365 Grateful - 5 & 6

Day 5 - January 5 2014

Date Night!

One of the reasons (I think) that Anthony and I have lasted together so long (apart from pure stubbornness!) is that we regularly take time out to do something together. Concerts, movies, dinner. Time with just the two of us...

Last night we went out for dinner at one of our favourite restaurants, The London. We ate outside (another thing to be grateful for - summer evenings!) and watched the silly Summernats folk wander around, all sunburnt and loud.

Then we went to the Dendy Premium Lounge to watch The Hobbit - Desolation of Smaug. It was our first time in the premium lounge and it was certainly a different way to watch a movie. The seats were very comfy, and I loved being able to have a beer and have a choc-top delivered halfway through, but it was also too comfortable, and because we were out past my bedtime, I found myself nodding off, like I would if I had been watching it at home.

It's also really expensive! Both the tickets and the food! Still, it was a nice experience (courtesy of a lovely friend that gave me the tickets for my birthday), and the movie wasn't too bad (I have to reserve judgement until I've seen it again fully awake!). So I'm grateful for that!

Mmmmm...Blueberries!

I'm grateful for berries. The sweet you can have when you really shouldn't be having sweets! I picked these today in my garden and I'm looking forward to enjoying them! As I've posted before, we love growing food and there's nothing like eating something out of your own garden. Berries are my favourite and they're so easy to grow! I'm grateful for berries today!

Death to Whipper Snippers!

Thanks Rickety for the photo.

Today, what should have been a half hour job turned into a epic battle between me and my new whipper snipper.

As you know, I do like to get out in the garden, but over the last couple of years, bits and pieces of my garden have gotten away from me. They are my 'weed gardens'.
I don't like that it's happened but I have a quarter acre block, too much to do, and not enough time to do it. Plus for the last couple of years I've been preoccupied.

But in our front yard (much of which is lovely with a big apple tree and berries galore), there are many of these weed gardens. One particularly bad patch is a bit near the road that has gone to grass.
And as it does, the grass grew. Quite tall actually.

It got to the point where I thought I'd better chop it down before it became a fire hazard/snake haven. So I got Anthony to go and buy a whipper snipper.
We went for electric this time, as our last petrol powered one met a grisly end. And it was noisy, and stinky and oily. I was happy with electric.

It's quite a nice little thing actually, but obviously not up to the massive task of thigh-high grass removal. I had barely managed 1 minute of snipping before it sucked the line into itself and stubbornly refused to work any more.

And there began our struggle. I patiently unscrewed the head, poked around for the line (which had somehow managed to tuck itself under other bits of line), rewound it and started again.

If you can imagine this process repeated 58 times, this was my afternoon.

Because I am stubborn (and extraordinarily patient, I think), I got the little weed garden chopped. It took a whole reel of line, but I did it. With a lovely accompaniment of words that I shall not repeat here.

It's sulking in the shed now. There are still more weed gardens that demand our attention, but they will have to wait. There's only so much a girl can take.

Me & My Green Thumb...

I quite enjoy gardening.

Not all types. Not the 'dig lots and lots and move dirt around but do nothing much else' type, but gardening when I can grow stuff and actually see it growing and then get something from it at the end.

Which is why I grow a lot of food. I've mentioned before about my dreams for the simple life, and the more I get out in my garden, the more I yearn for my little acreage.

Over the last couple of weekends, I've been doing a lot of gardening. I've cleared out and harvested a lot of vegies, including 7 lovely butternut pumpkins, lots of very cute little capsicums, and several kilos of tomatoes, including this whopper,

which we barbecued this morning and ate with our lovely brunch.

I've also done lots of planting. I've planted a heap of onions (red and brown), as well as garlic, leeks, spinach, broccoli, cauliflower, artichokes, silverbeet, carrots and cabbage.

There's something very satisfying about picking food from your own backyard and eating it. Not only is it much cheaper than buying it, but it's also much more tasty (even when I buy plants from Bunnings, which I try not to do too often) than the shop-bought stuff, and I know exactly what's gone into growing it. Absolutely no pesticides or even fertiliser (apart from animal poop in the soil - usually from our chooks). Totally organic.

A while ago, Anthony and I decided that we were going to replace as much as we can in our garden with food-bearing plants. We've got a 1/4 acre block (and a tiny 3 bedroom house), so we've got a fair bit of outdoor space. At the moment, this is what we have:

Ongoing plants:

• Apples (5 varieties)
• Oranges (2 varities - one with about 12 lovely oranges almost ready to pick!)
• Pears (2 varieties)
• Cherry 
• Pomegranite
• Passionfruit
• Kiwifruit (no fruit from them yet, but we're hoping for next year1)
• Almond
• Blackberry
• Boysenberry
• Blueberry
• Raspberry
• Strawberry (3 varieties)
• Red Currant
• Asparagus
• Rhubarb
• Artichoke
• Parsley
• Thyme
• Oregano
• Marjoram
• Chives
• Comfrey
• Chamomile
• Lemon Grass
• Saffron (lovely flowers with the very expensive golden stuff attached!)
• Silverbeet (it's annual, but keeps self-seeding in the same spot)

And we also regularly plant:

• Lettuce
• Onion
• Corn
• Sunflower (actually, they self-seed, you've seen my enormous ones!)
• Potatoes
• Tomatoes (they self-seed too, I haven't deliberately planted a tomato seed in at least 5 years!)
• Capsicums
• Squash/Pumpkins/Zucchini
• Basil
• Chillis
• Peas/snow peas

We've also got plans in the future (once we find a place for them!) to plant peaches/apricots, limes, mandarins, black currants, cranberries and hopefully some olives, a mulberry and a walnut tree (although I may have to wait for my big block of land for more trees!)

As I said, something very satisfying in growing food. And people don't usually mind taking the extras off my hands (although I did have trouble offloading my squash this year!).

The more I do it, the more I wish I had a job like Jackie French. You know, writing books or newspaper columns and spending the rest of my time pottering around the garden. I guess I have to hone my writing skills a bit, but it is possible! I'm making it my '45 plan'. I'll tell you about that next...

Make no little plans; they have no magic to stir men's blood.
Daniel Burnham

Livin' Simple

Blog This have issued a New Year challenge:

So smile! It's a brand new year! Enter in your picture of your new years eve, or your first picture of 2011! Feel free to mix it up a bit too, maybe you want to show us a picture that represents what you hope 2011 will hold, or what surprises came around in 2010.

I did have some nice New Year's Day photos of my lovely brothers (and sisters)-in-law building a pool for me and my smiling boy, but then I came across the following couple of photos, and they really made me think about my 2011.

I've never been much good at New Year's resolutions. With the glaring exception of consistent weight loss, if I put my mind to something, I will generally achieve it, but these achievements don't tend to correspond with the start of a new year.

So this year, I didn't make any resolutions, but I have resolved to continue changing my life in 2011. In one simple way.

Those of who that know me, and that have followed my strange journey this year will know that I have made some big life changes. Situations and events I had taken for granted before were suddenly unimportant, and I realised what was important, what I really wanted out of life.

And that's simplicity. To have the time and (sadly, but it is necessary) the financial security to enjoy the simple things in life.

Many of the aspects of this lifestyle I am all but craving are represented in these photos.

This photo, of assorted berries, potatoes, garlic and peas picked from my garden represents the connection I have with food (not always positive, but definitely so in this case), and the assurance and independence that I feel when I know exactly where my food has come from.

Over the last couple of years, Anthony and I have been replacing the plants in our garden with food-bearing plants. I am planning a post dedicated to it, but I wanted to mention that the more food I get from my own garden, the better I feel.
I would love nothing more than to be able to live year-round with little to no dependence on others for food. I'd settle for some kind of barter/market system with like-minded people, but how wonderful to know exactly what's going into your mouth!

And this photo represents the other things that I now find I am constantly craving. A tranquil, bush setting; time away from home/the city with my family; simple pleasures like a bonfire (or just a night away from the TV!); and holidays: the creation of those great memories that last far longer than any TV show, game or book ever could. One of the most comforting things for me after Sam died was knowing that he had led a full and happy (if short) life, and had been on lots of holidays!

So that's what I'm resolving to do. Not just this year, but from this year on. Simple living, lots of memories, holidays, and hopefully, a quiet bush place that I can call home. 

(Don't tell anyone, but if I have to make my bush retreat the house I live in now, I will, but really, I'm still hoping for that windfall that will get my my 50+ acres near the sea!)

I'm going to do my best to avoid the toxic people in my life, work just enough to get us where we need to be, and most of all, enjoy life.

I guess in the end that is a resolution. But it's one I think I can live with.

Happy New Year.