can, so that nutrients cycle around our land; we collect and use our own water and solar energy. None of these are closed loops, but they're a conscious effort towards localising energy production and usage on our property.</span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Mmmmmm....turkey-foot...</td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">And then we got 2 chook guard dogs from a local sheep farmer, and were very surprised to discover we had a closed loop on our property after all. Without even trying. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The inputs required for pets has weighed quite heavily on my mind since reading a bit about <a href="http://theconversation.com/what-about-your-carbon-pawprint-9878" target="_blank">the ecological footprint of pets in the West</a>. This information came as a bit of a shock to me, and was something I'd never even considered, in a whole life of pet-loving. But with our pastured chicken enterprise booming, we were wiling to take the plunge into dog ownership in order to fortify our fox defences.</span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Tiny dog teething on a chook feeder</td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">The first 2 dogs we got - Bell and Sock - are brother and sister kelpie-collie cross sheep dog rejects. This means that they're trained for farm work, but didn't quite make the grade for intensive large-scale sheep farming. The most recent addition to our working dog family is a little thing called Violet Tiny-Dog Von Hungry Face. She's also a farming dog, whose parents are integral to the workings of our friends at <a href="http://symphonyfarm.com.au/" target="_blank">Symphony Farm</a>, and, when she's big enough, she will also be doing her part to deter hungry foxes from our chickens. </span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A Sock</td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">So the dogs are working for us, protecting our chickens (and herding the chicks who have strayed from the group), their waste doesn't leave the property, and all that they require in the way of inputs (ie. food) is some chicken feet/heads/gizzards/necks, which are left over from our chicken processing. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">An additional bonus is that the completely unrefined, fresh and unprocessed nature of their diet means that they're healthy and non-smelly. Yay!</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">And while they're <i>not</i> cats (card-carrying 3rd generation crazy cat lady right here...) they <i>are</i> kind of cute, in their own doggy way.</span></div>
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anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-26716316059810572992014-08-19T22:25:00.000+10:002014-08-19T22:25:08.886+10:00The story of chicken (part one)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;">Chicken on grass in sunshine, a very simple equation<br /></td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">One Sunday a little while back we roasted a chicken. You may think this is nothing special given we raise pastured chickens. They must have chicken <i>all</i> the time, you think to yourself. But the thing is we don't. This is partly because there is more demand for our chickens than actual chicken available so we often end up selling part of our own share. But it's also because we think chicken should be special. For us, chicken is not an everyday food. We think vegetables and herbs and fruit are everyday food, meat is not. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I know we've all been sold the notion of cheap chicken. You can get the stuff for $5 per kg in the supermarket. It's probably the cheapest protein around, but there's a price to be paid for this kind of cheap protein. It's the price of a chicken that has literally lived its life in shit and never been outside and the price of </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">anti-biotic resistance </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">and the price of a farmer that is forced to farm so intensively to make a semblance of income and the price of chicken meat seriously bereft of nutrients and the price of environmental catastrophe and the price of forgetting what food can actually taste like....</span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">There was something pretty special about this roast chicken dinner. It happened amidst Annie's chemo regime. Our eating throughout her chemo consisted of a lot of broth and kale and miso and really whatever we could throw together that might satisfy our kids and Annie's very unwell self at the time. Chemotherapy and small farm life and two little kids is a very particular type of chaos. Needless to say, roast chicken dinners were not at the top of the dinner list. But this Sunday we had time and Annie was feeling ok and we had this whopping 3.5kg chicken in our freezer so we fired (literally) up our wood oven and created a little something special for ourselves. </span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;">Big fella out of freezer</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;">Holy smoke - what a delicious sight</td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">A 3.5kg chicken, WTF?! I know I know... we'd grown it in Autumn. Autumn is a very good time for growing chickens. Not too hot, not too cold. the pasture is lush from late Summer - early Autumn rain. It's not windy, chickens are calm and they grow and they just keep growing, if you let them. This big guy was about 14 weeks old when we killed him. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">In your conventional shed raised industrial system the chickens are killed around 5 weeks of age. This includes so-called free range. Basically these chickens live in sheds in their own shit. They live with thousands of other chickens and they often have the lights on for up to 20 hours everyday. Lights on means they will eat more, hence grow more quickly and be ready to slaughter at 5 weeks of age. In most pasture raised systems the chickens are killed around 8-9 weeks of age. They don't have lights on at night so only eat during daylight hours which are also spent foraging, nesting, walking, running, flapping ie. using more energy and growing more slowly. We were interested to see what would happen if we let our chickens live longer than nine weeks. W</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">e liked the idea of a longer lived chicken. Better taste, better texture we surmised. But t</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">here is so much mythical scare mongering about the Cornish Cross meat chicken that we were nervous - <i>it's a fast growing monster... It can't walk past five weeks of age... It'll die suddenly of a heart attack... It just sits around eating all day... </i>Regardless we gave it a try and it was as we thought. Better! The meat has more texture and flavour, the leg meat is darker and richer and there's just so much of it that no one misses out. I remember pulling the chicken out of the oven and tearing off a little bit of skin. Oh my! It was transcendental. I dug a little deeper and pulled off a chunk of flesh. I exclaimed out loud, it was just so good. Normally in a collective context one would feel some guilt about hoeing into the chicken before anyone else but when you have 3.5kg of the stuff you can please yourself knowing there is plenty for everyone. This night I felt rich. </span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;">Note - much darker leg meat</td></tr>
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</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">We ate well that night and the next day and the next day - A sensational dinner followed by some pretty spectacular sandwiches for a few days and all culminating in a very lovely bone broth. </span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Quality leftovers indeed</td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Regarding the Cornish Cross disparaging. It is, in the main, related to context. Chickens raised in their thousands in a shed probably don't move very much. Where would they go? And how would they get there? Of course they can't move. Their circadian rhythms are all out of whack from being kept awake most of the night so they probably do have a lot of health problems and are destined for a short life. To a certain extent this is linked to their breed. The reality is that a chicken bred to grow big breasts and fast will lose something in the way of resilience. To a large extent it's about context and it's about good grasses and sunshine. We can easily grow our meat chickens to 21 weeks and beyond because they have ample access to good grasses and sunshine. Their legs and hearts and livers are strong. It may sound simplistic but it's "the truth". Our animal husbandry is almost entirely premised on sun and grass. We aim to let our chicks out of the brooder into the sun and onto the grass for periods of the day by five days of age (weather permitting). Those that get this are noticeably more robust, active and resilient than those that have to remain inside due to cold or overcast or windy or wet weather. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">People ask us why we don't grow more chickens. We could. We have a waiting list of potential customers so the demand is most certainly there. But we can't because it's about the grass, man. The grass needs time to recover. It won't get the time it needs if we have too many chickens walking on it, eating on it and profusely shitting on it. To create and maintain a healthy pasture based system that regenerates the land rather than denudes it requires much keen observation, some restraint and some acceptance of limited profit. This is why chicken is special. </span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2PBVLsv1_vQdKK6hWD894g7e249Y-BzTinQ-9U5nC8D06AAhole-BtAGyAG8G94hWdH1IPQA2ZJ9ozO6zOrYhes04lWZ7PX1T6_DZDel-UfPTKchumf8GEzPOowK5BLLWI3jVILSuMQU/s1600/IMG_3762.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2PBVLsv1_vQdKK6hWD894g7e249Y-BzTinQ-9U5nC8D06AAhole-BtAGyAG8G94hWdH1IPQA2ZJ9ozO6zOrYhes04lWZ7PX1T6_DZDel-UfPTKchumf8GEzPOowK5BLLWI3jVILSuMQU/s1600/IMG_3762.JPG" height="300" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Chicks being chicks on a sunny day OUTSIDE</td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I've got another couple of big guys in the freezer - 3.3 and 3.6kg. The 3.6er was a 21 week old rooster we called 'Big Daddy'. I'll probably write about him at a later time as he had a special place in my heart. In the meantime I'm planning how exactly to cook him for my birthday lunch in Spring. </span>Genevievehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11985268626481495154noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-4310400861625565592014-07-27T13:38:00.000+10:002014-07-27T13:48:21.699+10:00When you're on a good thing...<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
There's a woman called Vanessa who lives in Balgownie, who's a fan of buying crocheted stubby holders for her friends as gifts. Obviously, I like this, because I love crocheting stubby holders for people, and I love the thought of people receiving handmade gifts.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqAKs2fS_yL7WnzHGLy42PLCZeQ64qqZyDTevLrg1KtSNwM21Suj_qnVP7JrUruN4uFlb4Xpc4oFTXrAs2A9LiJOLKHKRfgupFsd9D-sP74nw1QinAxyLIOJa1d0EyXqQtUj-GOjzmvSg/s1600/IMG_4193.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqAKs2fS_yL7WnzHGLy42PLCZeQ64qqZyDTevLrg1KtSNwM21Suj_qnVP7JrUruN4uFlb4Xpc4oFTXrAs2A9LiJOLKHKRfgupFsd9D-sP74nw1QinAxyLIOJa1d0EyXqQtUj-GOjzmvSg/s1600/IMG_4193.JPG" height="400" width="305" /></a></div>
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Vanessa has bought stubby holders from me before, but this lot, which she requested a few weeks ago, turned out particularly well on account of the fact that I was lying sick on the couch, so had hours to spend on experimenting with fancy crochet stitches and embroidery and whatnot.</div>
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Vanessa and I are both particularly fond of the blue and orange criss-cross one, which is made using the <a href="http://www.pearlandelspeth.blogspot.com.au/2014/06/hurrah-for-lovely-woolly-hat-action-in.html" target="_blank">stitch I recently learned to make a chemo hat</a>. I reckon I'm going to have to make myself one just like it.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCXXpZn49Pfmp5Bri1drsN0riQIr2F-F1flgtJmLyq0IT8Oo3uF0SGpG0SrZ1pZIw8YuEaeNuQntyl9LIWwFOUUtlN56U2P_6qGMU14HqUFnPMwVqqDoTWSBXMLSqcS4cQTSCGsvciav0/s1600/IMG_4191.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCXXpZn49Pfmp5Bri1drsN0riQIr2F-F1flgtJmLyq0IT8Oo3uF0SGpG0SrZ1pZIw8YuEaeNuQntyl9LIWwFOUUtlN56U2P_6qGMU14HqUFnPMwVqqDoTWSBXMLSqcS4cQTSCGsvciav0/s1600/IMG_4191.JPG" height="316" width="400" /></a></div>
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Oh and in case you're wondering, there are only 4 more skirts left in the <a href="http://www.pearlandelspeth.blogspot.com.au/2014/07/its-time-for-p-by-donation-skirt-clear.html" target="_blank">skirt sale</a>! Norfolk Island, the brown Australian Fauna one, the pink print one with embroidered pockets and the Cornwall mini. If you want one, make me an offer. I won't refuse!</div>
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anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2295872509186128724.post-28096380956327174292014-07-23T17:16:00.001+10:002014-07-23T17:16:33.641+10:00It's time for a P&E by-donation skirt clear-out fundraiser!Hi team! (yes, I think of you all as my team... Hope that's cool)<br />
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I realised today that I have a big stack of P&E skirts hanging about that need to go and do their thing in the world, so I'm offering them to you, blog readers, as part of a clear-out sale, where skirts will be available by donation. That's right folks - if you want one of these skirts, send me an email - pearlandelspeth@gmail.com - outlining the skirt you want and the amount you'd like to pay. This should be based on what you can afford and what you think the skirt is worth. Seriously - you name the price. Cool yeh?<br />
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If you really can't afford one, but want one, I'm also open to bartering, so email me. Especially if your bartering offer involves corflute signs (I can use them for the chook houses) or green and/or red/pink/yellow/orange wool (crocheting a blanket).<br />
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In the past, during these kind of clearances, some skirts have proven to be more popular than others and have been snaveled up <i>very</i> quickly, leaving some disappointed people in their wake. If this happens again, the highest bidder will be the 'winner' and will get the skirt. This is because I am a mercenary, capitalist scumbag. And also because the money raised from this clear-out will go towards building new houses for our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/AutumnfarmBega" target="_blank">Autumn Farm pastured meat chickens</a>. Fair enough, right?<br />
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The skirt sale ends next wednesday, when any unclaimed skirts will be sent to the op shop. So I guess Bega Valley readers can try their luck with that.<br />
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I'm listing them with the waist (top of the skirt - you don't have to wear it on your waist if you don't want to) measurement in cm, because I don't make to sizes like 12 or 14.<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOY3f2Hc5hmvvFg6Yvv7g8cLNFMivmUFhk4zJ3Pjh19_QuaDi8D-tcRRQsFsmRtfMSfjQQYC24yyfq2hIJ0xG_Wn4lISymov6TvW-eMDOGSRLLJtctsLIsVCY0ayb22T8OQ3UHaLUs5XU/s1600/IMG_4214.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOY3f2Hc5hmvvFg6Yvv7g8cLNFMivmUFhk4zJ3Pjh19_QuaDi8D-tcRRQsFsmRtfMSfjQQYC24yyfq2hIJ0xG_Wn4lISymov6TvW-eMDOGSRLLJtctsLIsVCY0ayb22T8OQ3UHaLUs5XU/s1600/IMG_4214.jpg" height="180" width="400" /></a></div>
Oh, and these 2 little skirts, for little people, will be given away for free, on request, with the purchase of another grown-up skirt. Just let me know which one you want.<br />
<br />
So now's your chance - get ye-self a lovely P&E skirt and contribute to some new chicken houses.<br />
<br />
Go team!<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhX7x4NVxYuWBUtwjS0ApEfW_e4kIoUlCTllIjp2Jro4Zszq6BdXlwMsyyuotKYsaKGMQYOonjLnkX3lzyzjN9D1ibOHyNXWrgTA_B_ubJTpDE8Qf7ou5BYKOhNZhAIAA7TqYcH0_nVC3U/s1600/IMG_4201.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhX7x4NVxYuWBUtwjS0ApEfW_e4kIoUlCTllIjp2Jro4Zszq6BdXlwMsyyuotKYsaKGMQYOonjLnkX3lzyzjN9D1ibOHyNXWrgTA_B_ubJTpDE8Qf7ou5BYKOhNZhAIAA7TqYcH0_nVC3U/s1600/IMG_4201.jpg" height="342" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Reclaimed Australian Fauna tablecloth A-line, 82cm</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8n4RD9JPb_S_BRd9qOhZEaSQDREBfi77Aus9DMRWmfwxkjP7QqBX-G_E4pRGSrTVIh6DgSKOomBV50px5RXtPSKIxIjg6kSh4v425qeQF5VCmshaK4K4c0_ENWq9EOdQ5cazJqWBdErQ/s1600/IMG_4202.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8n4RD9JPb_S_BRd9qOhZEaSQDREBfi77Aus9DMRWmfwxkjP7QqBX-G_E4pRGSrTVIh6DgSKOomBV50px5RXtPSKIxIjg6kSh4v425qeQF5VCmshaK4K4c0_ENWq9EOdQ5cazJqWBdErQ/s1600/IMG_4202.jpg" height="330" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Wren-pocket wrap 'n go, 84cm. You can give or take a few cm for this one as it's a wrap skirt</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiicPnvPZlLhiJ5L27r-V1afPjJWhicMLNSVJcfU6VGlPhKSf_dUMdUZmneZrIB9nlYfPQc9xuALUfBR8G1JbUWO0co63NLpGX9FJ4ugfa4UnX0JImS4jJijnD3ZPW1NMRP3lJOQz4_DI/s1600/IMG_4203.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiicPnvPZlLhiJ5L27r-V1afPjJWhicMLNSVJcfU6VGlPhKSf_dUMdUZmneZrIB9nlYfPQc9xuALUfBR8G1JbUWO0co63NLpGX9FJ4ugfa4UnX0JImS4jJijnD3ZPW1NMRP3lJOQz4_DI/s1600/IMG_4203.jpg" height="356" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Souvenir of Norfolk Island (it's blue on the back), 77cm</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiM7_4lzvzX21_xWiACdeX-HGomdAl8qTKF0v18CdpSFaTuqcqq6f8VLPUHdzgaYlGLy2yN7mtB2MopiurI2joO2E1yVkb5xwAnZo2JgfbTX08Of5alNMzLXsCK-s-xm0zdN53hzP7TRfs/s1600/IMG_4204.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiM7_4lzvzX21_xWiACdeX-HGomdAl8qTKF0v18CdpSFaTuqcqq6f8VLPUHdzgaYlGLy2yN7mtB2MopiurI2joO2E1yVkb5xwAnZo2JgfbTX08Of5alNMzLXsCK-s-xm0zdN53hzP7TRfs/s1600/IMG_4204.jpg" height="377" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Fishing A-line, 102cm</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIcZqI1mT68jzsSibgJieg2N95kKzD1b9xMmXkfixJRhc8Q1uCL_H6wLODBGsXgsEn320xrOUQr-fbMiCkLwXzcQ_3qYWqWKFyJ0KJ6eQtgGUqYlZo19m5ubnGh3viDS3x3RNbu14KtP8/s1600/IMG_4205.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIcZqI1mT68jzsSibgJieg2N95kKzD1b9xMmXkfixJRhc8Q1uCL_H6wLODBGsXgsEn320xrOUQr-fbMiCkLwXzcQ_3qYWqWKFyJ0KJ6eQtgGUqYlZo19m5ubnGh3viDS3x3RNbu14KtP8/s1600/IMG_4205.jpg" height="310" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Purple vintage curtains with pockets, 82cm</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbtF8sDxQqCZ8T6E1AzfP4vtmRBgRDIbkA7T__oX_Rvq9K8E4QbCSIgmlActPv4zZBav-zfSGatjXUKHAoxkuK-qjmwmjwPXlIQ96NPuLHs7_cPTG2mHBDtsu94_wTiIHTtDiQ4frQjGY/s1600/IMG_4206.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbtF8sDxQqCZ8T6E1AzfP4vtmRBgRDIbkA7T__oX_Rvq9K8E4QbCSIgmlActPv4zZBav-zfSGatjXUKHAoxkuK-qjmwmjwPXlIQ96NPuLHs7_cPTG2mHBDtsu94_wTiIHTtDiQ4frQjGY/s1600/IMG_4206.jpg" height="233" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Grafton mini skirt, 96cm</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyxajsMbxYDnWplKVRXVm8-2HLkYfzGg5W-i34g0EBm_auKcG6ZLhOSxV6k_-sKMvfRi9-KTmLFQ4FwShwiX9rqsXRHonCuTRqLxyd_W_xBe2aAgpJSg2Ip-bvtU8A0-AIpFsqUoV2-Ds/s1600/IMG_4207.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyxajsMbxYDnWplKVRXVm8-2HLkYfzGg5W-i34g0EBm_auKcG6ZLhOSxV6k_-sKMvfRi9-KTmLFQ4FwShwiX9rqsXRHonCuTRqLxyd_W_xBe2aAgpJSg2Ip-bvtU8A0-AIpFsqUoV2-Ds/s1600/IMG_4207.jpg" height="258" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cornwall mini skirt, 92cm</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyM1HSVyfh7XYFhh6mhkPtNWZ-uDk151KWEt6I_ygyWBrQ1Jj1A_6Tvl3qyEcgsrWIru4diJ8jQMTYnX7i3jRekpOXPWjW8rxU99cIaT7i_fMo2T1i9R_92f-kSMNFElDjFh7oN5uSD_I/s1600/IMG_4208.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyM1HSVyfh7XYFhh6mhkPtNWZ-uDk151KWEt6I_ygyWBrQ1Jj1A_6Tvl3qyEcgsrWIru4diJ8jQMTYnX7i3jRekpOXPWjW8rxU99cIaT7i_fMo2T1i9R_92f-kSMNFElDjFh7oN5uSD_I/s1600/IMG_4208.jpg" height="307" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Vintage embroidered swan pocket A-line, 84cm</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrQNtRUEkHfH9yuXcMh1WSmhi0SbdadiMQGATPRrN6CQKq2nrgkP4JIqtZ9Jy7e6bVNV0oN95SxiipmMBKnHOFIovMHmtO8sufjXhpQwPrDiE8NqDu7FLJRZufwxzoBi1ek6P5JZx0Z0Y/s1600/IMG_4209.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrQNtRUEkHfH9yuXcMh1WSmhi0SbdadiMQGATPRrN6CQKq2nrgkP4JIqtZ9Jy7e6bVNV0oN95SxiipmMBKnHOFIovMHmtO8sufjXhpQwPrDiE8NqDu7FLJRZufwxzoBi1ek6P5JZx0Z0Y/s1600/IMG_4209.jpg" height="308" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Navy velvet with vintage print side panels A-line, 79cm</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-9M4X8_PYGtDbHckfcC2t73ntUjDIt4U8B-5G7qLHEEAx70vm8poZ5vy0RrGCJQnO_FxSGahrxtyYDEvaz3O4sXbcCSAu1njQZbhebsmXWphRMPCvOu5z9QEvH-jpkjGD2nfX2mTaW7Y/s1600/IMG_4210.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-9M4X8_PYGtDbHckfcC2t73ntUjDIt4U8B-5G7qLHEEAx70vm8poZ5vy0RrGCJQnO_FxSGahrxtyYDEvaz3O4sXbcCSAu1njQZbhebsmXWphRMPCvOu5z9QEvH-jpkjGD2nfX2mTaW7Y/s1600/IMG_4210.jpg" height="351" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Vintage pink print with embroidered pockets A-line, 66cm</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-6q5fVnl10xz8JmUKu4UvvEqQDnKBLCv52qv6kHf8MwVAqtnqvKFWlsDW1ZQU04o7ug4pkLUCqLV0hkDnOAdfr0ixo2TjrYgwXQKvTlwGbkZiy8YE4EB72u6B4HfsI4o96lPQsMpRABs/s1600/IMG_4211.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-6q5fVnl10xz8JmUKu4UvvEqQDnKBLCv52qv6kHf8MwVAqtnqvKFWlsDW1ZQU04o7ug4pkLUCqLV0hkDnOAdfr0ixo2TjrYgwXQKvTlwGbkZiy8YE4EB72u6B4HfsI4o96lPQsMpRABs/s1600/IMG_4211.jpg" height="300" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cross-stitch print with vintage doily pocket, 91cm</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEMlkRxlftyt6U-5P1_wmgQi5uweGSxQPuLTtODmqiiKDMg95oUf14leZdNEj6cXKC3sPul4vEf97nUcrDzkjvyef5oDs0XUShc_MYtWOQgdXoj8j4mVYdr0aVt8Y7oPMuxl5eYLEPSg4/s1600/IMG_4213.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEMlkRxlftyt6U-5P1_wmgQi5uweGSxQPuLTtODmqiiKDMg95oUf14leZdNEj6cXKC3sPul4vEf97nUcrDzkjvyef5oDs0XUShc_MYtWOQgdXoj8j4mVYdr0aVt8Y7oPMuxl5eYLEPSg4/s1600/IMG_4213.jpg" height="356" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Horse pocket wrap 'n go, 85cm (give or take a bit)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitO1zj3vIgX0ZiiQ46TfKYelsfk1dMpQpQ94hCj26StgcKqgHDaYCB_UTVcihdrBxQoHCYapVbFNd9VxJQzjML2tTTnO-IIinBt_7i6mfm1ZQveAaQmm21llP3KtyxxI9IsywunjFrzuY/s1600/IMG_4212.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitO1zj3vIgX0ZiiQ46TfKYelsfk1dMpQpQ94hCj26StgcKqgHDaYCB_UTVcihdrBxQoHCYapVbFNd9VxJQzjML2tTTnO-IIinBt_7i6mfm1ZQveAaQmm21llP3KtyxxI9IsywunjFrzuY/s1600/IMG_4212.jpg" height="386" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Pin stripe A-line with embroidered pocket, 77cm</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div style="text-align: -webkit-auto;">
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCTm7jk2oHwN2UDDPUUDkuvNh3z8cCzqjFN_SifarCyxf5_XlOJsBau0l9XV1jNvqld59sK20wi9R06ZhGcOf3bBkXZjtc1xYRxForIlCDt-9sNqJZ_h4-cnfUBwN5Xw8K_sN_7Qvjvig/s1600/IMG_4216.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCTm7jk2oHwN2UDDPUUDkuvNh3z8cCzqjFN_SifarCyxf5_XlOJsBau0l9XV1jNvqld59sK20wi9R06ZhGcOf3bBkXZjtc1xYRxForIlCDt-9sNqJZ_h4-cnfUBwN5Xw8K_sN_7Qvjvig/s1600/IMG_4216.JPG" height="295" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Vintage hiking person pocket A-line, 85cm</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipW9HCCDPGunTkKzluwS7yziQVlISdX4XQSQp3t6eE-vi97vzplfyfqYIcwXpAxG_XR3YSx6AdV_O_9_PdpQ9fNi8FXLPGsLppc1XbAMEXVBOK_5VDaqUwGr1B-maN46g5NhwTSDOxk9g/s1600/IMG_4217.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipW9HCCDPGunTkKzluwS7yziQVlISdX4XQSQp3t6eE-vi97vzplfyfqYIcwXpAxG_XR3YSx6AdV_O_9_PdpQ9fNi8FXLPGsLppc1XbAMEXVBOK_5VDaqUwGr1B-maN46g5NhwTSDOxk9g/s1600/IMG_4217.jpg" height="361" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Teeny tiny but extremely gorgeous, perhaps for the discerning tween in your life? 67cm</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />anniehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08250724567675219592noreply@blogger.com2