Busy weekend

Its been a busy weekend

• split loads of firewood
• stacked the firewood
• weeding
• moved barrows of soil
• planted out seeds
• cleaned the chook shed
• washing, ironing
• cooking

Back to work tomorrow for a rest!

Jobs, jobs and more jobs

I've got a 3 day weekend, due to a RDO on Friday so the to do list is getting longer!

Friday is going to begin with walking Zane to the bus stop then off to his school for assembly before heading to kinder to move a pile soil to their vegie patches. Then its back home to do some work on the vegie beds, all the tomato and zucchini plants are coming out and a major weeding job is required.

I will be getting a load of soil and compost mix delivered later this afternoon for the vegie beds and am planning to go to the neighbours to split a load of wood that we cut week before last.

Also have the job of sorting out my seeds to see what I have and what I need to order, 3 of the smaller beds should be ready to plant out this weekend or next, the larger bed might take abit longer.

We still have not had any eggs from the chooks, cant be much longer to wait. Lisa has been letting them out to scratch around the garden most days and they are loving that!

I'll post some photos of what we get done over the weekend and let you know if the to list is getting short or not!

Busy day

So far today I have picked 7 1/2kg of damsons, 3kg of blackberries and about 5 kilos of windfall apples. Started a batch of damson jelly, its currently straining and will be finished of tomorrow. Made a batch of blackberry vinegar, that should be ready for straining and bottling next weekend. I'm currently making a batch of damson cheese - never made it before so not quite sure what it will be like and cooking a batch of blackberry and apple to go in the freezer.

Also had friends around for lunch, cleaned the chook house, entertained the kids and done many loads of washing up, I will be going back to work on Monday for a rest!!!

Korumburra Show

Today was the day if the show, we headed down earlier to check if we had won any prizes!

And we did quite well

Prizes included

Lemon Butter
Plum Jam
Chutney - Zucchini chutney
Potatoes
Any other veg - a squash
Plain scones
Date scones
Baked slice

The boys also did well with Zane winning with chocolate crackles and a trophy for best entries in the junior cooking class, Quinn scoped first with his decorated potato.

So we ended up with 11 prizes between us all!



Chook Coop Mark 2

Yes I know its been awhile but I have now nearly finished the chook coop!

Some very hot weather had delayed things along with having visitors, this week I had a extra long weekend and was able to finish the frame, concrete a gate post, erect 3 cross beams and do about 90% of the wire. A couple more hours on the weekend and I should have everything finished, except for the gate! As I still am unsure on what I am doing with this!

Here's some photos.



There is a market in town on Sunday and I hope to get 3 birds there, though we are having some hot weather forecast so I might delay getting the birds if it looks like it will be very hot all next week.

Vegie patch

Anyone for zucchinis ?(or courgette if you prefer) I have quite a few! I bought a punnet each  of zucchini  and button squash seedlings, not expecting all the plants to survive. Well they did!

I planted 2 of each in an outside bed, and 3 of each within the netted area. The outside ones are going great and I am picking 2 a day, the ones in the netted area are a little behind - partly to do with the poorer soil, but that's another story, and are now starting to produce.

Even with giving some away and trading some we are still eating zucchini or squash with every meal!

I will be picking the last 2 cabbage at the weekend and digging the last of the spuds, some of which will be going in the local show the following weekend. We are still picking kale though the sprouting broccoli has now finished. I picked the first tomato the other day too!

 

 

I've also been making some jams, jellies and chutneys to varying degrees of success. First attempt was a wild plum jelly, tasted very nice but didn't set too well,  next came plum jam - a great success, also zucchini chutney which is beautiful.

 

 

 







 Today I have also made some lemon butter and lemon cordial

 



As mentioned above we have been trading vegies, well mainly zucchinis and squash, and getting goats cheese and some smoked ham in return. The boys are loving the goats cheese, and Quinn liked the ham even though he knew where it came from - the next door neighbour's pig that he was feeding up until a few weeks ago.

Local Agricutlural Show

Saturday week is the local agricultural show, yesterday Lisa and I spent the day going through what we were going to enter. We ended up planning to enter 25 different classes, including some of the following

Potatoes
Rhubarb
Zucchinis
Novelty Veg
Plum Jam
Lemon Butter(Curd)
Chutney
Scones
Date Scones
Baked Slices
Apple Pie  - the big one! $100 prize money for the best pie
Chocolate Cake
The boys are also doing a few including
Lego
Edible necklaces
Chocolate Crackles
Decorated Eggs

I'll post an update with some photos after the show, hopefully with some prizes!

Chook coop and run

This weekend has been spent trying to build a run for the chook coop to go in, after several changes to my original idea its now half way built.

So far all the building materials have been found around the garden or in the shed, except for some wire I got from the neighbour. Star pickets and fence posts from the shed, roofing iron and some timber from under the house, wire mesh from an old sheep enclosure in the front garden.

Here is what it looks like at the moment, yes defiantly a work in progress!

Tomorrow I want to get the cross pieces up and work out what I am doing for an entry gate , then its off to the shop to buy wire. I was hoping to have it finished by next weekend so I could get the birds in, but not too sure at the moment

Things are growing... and not just the weeds!

Things are picking up in the vegie patch, today I have harvested the last of the peas, the first of the spuds, radishes, broccoli, and spring onions.

 

Tomorrow I will be making a sausage casserole, everything in it bar the sausages and a can of tomatoes will be home grown.

Spring onion, garlic, parsley, peas, broad beans, radish, potato, kale, broccoli and asparagus from the neighbour in exchange for broad beans.

The first of my red currants are coming along nicely and it looks like we will be eating lots of cabbage soon, I'm growing a variety called January King a large green cabbage. And much to my surprise it looks like I will get 6 or 7 decent size cabbage! At the old place I really struggled with brassicas as the caterpillars ate them all, but here they are growing brilliantly!

The next stage, chooks.

Well we are ready to take the net step and will be getting chooks soon!!!

I have ordered a coop, which should arrive early next week and hope to have that built and ready to house the chooks in a week or two, it depends on work as to when I can pick up the chooks.

I've been spending a lot of time recently reading about keeping chooks so am looking forward to getting them. I have decided to start small with 3 or 4 birds in a coop with small outside area, I plan to build a large coop and run but have not had the time to do it yet, I seem to be spending all my weekends cutting grass! When  I get the bigger run constructed I will use the first coop either for quail or something else.

Pictures to follow soon!!!

It's been awhile!!

Yes I know it's been awhile between posts.....

I could give several reasons for this but not sure if you really want to hear them! Main reason for not posting is we went overseas, back to the UK to visit family,

Anyway here are some of the things I've been upto  since the last post, in no particular order.

While we were away there was a big storm, 4 trees came down and a couple more lost branches, the largest was a gum that came over the back fence by the train line. The train guys cut the main trunk to clear the track but left the rest of the tree balancing on my fence and the slope down to the train line. Seven  hours of chain sawing later I managed to clear it from the fence and remove abit from the slope, to be left with a large pile of wood to be cut and stacked for firewood and an even bigger pile of small branches and foliage to be burnt. Two weekends later in between rain showers I managed to cut and store the firewood and burn off the smaller stuff,

 

The wood shed is now 3/4 quarters full, not enough for next winter but certainly a big help.

 

 







That still leaves the 2 willows that came over the front fence, a neighbour cut these as the were blocking the road and I have made several calls to the council to move the trunks from the roadside culvert but the are still there waiting to flood the road when I rains next! I need to get out there to remove the branches from the fence line but again they are on a slope and the ground is very wet around there so it might have to wait awhile.

I only discovered the fourth tree yesterday, a neighbour had told me about a tree he had down,  taking out a section of his fence, and while taking a walk with Quinn we found it over our fence! We also found a tiger snake.....  so I really need to cut that long grass.

Garden update

We now have an enclosed raised bed, eventually this will be planted out with soft fruits - raspberries, currants etc but to begin with I'm using the space for more vegies. I was going to build the enclosure myself but decided I wanted it doing properly so got a professional in! And we are very pleased with the results, thanks Aaron!


First I removed the 2 trees along the fence line, around 4 metres tall by 3 metres wide, I mulched a lot of the small branches and the rest went onto a bonfire.

 

 

The cleared area.

 

 

Several weeks later!

 

 

My two helpers assisting with moving the soil, nothing wrong with using child labour!

 



 

 

The first plantings, kale, mustard and Chinese cabbage transplanted from the other beds, peas, radish and various seeds planted on the left hand side. I have since planted some rhubarb towards the back and am waiting on raspberries, red, black and white currants all to go down the far end.

 

 

And here are the first 3 beds  I planted, most things are doing well. We've been picking radish, kale, mustard and rocket for a couple of weeks now. I have transplanted a fair few plants both to pots for the our other house and into the new plot, that's what happens when you get the little ones to plant the seed!

Busy few days

We're just had a busy few days at the new place, Lisa spent several days up there on her own painting the bathroom and the boys bedroom. I've been down there for the last couple of days planting out the next bed.

Firstly the bathroom, I thought I had some photos of what it looked like before we had any work done..  but I cant find any! Either we forgot to take any or Lisa has deleted them.

We had the old dated looking bathroom ripped out and new one installed. The old one didn't have a bath, something that we need with 2 young boys. So in went a bath, new shower and vanity, we decided to do our own painting so here is what it looked like after the builder finished.

 

 

Lisa spent several days painting and finishing the room and here is what it now looks like.

 

 

 



Fruit and Vegies

Here's a list of what we have planted so far.

Fruit-
Gooseberries
Jostaberry
Blueberries
Cherry Guava
Strawberry Guava
Strawberries
Native Lime
Seville Orange

Vegies
Potatoes
Garlic
Radish
Carrot
Turnip
Broad Beans
Peas
Cabbage, red and white
Broccoli
Kale
Rocket
Lettuce, several types
Cauliflower

Plus I bought 6 more fruit bushes/trees to be planted out this week
Fig, Quince, 2 Natal Plums and 2 Midgen Berries - a native Australian ground cover with a very sweet white berry.

I'm also looking to get some currant bushes and raspberries but I need to build a cage for these so the birds don't get them!

So far only the rocket is ready to pick, but at least its something.

Autumn Colours and Garden Statues

It's been awhile since my last update, been busy with work and a training course with the fire brigade, so here are some photos of what we have been doing around the place

Firstly some Autumn colours from the front garden

 

 

The boys have been helping tidy up the front garden, some far I have taken out 15 roses over 30 still to go!

 

 

 

While tidying up we have been finding lots of garden statues, the boys have even set up a statue shop!

 



 

 

Around the back of the house the vegies are coming along nicely, sorry no upto date photos as my camera has broke! I did finally cut down the 2 trees by the back gate, this area will be another vegie bed and maybe some soft fruits if I get around to building a cage.

 

 

 

I've mulched a lot of the smaller branches, the big stuff will be used for the wood heater and the rest will be put on a bonfire.











Big Pile of Soil

Saturday morning we had 3 cubic metres of compost delivered.

And with my trusty helper we filled the 5 raised beds I had made over the last few weeks. I decided to go for compost from the local garden supply place, the pile was still steaming when it arrived. We did find a couple of extra things in there, a local restaurant must be missing some cutlery!

 

 

Zane was a great help with his shovel and wheel barrow!

 

I ordered abit too much, so the rest was mixed in with the compost pile I built a couple of weeks ago, it was due for a turning so I just layered in some of the delivered compost with the existing pile.