Holiday near home

There is nothing wrong with having a holiday near home. We stayed only 30 minutes from our house and experienced the contrast of autumn near the beach for a school holiday getaway.Seaside negotiations with a 4 year old:

( Fill in the blanks)

"My baby starfish,

I found it down there under the rocks.

I want to take it home.

It can live in sea water,

we can put it in the bucket and take it home,

but it's my friend,

it's a baby.

No I don't want to put it back in the sea,

it can live with me in water.

Ok I can look at the photo when I miss him"

Seaside negotiations with a 13 year old:

(fill in the blanks)

" Mum look at me,

up here.

Look I'm higher now.

Nah I wanna go higher.

Why?

No it's not.

yeah but we're not at Playcentre."

Finally a last word from Mum

"Ok if YOU get out of the tree, and YOU put the starfish back we'll go say hi to the goats and feed the eels"

Tussah Silk

I want to win the "spinning a yarn" Tussah Silk! Thanks to http://spinayarn.felt.co.nz & www.blendy.co.nz You could have a chance to win too if you go here, but just so you know I'm feeling pretty lucky.

New Season accessories

The onset of the cooler weather is excuse enough for new accessories I think. Brown and black to suit the winter wardrobe. A "dapper day bag" the pattern from Sew Liberated by Meg McElwee. I omitted the piping ( too lazy and impatient to fiddle around with that), used lovely chocolate coloured leather for the gusset, strap and top of the bag and added an inside pocket with a zip so I can compartmentalise my stuff (separate my knitting from boring bits of paper like bills to pay)

Also for me, a new orange wallet because I like orange and wanted to make the "perfect" wallet that doesn't drop change, can accommodate receipts, allows me to quickly find my library card and coupon card with out having to search though dozens of compartments. I'm pleased to have found a use for some smaller bits of leather and fabric in this project. It' s only failing is that it doesn't hold a cheque book, but how often these days does one need a cheque book on hand?

I think it's spot on, so I have some to offer at the Mapua Easter Fair this weekend.

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Blackboy Peaches

Three trees is probably two too many, they all came ready at once on the weekend. I think everyone else in the district may have them in their back yard too because I can't even give them away. Skatey takes about 6 to school everyday, the other children maybe have one a day. I collected as many as I had the time and patience to deal with and got the dehydrator out in desperation, the other kids seem to like them better dried anyway, they will probably only last a few weeks dried unless I hide some. If I lived closer to my brother I would go to his house to dehydrate, he creates his own electricity with a water wheel and windmill. He has so much power he's thinking of building a heated pool.
May be one day he'll come and create free energy for me!! Other things we have done with them is put them into fruit muffins, make a peach chutney, bottle them in syrup, stew them and freeze.
Maybe I should try a little wine making or brandied peaches....
Anyway Black boy peaches, so easy to grow form seed (stone), almost disease free, low maintenance - just give a winter and summer prune. Plant comfrey underneath.
Walah, fruit in 3-4 years.
I have plenty of seedlings if anyone wants one.

Thrifty finds

Vintage curtains
Our little town sometimes yields great thrifty finds. We have a Hospice shop, Red Cross, and a Salvation Army. The Red Cross ladies are my favorites but I often find the best things at the other shops. I love to see what Jannelle has found each month, her finds usually make me wish I was visiting the thrift stores in her neighbourhood. This last month I think my finds are worth a mention. Boy's room, re-created warm curtains
Warm thermal curtains, too short for the window so I added a striped fabric and a wool backing to make the boys room cosy for winter. Skatey helped me hang a new curtain rail, he's better on a drill than me. He has a quilt on his wall for warmth as well.
A spiral bound book of Enid Gilchrist patterns

Merino off cuts

Probably my favorite find this month, Merino fabric off cuts at the market one Sunday. Perfect timing for making winter clothing, hoodies and long sleeve tops for the small children. We all need an extra layer in the morning when we do our outside jobs. Picking fruit for school lunches, with warm new tops.

Autumn snuck up

while I was sewing and performing my other role of children's taxi driver, teacher, confidence booster, reminder er, bed maker, cook, washerwoman, and nurse. Wet beds, a trip twice to Nelson for a teen's broken finger, Skatey for two dental visits with the burden of paying for braces, bigger shoes and teaching to tie laces, reminding to go to math tutorials and to take instruments to school, covering up a guinea pig at midnight in the rain, figuring out if hay fever warrants a visit to the Dr, treating the dog for fleas, cleaning the chookhouse and organising someone to clean the chimney.

Autumn arrived, while I was busy. It hasn't been my best year for gardening, the weekend breather has revealed fresh weeds after rain and the summer crops setting seeds. A storm skirted by us, but we got enough wind to blow the corn down and cause us to look for some extra warm blankets and clothes.

Thankfully I might save some grocery money for (skateys) braces from the peaches, grapes, apples, berries, tomatoes, cucumbers, herbs and eggs from the garden.

Meanwhile we're going to grab every last whiff of summer that we can. When did summers start to pass so quickly?

Kids clothes

"Sewing clothes kids love" is a book having a good influence on me at the moment. My colour combos and trims and not as daring as those in the book, though the patterns are truly delightful weather embellished or plain. The Capable of flying blog is written by the book's author and has some great links to other peoples creations from the book.
It has given me the confidence to try some great colour and pattern combos, with great results. Also influencing me has been Carefree clothes for girls, as yet I haven't made up any of the patterns provided, but the use of recycled hand stitched linen and crochet is adorable and inspiring, the colour palette using lots of linen and natural colours is a complete contrast to the other book I mentioned.
So the two youngest kids now have some good autumn additions to their wardrobes for school and Montessori.

I think I'm all sewed out for now, my temperamental over locker and I are calling it quits for a bit while we are still on good terms with each other, but what a productive week. Quite proud too that out of all of those fabrics only three pieces were bought new all the others have been sourced at the local op shops or as gifts from sewers downsizing their stash.

For a total change of scene and pace this weekend we'll be hanging out at Taste Tasman.
It looks as if it will be a great event.

Our house

I loved Melissa's question "Do you have an imaginary house somewhere?"

I do.

There is even a picture of it on our fridge.

Next to the gold cards that Skatey is very proud of.

We even have a story about our imaginary house. It is a ramshackle old villa within walking distance of the sea. There's fretwork around the veranda with saplings growing up through the decking and creepers winding up around the pillars. Some sweet jasmine sneaks it's way into the kitchen where baskets of herbs and vegetables are stacked waiting for preservation. Lemon verbena, thyme, Echinacea, and walnuts drying, a cat is watching a mouse. Herbal tinctures and dried herbs in dark glass jars line the shelves alongside picked onions and brandied cherries. An ancient coal range bakes bread, heats water and in winter we warm our feet in it's oven while coffee peculates on top. The attic has spiders, creaky floorboards and sunlight streaming in, a family quilt covers the bed. There are secret passages and a dark and creepy staircase. Outside the grounds are full of native birdsong because the cats and dog are too old to chase. There are beehives and a goat out back near a stream with a water wheel. Silly old sheep come when you call them and possums eat my roses and apples. Wildflowers do their own gardening as the sound of the waves crash and whales are sighted in the distance.

For Skatey there's a shed where he's restoring an old car, for teen there's Internet connection, for Pj Granny lives there too and for the red head there are monarch butterflies and books.

Do you have an imaginary house somewhere?

Berry buckle

I'd always rather be crafting than cooking. Had you picked that up already?

Tonight for dinner was rooster soup. None of the big kids complained at all , they know better. The red head is difficult at dinner time. I called them to the table with a wink to the big kids,
"noodle delicious" for tea tonight. They all played along, if you give it a jazzy name the red head just might eat it.
Half way through the bribes start. "better eat your noodle delicious if you want some pudding"

Pudding:
I only make it sporadically, the black berries inspired me tonight.
"Berry Buckle" from Alison Holst's Dollars and Sense cookbook.
My copy has seen better days, I almost burnt the house down awhile back when I set it down on a hot element and went outside to collect beans.

The butter, egg, flour, Cinnamon base with fresh blackberries, plus one extra with frozen red currants to have cold for the school lunches tomorrow.
Now here's why I don't bake much. Chopping butter into the topping till it looks like breadcrumbs!

Bah, I'd really rather be finishing my sewing.

Add whipped cream and it's all worth it. YUM

Welcome Autumn 2010

I LOVE AUTUMN.

All my favorite fruit and vege are ready for harvest and it's not too hot to get things done. "Skatey" told me this weekend is the last of summer, though for me it's felt like autumn for a few weeks already.

When I go out to feed the chooks in the morning I get covered in dew from the lemon verbena plant, also I'm not so keen to go to the school pool for an evening swim these days, firewood needs to be collected and stacked and bottling on the stove starts in earnest. Scoffing blackberries also signals autumn, as does the influx of seasonal workers to our town to pick apples, pears and kiwifruit.

However my shin is bruised from kicking myself!

I haven't planted enough pumpkins and am already craving pumpkin soup. The soup pot is not idle thank goodness, tonight it brews young rooster soup with corn, shallots, celery and carrots from the garden. There are already several containers of tomato soup in the freezer, as well as a good batch of tomato sauce in bottles. I added about a pound of redcurrants that were still hanging on the bushes, they were lovely and ripe, I just had to wait for the earwigs to run away before I put them in the pot . I'll need to pick more tomatoes this weekend before the stink bugs suck them to death .

My garden is about neck high in weeds, mainly fat hen and pas pallum grass, I'm surprisingly not bothered. I can find fresh food and herbs every night even if they are hiding. I've noted where the Elecampane and Echinecea are so I can harvest their roots for winter ailments. I probably should be venturing into beer making as well with the hop plant trying to take over the neighbourhood!

We're eating the Nashi today after noticing the neighbours chooks have started eating them through the fence. Willow the Jack Russell is getting the hang of chasing them off which I don't mind, though she's been a bit naughty lately going to the school to look for "skatey" almost every day, she knows he's not there I'm sure. How do you explain to a Jack Russel that he's OK he's just at High School now. I'm sure the teachers are getting fed up at sending PJ home with Willow. She's never been tied up in her life, so I don't know what to do?

Lastly my favorite plant stall has closed down for the season so I may have missed my flip on a whole lot of winter vege plants. I'm hoping that amongst the weeds that are seeding all over the garden that there's a few parsnip, kale, celery, coriander, leek and lettuce to tide us over. I do have some yams , leek, potatoes and broad beans to look forward to, as well as three trees of black boy peaches dripping with fruit...

Black boy fruit chutney, jam, dried- anyone?

Suede, Brain

The teen is getting quite good at juggling, but I'm sick of hearing the four of them fight over the juggling set so I made a trio out of suede. I sort of traced the pattern from a tennis ball, that turned out too big so the red head scored the first one. I made it smaller, tracing round the bottom of a glass. Very fiddly to sew but stuffed with sushi rice they are "spot on " according to the teen.
It's nice to see him juggling while he waits for the dial up to load. Good for his brain I'm sure.

Speaking of good for brains,
You'll recognise me in the supermarket because my kids, especially the red head will be saying "mum coke's not good for your brain eh? Are rice crackers good for your brain?
I probably refer to what I think is good for their brain a little too often, do you think?

Head cold

Lemon, honey, ginger, garlic and thyme tea. Plus two good books and a comfy chair, because I feel like I'm allergic to myself.

Surrounded by a family embrace

Well they say something about how you can't choose your family. I'm glad you can't because I couldn't have picked better myself.

I've got two little brothers. Apparently I was a terrible older sister when I was small, if you believe the stories the "Fabulous Aunt's" tell. I can't remember having tantrums like Pj does, or being separated from my young cousins for their own safety! I do remember chasing them with Wetas and telling stories of ghosts in my Grandma's house and of course how we told the youngest brother that the ugly painting in the hallway was "the big Eughh" and could scare the living daylights out of him at the mere mention of the fictional monster. Dad use to warn me though when I was scratching and pulling at the boys hair to be careful that one day they'd grow up bigger than me. He's not wrong, my two little brothers stand now at 6ft2in and 6ft4in. Lucky for me they both grew up to love their big (short) sister.

My littlest brother is visiting from Adelaide with his wife and two adorable little boys. It's brilliant having two extra adults around who care for my kids almost as much as I do. The big boys have adored having their Uncle, who's a big kid at heart, to play sport and swim with, while I appreciate a sister in law or Auntie to my kids who's much cooler than me but tells one of them not to moan "just get off your butt and get a job if you want something"

I watch their two wee boys for glimpses of my little brother and admire how gentile, sweet and full of mischief they are.

The extended family came for a shared meal to celebrate their arrival. It's just magic how three generations of brothers, sisters, daughters, sons, Mums, Dads, cousins, friends and a few second cousins once removed, create a joy full energy when gathered together. Shared food from many gardeners, meat grown ethically by family, fish from the neighbour, blackberries discovered around our garden with a promise of potting up some cuttings, tall tales and reminiscences all create a picture of "family" in early Autumn here tonight.

From my garden:

I harvested Maori potatoes for my contribution, making a completely sustainable, organic potato salad. The end result tasted better than it photographed.

Cheeky muffin

Someone has recently hit me over the head with the "happy homemaker stick". This is quite possibly the culprit: Doesn't eat his dinner but slyly whips off with the biggest muffin before the others even know they're out of the oven.
I'm actually not often this domesticated, but was inspired by a large harvest of poppy seeds when I went out to finally tackle the garden yesterday. I made 3 dozen muffins with lemon and poppy seeds to go in the freezer for school lunches. Perhaps being in the kitchen was a good way to avoid the garden where there is so much work to do I don't know where to start.

Got the gherkins bottled and made sauce as well.

Picked an armload of cucumbers, I'm struggling to know what to do with them all. There are still "bread and butter pickles" in the cupboard from last season. Anyone who visits has been sent home with them, the pet rat likes them. I think maybe I'll slice some up and rest my eyes awhile.

Anyone else have any good cosmetic recipes for them?

Family creativity

I know I didn't knit this enthusiastically when I was 8 years old. PJ caught the knitting bug in the last week of the school holidays and worked for three days to create a jersey for Willow and blankets for her favorite soft toys. I kind of bungled away nearby trying to set a good example and to be on hand to help while trying myself to perfect my Continental style knitting.

It was OK on these simple singlets:

I found the pattern for these after advice from Melissa who pointed me in the direction of Soule Mama whose archives I searched until I found this from The thrifty knitter , perfect for a newborn and a new knitter.

This:

was a little more difficult, I've been doing it on and off for about three weeks. I found myself switching back to the English style knitting that I learned around 8 years old myself, because the weight on the left hand needle made it harder to get into the swing of Continental style. Knitting two stitches together for the pattern slowed me down to a pain full beginners pace, though it did make me appreciate PJ's efforts alot more, but not enough to ignore my impatient streak. Back to English style to get it finished, both she and I are really pleased with the result. She helped me sort through some light weight fabrics to choose the blue floral which tones in beautifully with the cotton knit. I got the pattern from a book which I have since returned to the library, I think it was this one. I've put it on my wish list now because it's full of similar delights.

The paua shells I used as props with the singlets are from skatey's trip over the bay, his creative streak lead him to borrowing a grinder from the neighbour to grind off the grey shell to reveal the beautiful colours beneath. Then he varnished it to make the colour "pop". He gave me some to have in my bedroom. I treasure them as an expression of his creativity.

Faries Dance Here

A nice thing about the holidays has been that PJ hasn't had the influence of other girls telling her how she should be. I've finished a couple of dresses for her that have been half done for several months. She's been through her dress up box and added her Granny's apron over the top of them, then quietly acted out the stories she has made up, including her little brother when he is in a co-operative mood. It's a little sad that this week she will go back to school and start stressing about the outfit to put together so she doesn't get called a baby. Sad too that those other little 8 year old girls want to wear short shorts and tops instead of the lovely dresses I'm sure they'd all prefer. We're working on confidence so Pj can be a leader instead of a follower.

Oh I wish I had a WOOFER

I know, I'm repeating myself. It's just that time of year where a pair of extra hands would be helpful. I've picked a lot of huge tomatoes which need to be made into sauce. I'm not sure how many more I will get as I think the plants have blight. The symptoms are browning leaves and fruit browning before it goes ripe. A Woofer could pull out the affected plants and burn them, plant some seeds for winter crops, turn compost, summer prune fruit trees, pick gherkins and bottle them, dig the rest of the garlic and clean it up, pull the shallots and string them up, pick the last of the currants and preserve them, clean the chookhouse, weed and water, then mow the lawn. They'd deserve a good dinner and a swim after that.
You'd think two teenage boys would be pretty useful around the house wouldn't you? I haven't got the knack of how to get them motivated to help. Skatey has gone off adventuring again anyway, over to Anatori to collect Paua from the sea over there. One last adventure before school starts. Can't believe I'll have two at High School, I'm really hoping Skatey will find a lot to inspire him there. The teen is looking forward to going back now that we've sorted out his timetable clashes and bought the new uniform and supplies for school. He's doing English, Math, Physics, Computer Studies, P.E and Outdoor Education so I reckon he's in for an awesome year.

Tracks

Last week I packed up all the children for a journey over the nearby Takaka hill. It is not a trip I have done often despite living in this area for much of my life. Stopping me has been fear. It's not a particularly treacherous drive but I do hold onto a quite irrational fear of edges of hills from childhood.

Our destination was through winding roads to beautiful beaches beyond, in the Golden Bay. Summer camping spots full to the brim with tents don't hold much appeal to me though the beaches, wildlife, galleries and roadside stalls will now I'm sure tempt me back again. We past Pohara, Tata and Wainui at which point I wondered why I'd waited so long to go back to the area. We thought of their Dad and how much he loves adventure, a contrast to my homebodyness, as I willed myself through the fear to set a good example to my children.

We arrived at Totarnui and spent awhile on the beach watching the waterskiiers at full tide. A girl fell off and was knocked out. It was comforting to watch the rescue helicopter arrive what seemed like about 20minutes later. Skatey found a bike park where he attracted a crowd of adoring 8- 10 year old boys to watch his unicycle stunts.

The event that bought us to the bay started at 1pm. We were there to farewell the teen on his rite of passage to manhood. We didn't know what to expect really, though the course had come highly recommended. As his mother I can't explain the experience but from my perspective it was a very powerful and spiritual journey. Boys leave their mothers for the rite of passage with their fathers or mentors, other returning "trackers" and a group of Elders, for their week long rites. As a mother you say goodbye to the boy in a ceremony and welcome back a young man as we did yesterday. It seems all involved including the fathers gained so much spiritually from the experience that I would recommend it to families with teenage boys. Our extended family and even one of the teen's teachers was there to welcome him back as a young man. The love and support was almost overwhelming. We were also very touched to see the impression it had made on the other young men involved.

For me personally it was a joy to see respectful, spiritual, kind, caring, strong men are for real.

I applaud Tracks Trust for the experience they gave our family.

Using Rotten eggs

So it goes along with hatching eggs that a few may not hatch for one reason or another. The kids now view these as quite a treat, we collect them ever so carefully so as not to crack them and get covered in the stench of rotten egg, and go for an evening stroll down to a small stream nearby.

We had a "real" farm kid staying with us this week and he certainly showed us what separates the farm kids from the townies.

You can just see the farm kid in the stream, while a former farmers daughter sits on the bank wishing she still jumped in streams, climbed trees and chased other kids with weta's and hu hu grubs.

We waited and watched for eels coming upstream attracted by the smell of the eggs, while he just waded on in bare toes only covered by orange "crocks" and broke the couple of eggs that hadn't exploded when they hit the water. Though instead of high -tailing it out of the water quickly, he stayed in to look for koura or fresh water crayfish. It was nice to see that our stream is so healthy with wildlife, he found 5 in a matter of minutes. He also informed me their Maori name was "koura" as in "Kaikoura" on the South Island East coast, renowned for it's lovely sea crayfish and whale watching. We spied about 3 eels (in Maori tuna )make their way upstream to our eggs, but they weren't as big as the ones we saw last summer. We also discussed the New Zealand place names we know which include the words Kai (food) Koura (crayfish) and tuna (eel) and came up with quite a few from the areas we had lived and visited. These give a good clue to the history of an area. We deciphered another Maori place name we know. The road where we live translates to: dog oven!! So we speculated that probably this area may have been known in olden times for eating dog. For the boys especially our evening excursion in cooperated some great lessons that they just wouldn't get if traditionally stuck in a classroom to learn local history and ecology. Parents, never underestimate the value of family life and what kids can learn by"living"

We all came home glad to have taken the time to do it.

"Stuck to the computer boy" formally know as the "teen" sadly didn't join us.

Though at least I could also refer to him as "passed NCEA, stuck to the computer boy". Exam results came through yesterday.

Or to be specific, I should describe as: "often grouchy with mother, doesn't want to work, obsessed with a nice girl, talks to her online, thankfully passed NCEA, stuck to the computer, teen, lovely,boy"

hatching

Late Dec saw the majority of my chooks sitting on eggs or clucky. The three old ladies shared two eggs between them and by chance I noticed the hatching happening on Christmas eve. It's pretty mean but I whisked the 2 hatching eggs off the old girls and put them under the clucky bantam to hatch. She had six due also to hatch that day. I did this because I've let the big White Leghorns and Light Sussex hatch eggs before and found that their mothering instinct is nowhere near as strong as the bantams. They've stepped on the babies, left them out in the cold and while their backs were turned lost them to hawks and cats. By contrast the bantams puff up and attack when you come within a few feet of them. They are so hilarious to watch, the way they fuss about showing the chick some tid bit they've found. Clucking, scratching and flinging things everywhere with their feet as they call them over. Remember too if you are raising chicken to give them fresh water every day in a shallow bowl so they don't drown in it. Also while we do love hedgehogs in out garden we have to keep the chickens caged at night as my neighbour reported a hedgehog attacking her chickens again last week.So now the nests are empty and the egg production has stepped up a bit bacon and egg pie, scrambled eggs and Pavlova with fresh berries are back on the menu.

This week in the garden I have harvested: a cauliflower, about a bucket full of spuds, 1 cucumber, 5 tomatoes, 5 gigantic marrow fed to the chooks, 2lb of raspberries turned into 4 jars of jam, an ice cream container of red currents popped into the freezer, a feed of beans, poppy seeds, lemon verbena leaves for tea, St Johns wort for oil and too many garlic bulbs to count. Alot of them have some kind of fungal disease resulting in a sort of grey smelly bulb beginning to rot, they must be burnt quickly or I think the disease could spread to the rest of the garden. Their beds will have to be rotated for about 3 years, which makes finding enough space for next winter's crop quite difficult. I think it has happened because we've had a wet spring/ summer here and my garlic beds were well mulched to keep them moist for more typical dry summer weather.
Planted: spring onions
Planning: to plant more corn and leeks. Prepare beds for autumn/winter crops.
Enjoying: Watching the cat sitting under the fejoia tree for hours staring up into the tree which is flowering and wishing she was quick enough to catch herself a wax eye (bird) which is helping to pollinate the flowers.