Benny and the pets

We have goats, pet goats.  They are such funny creatures and very smart.

Technically only one of them is ours.  This is Benny, he is the boss.  The other goats and pet sheep that are in the paddock with him are his harem.  Even though he Lords it over them, he misses them dreadfully when they go off to shearing.

He looks a bit ratty in this photo as it was coming into warmer weather and he was losing his Winter coat.  

We got him as a 3 day old and hand-reared him.  We got another goat "Joon" at the same time, but she ate something poisonous when she was 2 weeks old and died.

Tessy and Joon

Our cat Tessy has always helped to look after the orphan lambs and goats.  She loved to play with them until they got too big for her.

This is Nellie.  We adopted Nellie from a neighbour.  Nellie was a naughty goat who lived in town, she thought she was a dog and used to jump the fences to play with the town dogs.  Goats are very nimble and agile and it is hard to keep them contained. 

With all the trouble she was getting into our neighbours asked if we could look after Nellie. 

Nellie is now a good goat and idolises Benny.

Below is Krysta (Isabel named her after the fairy in "Ferngully").

Krysta was also given to us by a neighbour.  She used to eat through her rope and jump the neighbours fence to eat the fruit trees.

Krysta is still a naughty goat, she tries to boss the other pets and she still escapes the paddock to eat the spilled grain under the silos.

Our little lambs are not so little anymore.  They occasionally come up for a scratch and a pat, but mostly they ignore us and keep on eating.

We are debating on how many of them to keep. If you ask our daughter it's all of them, but we have to be practical and think of how much feed is in the paddock and how many mouths are feeding on it.  Their fate will be decided next year at market time.

Enjoy life

Ann
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Using leftovers to make Bubble 'n' squeak

What do you do with leftover food?

When I make the evening meal I always make up a spare plate to put in the fridge or freezer so that there is always something available for my husband to reheat if I am away shopping.  I drive an hour one way to get to the nearest town with a supermarket, so a grocery shopping trip takes a minimum of 3 hours. While I am there I take the opportunity to schedule as many appointments as possible to save on unscheduled trips.

Sometimes when I make the spare meal I misjudge the amount of vegetables needed and end up with a bowl of leftover vegies.

I was home alone at lunch time with this bowl of vegies and I thought what could I do with them.  Then I remembered that my Mum used to cook "Bubble 'n' Squeak" for us as kids.  So I put the leftover mashed potato, vegies and some parmesan cheese in a bowl, mashed them together and made fritters.  I fried them in a little bit of oil and I honestly wasn't going to eat them all, but they were so delicious and full of memories that before I knew it there were none left for anybody else.

Do you have any family favourite recipes that are full of memories too?

Enjoy life, it's the only one we will ever get.

Ann

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What a farmer does at harvest time.

Harvest 2017 is well and truly under way.  

The Barley and vetch are off the paddock and in the silo, and we are starting on the wheat with one paddock stripped.

Aside from driving the header (the machinery that harvests the crop) my husband also carts the grain to our on farm silo's in the old truck, climbs up and down the 30 foot silos, opening and closing lids and making sure they don't overflow with grain, shovelling up the spilt grain when it overflows, fixing any machinery that breaks down, negotiating grain prices with buyers and co-ordinating freight of the grain sold.

But what do I do during harvest? 

Apart from my everyday chores I also shepherd the machinery when we shift paddocks, I am on call to help drive my husband from one piece of machinery to another (to save him a long walk through the paddock), I pick up parts when we have a breakdown and I keep the house and farm running.

I also deliver meals to my husband on the header.  During harvest we don't see him as much, he starts work at 8am and doesn't return home until after our daughters bedtime.  So at harvest we take our meals to the header and have a picnic with Daddy while he works.

Today we are hoping for not as much rain as the bureau have predicted (20-40mm predicted with thunderstorms). We would love the rain, but not right now.  We are busily trying to empty the in paddock storage and filling and closing silo's. 

Wishing everyone a safe and bountiful harvest

Ann
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Willy Wagtail

Each Spring the bird life get very busy, finding mates and building nests.  We get great delight when we discover their nest and we can then monitor, from a distance, the development of the eggs through to chicks.

The Willy Wagtail always builds it's nest close to our house. This year they built it right next to Tessy my cat's cage! The white plank in the background of the photo on the left is part of the cat run.

We lock Tessy up each evening, to protect her from foxes but mostly to protect the bird life from her. But why would the Willy Wagtail tempt fate by building it's nest next to her cage?

We rigged up this cardboard barrier to hopefully deter Tessy (and the dog) from stealing the two perfect little eggs in the nest. 

Thankfully it didn't disturb the Willy Wagtail who was happy to return to her nest.

I will keep you posted on the expectant mother and her babies.

Enjoy

Ann
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Walking the dog

I am trying to get fit, again!  This time I am starting out small, making little changes until they become a habit and then moving onto the next small change.

I have started walking each morning, after I have taken my daughter to the bus stop.  For now I am walking about 2km, through the crop. But as my husband is about to harvest that paddock I will have to rethink my route.  When that change occurs I will increase my distance.

This is Skipper (my daughter's dog).  She is my walking buddy and she loves to go on "walkies".  This is her expectant face, "come on Mum, hurry up and get your shoes on".

As we are walking down the track through the crop she often disappears hunting.  When I whistle she comes bounding back, leaping high over the crop so she can see where I am. She always makes me giggle when she does this.

The mornings are a beautiful time to go walking.  It's not too hot, the bird life are out and about and the flies are not out yet.

When do you go walking? Where do you go walking? Do you listen to music or to nature?

My next small goal is to increase my water intake.  I am not drinking my 2lt a day and if I'm not it is very hard to encourage my daughter to drink enough water.

I am me

Ann
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My Spring Garden

I love Spring time.

I love the weather at this time of year. It's not too hot and the cold is slowly disappearing.  Although this year has been a bit cooler than normal, I can't wait for the weather to warm up.

I love the garden in Spring, all the flowers that bloom are inviting me to get outdoors and enjoy the scent and beauty of them.

Banksia Rose (Rosa Banksiae)

This is the very stunning Banksia rose, it has bloomed spectacularly this year and thrives on being ignored, only requiring an occasional light pruning.  I am training it to grow over my path so it will form an archway.

 

 

 

 
 Just some of the beautiful blooms in my garden.

The vegie garden is also thriving at this time of year after a bit of neglect over Winter, but I'll leave that for another post.

Things are beginning to get hectic here with harvest almost upon us.  Here's hoping for a bountiful harvest and enough rain next year.


Enjoy

Ann
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My sewing room

I do a lot of crafting.

Well I try to do a lot of crafting. I have a lot of UFO's (unfinished projects).  I usually have a couple of projects on the go, be they, scrapbooking, quilting, sewing or crocheting.

I outgrew the spare bedroom, and besides we needed it for guests, so we bought a retired shipping container and my husband converted it to a sewing room.  The shelves were bought from a second hand office furniture shop, all the tables were donated or upcycled from pieces around the farm, the door was our front door (until we got a new one), the screen door was my Dad's and my husband built the ramp and concrete drums it sits on.  The only new things were the windows and the reverse-cycle air-conditioner.

I love going out and spending time in my shed, unfortunately that doesn't happen as often as I would like (housework seems to impede on my "me time").

Even when I do get out there my "me time" isn't just me.  My daughter loves to come out and play and create with me, which I don't mind as much now that she's older as she knows where everything is and can usually fend for herself with limited interruptions to my time.

The other interruption to my "me time" is my cat Tess.  She is a 13yo tortoiseshell.  She loves to be wherever I am and she loves to be as close to me as she can get.  Her favourite position is up on my shoulders, which is not so good for me.  Her other preferred position is to sit on whatever I am sewing or crafting.  She has a perfectly comfortable basket to sleep in on the sewing table, but no, she has to be close to me.












Enjoy

Ann
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Quandong Jam

Living in the Victorian Mallee we are surrounded by native plants, trees and flowers.  One of these is the Quandong (Santalum acuminatum) or native peach.  This parasitic tree belongs in the same family as the Sandalwood.

In early Spring the Quandong produces a small bright red fruit, it has a bitter taste but the fruit is delicious when made into jam.

Quandong Jam

2 cups of Quandongs de-seeded and roughly chopped 

2 cups castor sugar
2 cups water
1 tsp balsamic vinegar

Boil together stirring continuously.  Pour into sterilised jars, seal and label.


















Looking forward to enjoying this on my toast in the morning.










When you have finished preparing the fruit, you are left with these wonderful seeds.  My Mother-in-law had collected hundreds of them which I have in a jar in my craft room.

So far I have used them as game pieces in a Chinese Checkers game and as beads in a necklace.  I am still looking for more uses for them, so any ideas will be gratefully accepted.


Enjoy

Ann
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Mallee Wildflowers

Early Spring is a beautiful time in the Mallee.

The weather is changing to cool mornings and wonderful sunny afternoons, which are perfect for walking through the scrub to look at the wildflowers that are in bloom.  The snakes are not quite on the move, and if they are, they are still a bit sluggish from Winter (hopefully).

We picked a fine day and didn't have to walk very far up our drive to see these wildflowers:

Minuria Leptophylla - Variable minnie daisy

Olearia Pimeleoides - Showy daisy bush

The flowers below where all found around my garden, I love the natives in my garden, they bring the bees and the birds.  I get a lot of pleasure sitting on the veranda on a sunny day watching the birds feeding on the nectar.

Eremophila maculata -  emu bush

Eremophila maculata - emu bush

Grevillea

Grevillea

Acacia

We picked another nice day to go for a drive down the track to explore and discover the local flora.

Clematis microphylla - Old man's beard

Cassia nemophila - Wild boronia or desert cassia

Grevillea huegelii - Comb spider-flower

Acacia

Acacia colletioides - Wait-a-while

Eucalyptus gracilis - White mallee

Zygophyllum apiculatum

Zygophyllum glaucum 

I am no expert on identifying flowers, I have a whole garden of unidentified flowers. So if you recognise a mistake in my identification please let me know.  

For my reference I used the following books:

The Mallee in flower by I R McCann

An introduction to The Wildflowers of "The Millewa" by Margaret Kelly

They have become my bibles on my travels through our scrub and roads.

Enjoy

Ann

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