so far...

I love school holidays.
The slow pace...
the pyjama's until lunch time...
the baking...
and the making....

Block rockets of course for the boy...
complete with stones for fire because a rocket must have the fire coming out of it's turbo boosters...did you know?


and of course there's the extra time for the garden.
And the girl has been working on the same at school...
which has carried over to the holidays too...
makes a Mama very happy.
So far, so good.

yesterday

Yesterday it rained.

A steady all day kind of rain.

It was a day for nesting indoors

and drinking tea

and listening to the lorikeets gently chattering as they gorged their colourful selves on the fruits from my golden canes.

It's how I know it's almost April.

Sunday, February 6, 2011

sunset

the sun is noticeably shifting again
sunset is reaching the sill of my kitchen
and from the other direction sunrise is casting crystal rainbows through the same
it's still all about the flowers from my garden here
and sun
and heat
and trips to the sea
but then it is February now after all

Monday, January 31, 2011

just us here

Wandering the garden this morning with my tea

As I find myself needing to do each and every morning

The bird song

The chickens

Fat boy awaiting my treats

And the bees

Just us here

Monday, November 15, 2010

birds and bits

With my permaculture garden taking shape in the backyard there was a need for the addition of a water element. Of course I had/have many plans for this but one we completed this weekend with the addition of a new bird (and bug!) bath.
We'd saved many parts of a tree we recently cut down (to make way for more and more practical growing space) to use around the place. How could we waste such an awesome resource? And the best bit we saved... the trunk crown...a place where Mia used to sometimes sit enjoying a birds eye view... has now made the base of our new bird bath. I dug (and dug!) it into the centre of what will soon be another large garden bed. I think it will keep all the birds that seem to be visiting us so much lately quite happy....

And for the bits... we have two new nature shelves, made from some garden hardwood.

This house seems to collect a crazy amount of oddities from the wild.

In every corner there seems to accumulate a myriad of rocks, stones, feathers, seeds, leaves, flowers, nests, bugs...dead bugs, live bugs, sticks, shells....you get the picture.

Secretly, or not so secretly, I love it....adore it.

So we made some shelves where we can let them collect together....so we can admire them all together, when we walk past or when we choose to curl up on the couch next to them reading from the book basket below or sit right there on the floor and sift through the treasures that have been collected.

I'm not kidding myself though... I have no doubt our goodies from nature will still accumulate in any other free (or not) space around here but it's still nice to have a relegated spot regardless right?

In other news...
the tooth fairy is sending us broke!
She's growing.

Monday, November 8, 2010

the whir

Can you hear it?
Me neither, but it's there... that whir.

I walked to work this weekend.
I worked two twelve hour shifts over both Saturday and Sunday and I walked to and from both.
With ipod in one ear and bird song in the other I blissed out for a full 25 minutes at a time with only myself, my footsteps and the freshness that is 6am.
I have to add I have fallen head over heals with these guys, hence the ipod, otherwise it would have been just me and the birds I tell you. Like I said..bliss... (and maybe a little side *training* for a January goal)...although as soon as my bike is on the road I shall be making the trip via pedal power.
But aside from my moments of quiet and solitude stepping it out rhythmically in between work the only glimpses of home these two days were of the shower and my pillow.
It made me realise how lucky I am that the whir of time really does have it's slow moments for me amidst the other business of my days. Do I really kid myself so often that I am that crazy busy?
I noticed this morning (amidst reorganising the chaos that is two days without Mama home) that the choko vine had reached the top of the chicken coop...really? In two days?
And the tomatoes are so fat... and so are the rosa bianca's (I can't wait for those grilled aubergines!).
The sugar cane setts have sprouted.
And could those banana's really be fatter too?
Noticing such changes after a couple of days without pottering and garden gazing really does show that I must find and spend quite some time doing just that in my days. A little indulgent for such a busy Mama? Or has that too become part of what my own business entails. Blessed me.

So maybe that's why I usually don't quite hear that whir.
Because I'm usually quite aside from it... taking that mindful time out to notice and watch amidst all my other doings.
I am however a little glad I got caught up in the whir for a weekend because sometimes it's that *carrying away* that gives us our reminder of what we have created at home...and just how different and separate our own whirs are....
and how very good that is.

Tuesday, October 26, 2010

procrastination is not a bad thing

I finished a rag rug I've been wanting to make for the longest time!
And in the process I've figured out I'm a master of a couple of things.
I'm a master at coming up with new ideas and new projects or just simply adding them to my ever increasing list of things I want to do...
and I'm a master at never actually finishing too much because there is always something else or another new project to begin or dream about.
Procrastination?
Do you see that cute fatty of a white and green crochet hook up there? I think I purchased that three years ago. Three years! I blamed procrastinating on this project on waiting for just the right group of sheets to show up at the thrift shop.
Well I think I'm going to reinforce that excuse right now because I'm kinda glad I did because this little rag rug is hopefully going to be kept by my girl for a long time for its sentimental value.
You see when I was procrastinating the other week on working on my latest study assignment I picked up that fat lonely unused hook, walked straight to the linen cupboard with an idea popping in my head and grabbed Mia's cot sheets, kindergarten sheets and her first bed spread and began cutting. It felt a little wrong but I continued on.
And there it is.
Completed I tell you...completed!
One rag rug crossed off my list and now living on her bedroom floor.
I found her the morning after I completed it, after sliding it quietly into her room while she slept, curled up with wild bed hair on the floor lying across it. I think she likes it!
And it goes quite nicely with her desk. Do you remember we started that thrifted project a little while ago too. It then sat for a while chair-less... waiting for just the right one that met Mama's approval.
And it popped up during our latest trip to Pottsville in the form of my and my siblings study chair from our childhoods. A lick of white paint and it's just right... don't you think?
It may take years in some cases but even after, and sometimes because of, a little procrastination things do get completed and turn out just right in the end.
That's what I'm telling myself anyway as I sit here blogging instead of working on that assignment and finishing the painting of all our trims and doors that I started yesterday ( and has been waiting for probably close to three years too!)..... sigh.
I think I might just wander down to Mia's room with my cup of tea first and admire her rug just one more time before I get back into it.

Monday, October 18, 2010

sugar and sunshine

It's been a while between drinks, friends.
My sweet sisters comments about not updating my blog in a while with some images and words for her to look at has found me motivated to be here again.
"I haven't even blogged in ages" I almost moaned to her last week after commenting on just how long it's been since I gave the house a good clean and nosed down into my studies properly. Exactly what have I been doing lately? Other than mothering, working, updating work training, pondering and setting some new goals for myself that is!
"Gee what's it been, almost two weeks?" I casually threw out there while we were out on a rare sister date on Friday night. (We went to see this by the way...)
"The 1st of October!" she ever so quickly replied.
The surprise must have registered on my face, so she explained her disappointment every time she clicked over here to see if I'd visited and the same date popped up in the post header.
Friday, October 1, 2010.
So it was.
Call it shaken, nudged or inspired...whatever...but here I am and that's a good thing. I've missed this space of mine... as have others it seems. Love.

Happenings around my world have been varied but mostly marred by rain. An enormous amount of rain! Gratefully received of course...the earth has been rightly soaked and the dams have been releasing water with warnings of floods along the river as a result. Quite the turnaround from when we were watching that same dam receding without a raindrop in sight not too long ago! How the worm turns and how mother nature loves to remind us who's in control. I love that.
But...I also do love the sunshine and the excitement that something we so take for granted can bring when it streams through the windows first thing in the morning after quite the long hiatus.
Thanks to the last two days of glorious sun I have made some serious progress in the redesign of the back garden and have even been planting (and nursing a little case of sunburn today...how silly...yes sunburn!) Oh yes and as quickly as a single area had been slightly finished, or in some cases half finished I found myself there on hands and knees sowing seeds and transplanting seedlings straight down into it!
My newly planted green babies include more papaya, roma tomatoes (now I know I can grow tomatoes!), pigeon pea, lettuce, coriander, basil, radish and a couple of things it's probably not the right time for like perennial leeks and broad beans...but ah I couldn't help myself. It's been so long.
I've also planted a choko vine on the chicken coop for fruit and shade as during our blitz out the back a few trees have now departed, and some sugar cane setts by the cubby which we acquired by the side of the road. Sweet sugar cane...planted not before a few sections were stripped and chewed of course.
We have also been joined by a raspberry bush and a loquat tree. Very exciting and very experimental...fingers crossed!

So amidst the mothering, working, training, pondering and goal setting, there have indeed been other things afoot. Between the rain, the sun, the digging and planting there has also been quite a bit of mulberry hunting and eating; bonding with a new *Charlotte* (we love our garden creatures here) and a new craft project for this Mama.
I guess the fact the house hasn't been cleaned in so long is not such a bad thing.
I'll take the sugar and sunshine over that any day.

Thursday, August 12, 2010

I've found joy...

quite easily now I've stopped to look....in the simple things.
Is it any surprise...really?
After all the drama and grief of late it really is no surprise it is indeed the simple things I have turned to to rediscover my joy.
Lately amidst it all there has been the elation in finding green tree frogs hiding in my bromeliads...
and just a little disappointment in finding this one who has only one battle scarred eye. But alas his beauty and green-ness and mere presence in my space is proof enough of the welcoming environment my garden provides to such delicate little beings...joy indeed I tell you!
And in addition to that there is the joy in teaching my girl to embroider. Oh yes.
Her own pattern drawn straight on some calico....who else but Zeus our beloved old chihuahua...who I think would truly prefer to be left alone than smothered in the love this girl needs to lavish on him. It's a funny tug of war this one. But one that has ended in a delightfully cute piece of stitching. I'm rather proud.
And then there is the joy of natural play. The kind of joy that comes after the nervousness of some serious pruning in the garden. Where the fear of the change actually ends in thankfulness for the courage....and some perfect prunings of hollow papaya and mulberry branches that make perfect drums and perfect drumsticks. A sound from heaven for sure.
Enough to go with winter garden colour and of course warmth.
The fire pit is still in use and has warmed many a toe after recent long emotional days.

And on that note I must say sorry for seeming so cryptic of late....
and without trying to continue on that theme....thank you for the wishes of wellness over the last two weeks.
I am seeing the end of the journey I hope.
Without ethically and legally saying too much....my job involves caring for those with an inability to do so themselves and who are therefore vulnerable and dependent in so many unimaginable ways.
It took until now to realise that the vulnerability I support and protect in others also stretches to reach myself.
Sometimes the very thing we work to prevent happens and we need to bid farewell and in doing so take a good look at ourselves, our morals, our fortune, our reasons, our strengths and our weaknesses. Sometimes things happen that make us revisit and question and frighteningly be questioned. It shakes us.
Sometimes things happen that make us wonder why we even do what we do....briefly. Sometimes they happen, I have realised, to confirm why we do what we do.
Sometimes an ending for some leads to, I believe, flight...

and eventually joy.

What is your joy right now?

Tuesday, June 29, 2010

a tooth for a star

Last night while we slept the tooth fairy paid her very first visit to our home.

Today there is a slightly lispy and excited girl with precious coins jingling in her pockets.

Tonight we will be out looking for the newest and brightest star in the sky.

Wednesday, June 23, 2010

the love of whacking

My Dad parted with our childhood totem tennis set on the weekend.
It now lives breathing a new, but not unfamiliar, life in my backyard.
I had forgotten he even had it. In fact I had almost forgotten it even existed.
But now I've laid eyes on it again the memories have tumbled back home.
Australian summers of the 70's.
Barefoot and dodging bindii's in my Dad's backyard.
My big brother and I.
Terry towelling hats, riding bikes, making jumps, being jumped over! (the compulsory role of the younger sister isn't it)
And whacking that totem tennis ball.
It's been a long time.
Things have changed.
But let me tell you when I held those bats in my hands again the other day...and ahem each day since...that whacking came straight back to me. Except maybe this time harder, stronger and if it's possible, more fun.
Hmm Mama could possibly match that beloved older brother who used to spin that ball round and round that totem coil not allowing his little sister to have her turn...joyfully living in his own world of whacking. How about it bro? Rematch time?
All hands here have had a go at this new, old, toy.
It's even been used in dispute resolution with a challenge having been set to the Mister. It never happened but it all ended in giggles and a few hours of good natured "talking it up".
A good tool to remember.
So even though it's cold here now, it's standing out there again. Perhaps in training for Summer.
I wonder if it will survive my two little one's antics?
I wonder if they will grow up and remember the days of totem tennis where one outhit the other or where one needed to jump the bmx over the other....
Who knows but for now we can aim for that, except maybe with the occasional.....

"Stand back kids...Mama's going to whack this one!"

Friday, June 4, 2010

il sole

The sun was shining this morning.
Bright uninterrupted streams of warm light from a cloudless sky.
It feels like forever since we have had a clear day like this and I decided to lap it up.
I hung my washing on the line just knowing I will bring it in tonight smelling of light, with that crisp slight stiffness of being dried outdoors and that it just may still be warm when I plunge my hands into the bottom of the basket to pull it back out and fold it all.

The boy and I sat outside on the day bed on the front verandah, chasing the sun in the north, to drink our tea.
His chamomile, mine lemon myrtle.
Him swinging on my legs and me reading my gardening books.

Both enjoying the view to the garden and the streams of sun shining within it.

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