Mighty Thor

The Norse gods decide to have a big party, no expense spared – wine, food, maidens – the lot. After three days it finally comes to an end after much drunkenness and even more debauchery. The God of Thunder, Thor, awakes to find himself lying next to a beautiful young maiden, with absolutely no recollection as to what has happened, although he has a fairly good idea. He decides that a formal introduction is in order so he leans over and says grandly “I am mighty Thor”, to which she replies “You’re thore? I can’t even pith!” As a dad I have a right, actually a duty to tell bad jokes and I tell this one because tonight I too am mighty Thor.


I started the day with Em in the garden, mounding potatoes and planning where to plant our summer veggies. We’re convinced the frosts have finally finished and we probably could have started sooner but you know how it is. Em then spent the rest of the day being very impressive – lots of planting, mulching and carting compost. My favourite bit was when I looked over and saw her pushing the wheelbarrow through the horse paddock, loaded up with horse poo. What a woman.


I spent the day with Rob lifting seventeen poles into their holes, with a little help from Emma and more help from our neighbour Steve and his tractor. Lots of digging and tamping and some very heavy lifting, broken up by a delicious morning tea of baklava muffins that Em had made the other day – cinnamon and sugar and walnuts, mmmmm. Did I mention I love my wife?


“I’m grateful that Morrow came over for a sleepover and we got a dozen poles up.”
(Confused? Look)

One more notch

I’m not sure I want the magpies to win. No, I’m not talking about Saturday’s AFL Grand Final but rather the battle of the birds that is going on outside. Swallows have moved in recently and have become a cute addition to our avian wildlife, arcing fast and low over the veggie patch and up under the eaves of the Dairy. For some reason the magpies aren’t so keen on them being here and this morning there was an all out birdie brawl with a pair of magpies chasing about four swallows across the paddock, intent on causing them harm, diving and swooping, getting close before the smaller more manoeuvrable birds would sharply turn, evading a snapping beak.

My days are being gobbled up by the time-hungry orchard, the site now looking like a forest felled by a bomb blast with poles lying every which way on the ground. I spent over ten hours the other day exhausting myself felling trees and dragging logs out from the back of the block with our snarling little tractor, sitting astride it as it strained like a bulldog on a leash. We now have over two dozen poles ready to go, which all need to be treated first then stood up and braced before Tuesday when our friend Mountain Ryan is coming over to help stand up the four big, six metre centre poles. It’s funny that we’re doing so much work in preparation for our garden club next Saturday. The idea is our friends come around and help us knock off a big project but we almost need a garden club to help prepare for garden club. At least when it is done we will have clicked up one more notch in the ratchet, one more project will be behind us, our future proofing will be that one little bit more advanced.

We had a blackout last night, coincidently the same day Emma has started reading Choosing Eden, a book about a middle-aged couple that moved to Bellingen from Sydney and started future proofing in response to their fears about peak oil. After a day thinking again about how we would live without cheap oil it was suddenly brought into reality when the lights didn’t work, we couldn’t watch our River Cottage DVD, and we couldn’t even have a warm shower as the gas hot water system has an electric starter. In the spirit of local production I cooked a green curry with asparagus, broccoli and kaffir lime leaves from our garden, snow peas from Sue’s garden and local Kindee beef. Then we went to bed.


I hope the Freo Dockers can win a premiership before peak oil hits hard. Perhaps they have started stockpiling aviation fuel to keep their premiership window open.

“I’m grateful that I goed for a sleepover.”
(Confused? Look)

Butter is better

As Ryan said yesterday I am pretty exited about something, namely the making of butter. For a while now I have been getting milk from our local organic dairy, skimming the cream off the top and making butter. Now I am getting ready to upscale. The owner of the dairy is willing to give me milk for free if I can provide butter for them and us. They have a big old hand cranked milk separator that they found at an antique sale, which will have to be cleaned up but I think it should work fine. It separates using centrifugal force and apparently goes like the clappers once you get it whirring. And now I am looking around for a churn. I'm thinking electric, 8 litres and like everything round here not too expensive. Our friend Pete is dreaming up a bicycle powered device with multiple attachment options that I really like the sound of but until then I think we need something more conventional. Not that there is really anything conventional in the home butter churn, not many people doing it. But I will be producing the best butter in the world. It will also be good to be more involved with the dairy and maybe even learn a thing or two about cows, milking etc, for when our girls come on line. I am looking forward to experimenting and perfecting the art of butter making. Hopefully it will become one of my special skills I can offer up to our community of like minded, food producing friends that for the time being I refer to as PLAGGA Produce.
Next step cheese.

Tonight I was grateful that I was eating Brian's beautiful, grass fed, local, beef. Very tender and delicious, cooked rare and full of nutrients. Best meat I've had over here.



Noah was grateful that
"we dug some holes for those poles"

Great friends

We have some great friends. One lent us his excavator; the other came around, greased its nipples and then dug a long trench to connect the water to the orchard.


Does it get any better than this? I know Emma thinks so – she’s even more excited than me, but not about excavators…

“I’m grateful that we got the pipe in.”
(Confused? Look)

Holes for the Poles

There’s fifteen millimetres of rain in the gauge tonight after twenty seven fell last night, most of it in a big electrical storm that boomed and lit up the sky. Somehow Emma managed to sleep right through it, waking later when the sky was clear but still being illuminated almost constantly by distant sheet lightning. Whenever it rains like that I imagine it coming down in the forest up the valley in the national parks, how the forest soaks it up, dark and wet, how the rainforest and rivers are replenished. And I contrast it with the paddocks that we humans have cleared and in which we live – wide expanses, little vegetation, mud.


I was supposed to head off at eight this morning to go and help some friends with a verandah but it was still raining so I got to laze around for a change, battling valiantly against gravity from the couch. The call did come through eventually so I headed off, excited to be exploring a part of the valley I haven’t seen before, Magic Mountain. I’m not sure what part is the magic part but for me it was the sheds - knocked together with recycled material, keeping big stacks of timber dry. Dirt floor and lots of building tools. Having spent so much of the last eighteen months building the Dairy I love checking out other people’s projects and how they go about it, the materials they use.

It was also nice to have a look around at their garden, seeing what is growing and the solutions they’ve come up with to the same problems we have – birds, grass, water. Their veggie garden is netted, something I think we’ll do at some stage, and I loved the use of bamboo poles for props – cheap, easy, available – challenging my kneejerk thoughts that instantly head toward big timbers.


Not long after I got home Jim turned up with the little excavator we are borrowing from a friend to dig holes for the poles for our new orchard. Very exciting.

A Quick Tinkle

Meet Morna Flower. Until recently Morna had a nursery down the road in Pembrooke where she also sold chickens. Lots of chickens. Almost enough to qualify her as a crazy chook lady. She has sold her business now and has got rid of a lot of her chooks in preparation for a trip around Australia with her husband, a piano, her little dog and some of her chooks. The trailer she is standing in front of is the one she had built especially for the trip, with the chooks housed on one side, a camp kitchen on the other and the piano between the two. For a quick tinkle of the ivories you just have to lower the tailgate and the piano slides right out – just the thing for the dancing dog and chicken double act she’s working on. I love it. Gold. Think of all the prioritising that goes on when thinking of how to spend your money and yet their list for what a trailer had to have for their trip around Australia settled on chook accommodation and a slide out piano. Thank goodness for people like Morna in the world, following their dreams and letting their bright light shine.

We went to see Morna today to buy some fertilised Araucana eggs to slip under Gladys. Em has been coveting Araucana eggs, which are a very pale blue, for some time now so we’ve bought six in the hope we’ll get about three new hens to keep up a regular supply. Tonight we substituted six of the eggs Gladys has just started sitting on for our new pale blue beauties, slipping them under her while she was half asleep.

Cacophony of clucking

I quite like the little noises roosters make. The crowing - iconic, climactic and slightly silly, but I like the other sounds as well. Like the gentle “took took” when they have found a tasty treat for their hens and then step back so the girls can gobble it up. Then there’s the slightly more urgent warning “took took took” causing all the girls to stop what they’re doing and look up to see what’s going on. Today all the chooks erupted into a cacophony of clucking and squawking so Emma went to see what was going on. Then she saw Gladys was off her nest.

Gladys is our good sitter. She gets broody regularly and will go the distance looking after her eggs. I moved her into the chook tractor this morning so she could sit on her eggs in peace without being bothered by the other hens wanting to have a turn in the nest, adding to her collection. She is sitting on ten eggs. Ten eggs! About two of them are her own, about three or four belong to her daughters and the rest are from the other girls. She isn’t a big hen so she only just gets them all under her, bulging and flattening out, covering them all with her soft warm breast feathers.


The reason she was off the nest was because there was a young lace monitor lizard in there, about two and a half feet long, eating her eggs. It took off when Emma arrived, slipping straight through the chicken wire and bolting off across the paddock towards the forest. Gladys was beside herself and very distressed, clucking away, not going near her nest, unsure if the lizard was still there in the long grass in the chook tractor. We were really worried that she wouldn’t sit again so we quickly cleaned up the broken eggs, moved the tractor onto some short grass and left her alone. And thankfully she went straight back on to the nest.


Later we replaced the wider gauge chicken wire with some stronger dog wire that has a smaller hole, hopefully too small to let the lizard through. Even though we had to be right in the tractor to replace the wire Gladys still stayed on her nest. She is a good sitter. And Emma replaced the two stolen eggs with freshly laid ones from the other chooks.

“I’m grateful that Gladys went back on her eggs.”
(Confused? Look)

Just the tonic

The orange trees are in blossom again. The scent is one of my favourites and I break off little branches to take with me to work, to put in the car. Just the tonic for hard days, uninspiring days. I bury my nose in the blossoms and the smell cuts right through to my soul and lifts me up.

Em and I have finished our Small Farm workshops and our heads are full again of ideas, this time about making butter. Emma is quite passionate about it and as there is no substitute for passion in life now we need to work out how to make it happen. In the midst of all these ideas we’re working hard to raise the netted orchard into existence and finish the garden. But today I spent working in town while Em was kept busy with Noah and his friend Denny who was over for the day.


“I’m grateful that Morrow comed over after school.”
(Confused? Look)

El Dorado

Another day for Em and me spent visiting farms with the Small Farms Network. Today we got a lift with Bev and headed up to Comboyne to visit a blueberry farm, high on the Comboyne plateau with amazing views taking in the hills of Pappinbarra to the north and the ocean to the east. Like with most fruit around here they have to use netting to keep out birds and flying foxes but I was taken aback by the size of their net, probably about two to three hectares. Every speaker we have had is always passionate and generous with their time and the owner Penny continued the trend, showing us around, telling us what they’re doing and answering our questions. Things got even better when we adjourned for a cup of tea and some yummy cakes – chocolate beetroot and lemon delicious.


Next we went to an avocado farm just down the road where they have about 6500 avocado trees. Avocado trees are quite susceptible to root rot or dieback (phytophthora cinnamomi) and being a high rainfall area it was quite amazing to see the lengths that the growers here go to to reduce its impact. The entire side of a hill had been carved up into terraces with a bulldozer, resembling an open cut mine. In amongst the mature trees, like a green el Dorado, the streets were paved with avocados - missed by pickers, ripened too late or not of a good enough quality or size. They were good enough for me though and we had a shopping bag filled by the time we left.


The last farm was a macadamia nut farm down in Lorne with a café for lunch. I am not really interested in having a plantation of either blueberries, avocadoes or macadamias although I will probably try and grow all three. I found it interesting that each of the farms was essentially a big monoculture, influenced I’m sure by the need to streamline production to keep costs to a minimum and remain competitive. None of the people looked to be making millions and I wonder how they keep their enthusiasm up given the lack of diversity in their work. They all seem to be putting in a lot of energy, a lot of time, and a lot of capital.

I came away feeling blessed that I don’t feel pressure to be earning an income from this land and instead can concentrate on self-sufficiency and importantly, diversity. To keep me interested. I’m convinced that a diverse system is a healthy system, mirroring those found in nature and also robust - not as susceptible to disease, disinterest or cheap imports. I want to have pigs, make sausages, grow 50 types of fruit, have a big veggie garden, make butter and cheese and yoghurt, cows, goats, ducks, geese, chooks, rice, bush foods, etc, etc, etc. The other thing I came away with was a big bag of avocadoes.


“I’m grateful that I helped Grandad.”
(Confused? Look)

The old farmhouse

We’ve been in town today at the latest Small Farming Workshop. Today was Native Foods and tomorrow is more mainstream tree crops – blueberries, avocados and macadamias.


The speaker today scared me a little with how much work he has put in to try and make a living from native foods, but at the same time I was very inspired to try and get some productive native trees and use them to solve the problem of what to put in the chook pen and the cow paddock for shade, creating an Australian version of an English hedgerow.


After lunch we went for an excursion to Lachie and Jan Hollis's organic farm where they grow garlic, calendulas and make essential oils. Emma and I both really love visiting other people's farms, checking everything out - soil, drying sheds, machinery, even just sneaking away to look at the old farmhouse.

“I’m grateful that I looked at that animal book of cuddles and go to make a lovely leopard at preschool.”
(Confused? Look)

Four quick strokes

Jean, Emma’s Nana, has been staying with Sue and Rob since she came down for Rob’s birthday last week. I made it back from choir tonight in time to see her before she left to catch her train back to Noosa. I’m not sure what it is, maybe the couple of glasses of punch she had at the party the other night, but I’ve been seeing similarities between her and Emma – the sweet tooth, the love of naps and maybe just a little cheekiness.


When I finally got home I decided to throw caution to the wind and try my straight edge razor for the first time. Yikes. After a good lather and a little shaking I emerged half an hour later triumphant, smooth and unbloodied. I’m looking forward to the day when I can shave with four quick strokes while riding a horse.

A-ha moment

I’ve been out turning the compost this morning, seeing how it’s going. It has a lot of uncomposted kikuyu in it, enjoying the nutrients, starting to shoot. That won’t go in again. Besides that it is pretty good but not the homogenous, well broken down compost that I’ve been reading about in my new composting book. In it Tim Marshall talks about leaving heaps for at least 2-3 months so that everything is broken down, no longer recognisable as individual ingredients. This heap is about a month old but I really want to get it out into the garden and spread it on the tomato bed, get it ready for planting. The new flower bed could take some, so could the fruit trees, then there’s the new orchard on it’s way. I had a big a-ha moment this morning when I realised I could have two heaps going at the same time, doubling my production. If I spend some time producing more than I need (which honestly doesn’t seem possible) then I will be able to build up a stockpile and let it age for longer before I use it.


Saturday night’s party was fun – music, alcohol, dress-ups – all the essential ingredients. We have some stars here in the valley and they shone brightly on Saturday.


And congratulations to Lee and Gavin on the birth of their beautiful baby boy Tycho. They’ve had some tough times and I’m just so very happy for them, and yes, perhaps just a little weepy.

The USofA

Ryan has taken over the blog, and is doing a wonderful job. So much so that I have been even more slack in posting anything, including photos of my America trip. So here are a very few out of the 700 or so I took.







New York. What can I say. We sent 11 days there walking, sight seeing, catching the subway.
We had some very touristy experiences- a show on Broadway, going to the Metropolatian Museum of Art. We also had untouristy experiences- a lot of lady boys in the Meat Packers district, fear and loathing in the trogloditic labyrinth that is the subway system.





My sister and I then went driving for a week through the beautiful country side of Virginia and Pennsylvania (thanks for looking after Soph, Ken). Saw many great and wondrous things including bears in the Shenandoah, Amish people in Lancaster county and the biggest bestest barns ever.


The Amish are cool and very interesting. I don't know why they are so interesting but they are. I was very exited at my first horse and buggy encounter. They pulled up behind us coming out of the supermarket car park. I think I was more excited than when I saw the bears.
We got to go to a working Amish dairy, (although there was the option of a helicopter tour of the Amish "Lower, lower. I think I can see one!") and had a small look around their farm. Neat, white washed, good mules. Love it!






We stayed two nights on a gorgeous little raw milk organic dairy. The owner Kitty had an old log cabin converted into a farmstay. Kitty was awesome and really loved our interest in her cows.

So now I'm back and getting into things again, trying to work things out, how to live a better life and of course make some money and have a little time for fun.

Tight little sequin numbers

The asparagus is coming! The asparagus is coming! I made my first ever hollandaise sauce and we yummed it up for breakfast with poached eggs and bacon, washed down with fresh coffee. Mmm mmmmm.


Tonight we’re going to a birthday party for a couple of friends so we hitched our caravan up to our friend’s car and took it up the road. It must have been déjà vu for them as they are the same people who towed it up and down the east coast for years for the original owner. We’re going to stay the night, our first night in the caravan, and we may even dream of swinging high in the trapeze, far above the ground, dressed in tight little sequin numbers.


My head is still spinning a bit that Mark Harvey has been sacked as coach of the Fremantle Dockers. What did he do wrong? I remember reading that when he first started at the club and had a few losses some coaches from other clubs rang him and reassured him, telling him he could coach, that things would get better. And they did. He’s grown a talented, tough side that has had a terrible run with injury this year. This vulnerable man, not immune to self doubt, looked completely devastated the other day, sunglasses on, not far from crying again. I feel very sorry for him. We'd better win a premiership.

Cakey

It’s a cakey kind of day.


Making and eating. Happy Birthday Rob.

The Carrot

I remember seeing a documentary in which a four year old Inuit boy had his own hunting knife. The memory of that boy lingers on, and comes to mind when I think about what Noah can and can’t do – I’m convinced that one of the main reasons he can’t do something is because I don’t think he can. I started giving him chores a couple of months ago and now I want more. I figure he can dress himself and make his own breakfast from now on, even if he isn’t all that keen.


To get him on board I’ve resorted to The Carrot, as opposed to The Stick. He now has a Sleepover Chart with six things he has to do everyday – do them for a week and he gets to have a sleepover. After days of him protesting loudly, dragging his feet and just plain refusing to get his own breakfast, today he couldn’t do it fast enough. Yay. I do have one eye on dealing with bedwetting this summer so I hope the chart works.


Rob and I have started cutting poles for the orchard. It’s a bit sad felling trees on our block, crack whoosh thud, taking out it’s neighbours on the way down, but it is very local, very cheap, and always satisfying being self-sufficient. We tried dragging three poles back at the same time but it was too heavy. I got almost halfway back with two before I hit the mud, tractor wheels spinning. So it looks like we’re going to have to drag them back one at a time. We’ve got a lot of work to do.

“I’m grateful that I played Hide and Seek with Morrow, and Morrow didn’t really find me.”
(Confused? Look)

Brass Nipples

The washing machine has been broken for a long time, ever since we moved in. Useful for putting things on but to be honest I look for a little more in a washing machine. Something more sudsy. This morning the washing machine’s lucky number came up so Rob and I hauled it up to his house to have a go at fixing it.

We have very different techniques. I usually open things up, scratch my head a bit and look for something really obvious like a loose wire or the charred remains of where a part used to be. Then I usually have a go fixing it with whatever is within reach – breadknife, toilet brush, gumboot – before putting it back together hoping that somehow, miraculously I have fixed it and can now proudly go around claiming credit, trumpeting my achievement.

Rob has a different approach. He opens things up and then goes about identifying parts he knows – “hmmmm 2000 watts, that must be the heating element”, “I’d say that’s some kind of diaphragm, maybe a pressure switch” and “there’s two solanoids on the cold intake.” Then he goes and gets tools. Real tools. A multimeter. Portable soldering iron. Heat shrink. Portable heat gun. And if the soldering iron is empty he has a can of butane in the shed.

Fortunately I was able to be of some assistance in identifying the problem. My big clue was the straw, grass, leaves, feathers and rat shit filling every available space inside. Wires had been chewed everywhere so we tested the connectivity and then bypassed some of the worst bits by soldering in some new wire. (Notice how I’ve moved seamlessly to “we”?) Rob had all the bits we needed to hook it up and test it outside, including a two way adaptor for the water intake and a ¾” brass nipple, once again demonstrating his preparedness. I don’t have any brass nipples. Noah even got in on the act blasting out all the crap with the air compressor.

Now our washing machine is home again, turning and churning outside as I write this. Sudsy again.


“I’m grateful that we fixed the washing machine.”
(Confused? Look)

Oh Happy Days

Rob and Sue’s car pulled away this morning, down the drive, out onto the road and off to town – with Noah happily waving goodbye from inside, on his way to preschool leaving his very happy parents behind. We are very lucky Rob and Sue are here to raise him up with us, hold him and occasionally grant us our freedom. And what to do with such freedom, such peace? Rejoice and then walk around the cow paddock for a couple of hours collecting a big trailerful of cow poo for the new garden bed. Oh happy days.


It was with such sadness that I wrenched myself away from the sunshine and garden and went to earn some money installing new handrails for a friend. I want to be here all the time, in our beautiful valley. Willing this dream into existence by waking up and working hard for it.

“I’m grateful that you made us a nice dinner tonight.”
(Confused? Look)

How to Find Joy

I found a quote the other day I really like:

"We don't know what details of a truly sustainable future are going to be like, but we need options, we need people experimenting in all kinds of ways and permaculturists are one of the critical gangs that are doing that." Dr David Suzuki

I like it because this is what we’re doing. Experimenting. Building our resilience, our self-sufficiency, reducing our dependence on fossil fuels while the madness machine hurtles on regardless. As Leunig says, “Father, do not forgive them for they know precisely what they do.” We fortunate people with such relative wealth and education – who don’t know civil war or famine, whose children will grow up in good health, free to speak their minds, move around – we all have enough information about the state of the planet, it’s just about whether we choose to act. Our friends in Freo are.


Interestingly, for someone trying to reduce my dependence on fossil fuels I realise that in the last week I have used them in the car, the tractor, the pump, the lawnmower, the brushcutter, and the chainsaw. And the gas for the hot water. I am trying though. Very trying.

We mowed the lawn yesterday for the first time of the season and it is very beautiful, the last of the frost burnt grass is gone and nothing remains but lush green. The sun warms winter hearts and earth and the place to be is in the garden, making new beds, moving topsoil, stopping to smell the flowers.


Noah was attacked by an enormous pile of logs at cricket yesterday so this afternoon Rob and I returned to wreak our familial revenge. Airy-fairy theories on child raising are all very good but my son had been attacked. We took a chainsaw. I don’t think it will be trying anything again anytime soon and the trailer of firewood we ended up with was purely incidental.

With spring here the days of lighting the wood heater at night are coming to an end but we’re still stockpiling firewood so it will be good and dry for next year, burning easier, hotter and cleaner. We do have lots of trees on our block but we do try and resist chopping them down, disturbing ecosystems and habitats. The timber we got today was just going to be burnt anyway so we are utilising a waste resource, which always feels good.

How to find joy: Go to the asparagus bed in your gumboots. Pick about half a dozen spears. Gobble them up raw. Does it get any better than this?

“I’m grateful that I read a book in preschool.”
(Confused? Look)

Embracing the Crusty

I was tired last night because we had been up the mountain to our friend’s place, celebrating the end of her brother’s PhD and wishing him well as he set off on another adventure – trekking through Nepal, cycling through Europe, all with his new Swedish gal. We lit a fire and sat around watching the sun go down behind the smoky green hills of our valley, playing guitar and ukulele, drinking mulled cider. Besides Pete's bum wiggling version of Funky Town I quite liked the endless G-C medley, morphing from the Rolling Stones to the Boys Next Door and ending up in spandex and big hair - it may have been Poison. The kids ran and played and jumped on the trampoline, staying up late, banding together in a big tribe, lighting the darkness with their torches. Memories are made of this.


I have blog envy. I wish I had a more impressive blog, like this one. More poetic, more visual, more inspiring. I was reading it the other day and I got all weepy – nothing too serious, more along the lines of a Leunig-it’s-just-so-beautiful, gentle weeping. I haven’t always been a weepy person but something changed when Noah was born. Suddenly my tolerance for violent films plummeted; I had to be careful watching the news given their obsession with graphic depictions of tragedy; and I can be listening to music, so very beautiful, and then out of the blue I’m having a little weep.


Em made Spanish Macaroons this morning, multi-tasking baking and skin care, scrubbing the sooty mould off some of our home-grown oranges so she could zest them. Embracing the crusty for it is what we have, letting go of the need for perfection. Like my blog, my marriage, my life. I wouldn’t change a thing (Em says except for drawers in the kitchen that work). She was making them for the Annual Pappinbarra Fathers Day Cricket Match which was on today with teams allocated depending on where you live, tarmac vs the dirt. It worked out at about 30 a side, everyone on the field at once, the pitch shortened when the little kids bowled, longer for the steam trains. Backyard rules apply – on the road on the full is six and out, retire at fifteen and you can’t get out without scoring. Don’t spill your beer.


Noah wandered around with the other kids, ignoring the cricket and climbing the enormous pile of logs that have been pushed up from when they cleared a space for the new fire shed. Despite other parents telling me they wouldn’t let their kids climb on them I let him anyway – he needs to take risks and discover his limits. And he did. He fell off and got wedged in amongst the branches, scared and scratched, crying. In need of a cuddle but OK.

“I’m grateful that we goed on that big pile of wood again.”
(Confused? Look)

Turning the big heavy bullocks

Oh blessed be, this rich life. Em and I rolled our sleeves up and charged out into the garden yesterday morning united in purpose and ready to mow, mulch and compost a new bed into existence. It took about five minutes for it all to fall apart. Every decision, every border, the big picture – all became contentious and fractured until before long we were both sitting separately, deflated and unenthused having retreated into our shells of relationship self-preservation. We’ve been there before and we’ll be there again but we’ve both been making a big effort lately not to linger there. Grabbing the reins and pulling hard, slowly turning the big heavy bullocks around. We are getting better at it. Our common ground in the end was the principle of starting in close to the house and working out from there, abandoning the contentious bed further out. United again we threw a burst of energy at the grass and made a good start before I had to stop and head off for a choir performance.


The performance was for a wedding in Port – a long drive, always a long drive. I would probably join another choir or two if it didn’t involve so much travelling, but at least on the way I got to listen to Mumford and Sons, dreaming of arrangements for a men’s choir. The bride and groom didn’t know it was coming and were genuinely surprised to find twenty people on the pavement singing to them as they left their reception.

Shine

The sun was clear this morning, it lit everything up and made it shine.

More later,so tired...

Run and Scratch

I’m missing my little camera. I would have taken a photo of the paving Jim and I are working on, snaking its way across the front yard. I really like the look of recycled bricks in paving, the sweeping curves with the strong border and the distracting herringbone infill suit it well. Em thinks her mum might have a camera we could use. I really hope so.

On the way home I stopped at the produce store and bought lucerne chaff, mill run and scratch, also enquiring about the sulphur content of their stock licks (I’m after 16 percent not the regular 12). As I was being served it struck me how far I had come from my city life.

Em has been feeling sick today, nothing too serious but unpleasant all the same, battling through with Noah. I bought her some flowers on the way home, not even thinking to cheer her up or anything noble, but just because she assures me that women like that kind of thing. So I buy her some every now and then when I remember, as I am rather fond of her.

“I’m grateful that I watched two DVDs until you got here.”
(Confused? Look)

Some of the tines

We have two neighbours, both called Steve. Steve the farmer borrowed an aerator recently and ran it over our bottom paddock the other day, penetrating about 6-8 inches into the soil, opening up the earth and unfortunately bending some of the tines on some of the many rocks that lie just below the surface. I lent him my generator while he was doing up his shed on his back block and he was very grateful and keen to repay the favour in some way. Although he didn’t need to do it, aerating the paddock was a thoughtful thing to do. I’ll have to find out what I need to do next – fertilise? Mineralise? Sow seed? Add worm juice? We do need to sit down with someone who knows what they’re doing and plan the year out – what needs doing and when; what we’re going to sow; how much lime we should add. I also have a growing list of supplies that we need that includes a backpack sprayer, some electric fence tape, two energisers, insulated pickets, and electric chook fencing. I’m also going to have to make a mobile chook house, a system to get water to the chooks, a mobile mineral feeder for the cows and probably something to provide shade for the chooks and cows, something mobile. Given all the effort required I am leaning towards having more than just our two heifers in there.

Our other neighbour Steve has a business selling health food and products online. He did the Small Farming Workshop with us the other day which included lunch and I was interested to see what he ate given that he only eats raw food. It turns out he makes the occasional exception, mainly to get along with people, share a meal and accept the food they offer him. I was curious how cooked and processed food tastes to him and his answer surprised me. I was expecting him to talk about how intense the flavour is, how loaded with salt and sugar and fat it is, how it triggers memories of home when he was growing up, how he misses bacon. Instead he simply said that the food tastes dead, how all the life and goodness has been cooked out of it. Which makes sense if you’re used to eating raw food. I can’t dismiss what he said but at the same time I’m not about to make wholesale changes to my diet – I must be getting some nutrition from my food or I wouldn’t be here. And I would miss bacon.

The weather is still magic - cold mist in the morning warming to clear skies and shorts. I spent the morning doing a few jobs around the house – turning the compost, collecting firewood, hanging the chook gate – and then went to finish a job up the road for the woman whose window I’m not making. I feel so much better having decided not to make the window, so much better. I wasn’t confident I was going to be able to do a good job, which is important to me when someone is paying me money. Fortunately she was very understanding, for which I am very grateful. I put up a mantelpiece for her and fixed up a dodgy light fitting, jobs I knew I could do well.

Building an enclosed orchard is going to be our next project for PLAGGA and we need the big poles up beforehand which gives us about two weeks. I rang the guy who is supplying the poles for our orchard this morning but didn’t get through, only able to leave a message. We ordered the poles five months ago and every time I ring him he says it’s too wet to get them out, despite winter being our dry season. I was going to tell him to deliver them within a fortnight or not bother but I spoke to Rob at lunch and he is keen to tell him simply not to bother. Rob thinks we’ll be able to get them out of the bush here and save ourselves almost a thousand dollars. I think it’s a good idea.

Summon the courage

Yesterday I spoke of the Beechwood Hall, dreaming of shows that had been held there in the past. I had meant to talk about the play put on by the Pappinbarra Players a few months ago but I didn’t have a photo from the show – the only photo I had was of Em just before she headed off for her debut. I wasn’t sure if she wanted me to put it on here so I hung back, but I spoke to her over dinner tonight (lasagne made with our homemade pasta sheets) and got the OK. The play was Jack Hibberd’s Dimboola and it was held not at Beechwood but at our local hall, Hollisdale. Em played a seven year old girl, Astrid, and revelled in the opportunity to indulge her love of the Japanese Sweet Lolita style and dress up.


The play was fantastic – funny, bawdy, drunken and refreshingly un-PC. One of the best things about the play was that it was a local production, put on by people in the valley to entertain their family and friends – a kind of self-sufficient, low carbon miles form of entertainment. There were some very impressive efforts put in by people to make the play happen but none were greater than Darren who initiated, cast, stage managed, produced and directed the play and his wife Kerry who organised and cooked a three course meal for everyone in the audience, three days in a row. Often with her young one strapped to her back. There is talk of the play being dusted off and put on down at Beechwood Hall which would make a great venue, alive once more.

Many of our family and friends got involved in some way and through it our valley grew bigger and closer. And Emma sung a solo, being very brave as she can be sometimes. As I tell Noah, brave means being scared of something and doing it anyway. Good things happen when you summon the courage to be brave. Like Baz Luhrmann says, a life lived in fear is a life half lived.

“I’m grateful that I actually lifted the bricks for Grandad.”
(Confused? Look)

Unlying life

My razor arrived last night. It gleams. My strop is finished and it’s on it’s way now.


More workshopping today. The morning session was held in the Beechwood Hall, a big space with painted white wallboards – barnish. It has its own permanent stage and inescapably my mind is drawn to wondering about past shows and packed houses, laughter and music. Today it was filled with talk of woody weeds, riparian zones and Barber’s pole worms. Our friend spoke on Bush Regeneration, followed by a local vet who really got me worried the more I listened to him. In a fearful state I started thinking I’ll do what it takes, anything to stop these terrible things happening to our livestock. It’s interesting that Chris and Ann don’t drench or vaccinate, instead focussing on soil health and nutrition, and the number of sick animals has plummeted, along with their vet bills. Both Em and I feel very lucky we have Chris and Ann to talk to, tapping into what they have learned, getting encouragement and advice. Helping cool, unlying life rush in.


In the afternoon we went back to the Eggert’s farm for a talk on dung beetles, unpaid workers that take dung underground into the soil profile, helping to maintain the fertility of the soil as well as discourage fly larvae. Beth showed us how to set up a dung beetle trap so I’m keen to give it a go sometime and see what we might have already. I really hope we have some as she was talking about them costing $800-1000 for a colony.

“I’m grateful that I went to preschool and did one of those special things for you Mum.”
(Confused? Look)