Gearing up for November

Things could be fairly quite around here for the next month, as most of my writing energy goes towards making my 50,000 word goal as part of NaNoWriMo.



I've made this goal for the last two years, but at that time I wasn't trying to garden or make all these things at the same time. But I will give it a go again regardless.

DH and I have also set ourselves a challenge for this month, we're not going to buy anything other than food and medications for the month. Any money saved will go towards our credit card debt (which was run up with building expenses).

This is more than just a money saving challenge though. Over the last 18 or so months, since we first packed up our unit ready to move, we've lived out of boxes, many of which are still not unpacked, meaning much of the stuff we have either DD has grown out of, or we just plain don't need. We are all feeling a little overwhelmed by the sheer volume of STUFF in our house (not to mention still in the garage!), and until it is under control, we don't want to bring anything more into the house. So this isn't just about money and spending, it's about not bringing anything new into the house full stop. Not from any source.

And as if that wasn't enough for one month, we're going to try to get rid of existing clutter. I'm hoping we can get at least 100 items OUT OF THE HOUSE (or shed). That's a little over 3 items a day. Think we can do it? I reckon we can.

So expect a lot of posts about how we've resisted bringing new things into the house (and hopefully found some creative and innovative solutions to anything that we are lacking), and updates on how many items we've gotten rid of. And, of course, some updates on my word count.

Sewing Day

After spending a few hours last night surfing blogs and following link after link to cool tutorials, I decided to try some of them out today. These are door stops, made from this tutorial. Very simple and easy, and very practical. Since DH put some grease on the toilet door, it mysteriously closes itself whenever you aren't looking. Not a problem, except when you're trying to help a 4yo in there, and one of your bumps yourself on a door in the wrong place. So the blue one is in the toilet, and the white stripy one is in the laundry, who's door often blows closed with an annoyingly loud bang (usually when I'm out hanging up the washing, and trying to her DD yelling something inside.)

Since DD was so taken with the rice filled pyramid door stops, and was determined to carry them around, negating their usefulness in preventing doors blowing closed, I made her these bean-bags to throw instead, based on this tutorial (which I had read, but not planned on making, so going on memory). She was successfully diverted, and the door-stops have remained (mostly) in place.

And this was my final project, finished only because I hate to leave things undone. It's a floor mat, and a woeful attempt at the quilt in this tutorial. Unfortunately, I don't have a roller cutter, making it kind of hard to get the squares, well, square. I also made the strips between the pieces a little too thick (those white ones), and it was only saved from awfulness by the pretty blue border. Luckily, aside from the border, it was all made with leftover scraps and recycled materials, so I don't feel too badly about it. It's a learning experience, and I'm sure when it's on the floor and we're wiping our feet on it, we won't notice all the many imperfections. (Well, anyone but me probably won't anyway.

Potato Cages

I haven't done much of a garden update lately simply because I haven't gotten around to taking any photos. But I have been working to my plan, and things are slowly starting to come together. The potato cages, shown on the left hand side of the house, are in.

I've managed to fit 4 sugar cane bale cages in and the two I originally planted with 9 potatoes each are powering along. I've just covered them with the second lot of mulch, they're growing so quickly. I planted 9 more potatoes in the next cage and will plant the final one in another few weeks time. We're still going on the last of the potatoes harvested from my first patch. Once this lot is gone, there is another patch to harvest. I'm not sure if those will be enough to carry us through to this lot maturing, but we'll have to wait and see.

And not really garden related (though it is a flower!) DD and I made this for her baby cousin, after her fascination with DD's dinosaur.

Lemon Butter

I had my second go at making lemon butter today, and luckily it turned out much better than my first go. Not that I didn't eat and enjoy all of that first attempt, but this time, when I tasted a little of the spills, I was transported instantly back to eating my grandmother's lemon butter as a child. This is how lemon butter is supposed to taste!

I made up double the recipe this time, since I have plenty of eggs to use up. The chooks are laying 4-5 eggs a day now, and even though we are selling extras to friends and family (for $2 a dozen, to cover chook food), we still have more than we can eat. Double the recipe calls for a dozen eggs, so without your own chickens, this could be quite a costly recipe (although still probably cheaper than buying it at the store). And I think that the eggs from our free range chooks is what really made this special. Look at the colour of it! Most lemon butter you see these days is a kind of washed out yellow, not bright and vibrant like this. That is the actual colour of the lemon butter, no added colours, and no photoshopping the picture (well, not to alter the colour anyway).

By my calculations, this recipe probably ends up at about $1 a jar. All up, the eggs were free, the butter - 225g, about $1, the sugar - just under a 1kg, $1 (I buy it in bulk), and the lemons were $2 a kg, I used 5, not exactly sure what they weighed, but lets say 1kg, so $2. $5 for the 5 jars. I have no idea what lemon butter sells for in the shops, but I'm guessing that it's at least $2 a bottle, saving me 50%.

It's now sitting in the fridge with the remainder of my last strawberry jam. Hopefully, it should last me six months or so before I need to make more.

Ditching the Plastic

Plastic bags that is. We've actually been plastic bag free (mostly) for a while now, but I've only just gotten around to taking some pictures of these. While we used green bags for our groceries for quite a while, it took a little longer to ditch the plastic fruit bags. When we started going to the markets regularly, it seemed somehow even more silly to be still putting our fruit in plastic bags, so I made up these vegie bags from some old curtain material. They're just simple drawstring bags, really easy to make, although it did take me until yesterday to get around to putting the drawstring in. They worked just fine without it though.

The trick to making these is to use as lightweight materials (material and drawstrings) as possible, so that they aren't adding weight to your fruit and veg prices. Also, make sure you use something see-through so that the cashiers can work out what you're buying. Finally, I used french seams to make sure that they weren't going to break at an inopportune moment. Several months of use, and they're still going strong. When we get home from the markets, I empty the fruit into the cupboard/fridge, and chuck them in the wash so that they're ready for next week.

Here they are full of fruit, they're about the size of an A4 page, which seems to be a pretty good size, although we usually buy two bags full of bananas! Since my green bags are nearing the end of their days, and actually aren't that green being made from what is basically plastic, I'm working on making some replacement cloth bags for general grocery shopping. This is my prototype, made form an old sheet (which is poly-cotton, so not great for clothes). It works great, but still needs a bit more fiddling with the shape and placement of the handles. I much prefer it over the green bags, although I think it could benefit from being a bit stiffer in places.

Rooster Free

Well, Jumpy the rooster finally went to a new home today. We took him over to the father of the breeder we bought the eggs off. He said he has 4 or 5 roosters that people have given him (and we think one of them is Roley), and he does his best to find new homes for them. Often, if people are buying some chooks, he will give them a rooster for free. He seemed to genuinely love chooks, and we are sure he will take good care of Jumpy, and find him a new home if he can.

Here though, it is a big relief that he is gone. He has been getting increasingly more aggressive, especially towards DD. Every time the chooks hear the front door open, they come running, hoping we have food. Jumpy though, will try to run at DD whenever he sees her, making taking her outside (except into the front yard, which is fenced separately) is difficult. Initially I could manage by taking a large stick to keep Jumpy away with, but lately he has taken to attacking the stick when I was trying to push him back, so even that was difficult.

Now that he has been re-homed, we can get back to enjoying our backyard and our chooks without worrying about being chased whenever we walk outside. Perhaps one day we'll try getting another rooster, but for now, were happy with just our chickens. Although I do have ideas about some ducks as soon as I can work out a way to have a pond for them...

Personalised Softie

Softies, as they seem to be called, are all the rage, seems like I see pictures of them everywhere. I've never been a big fan myself, being more of a realism person, but DD saw a stuffed striped giraffe at an organic store I visited with my sister yesterday, and really wanted it. Thankfully she was placated with promises of making one. So make one we did, only ours, of course, is a dinosaur. Not just any dinosaur either, but a Tyrannosaurus Rex.

DD was thrilled to join in with drawing up a 'pattern' for us to use. I told her she had to draw it big, or she wouldn't get a big dinosaur, and she obliged.

DD chose out her material, and I cut out some rough pieces for the body, arms, legs, tail and head. And an extra plain piece for the face. Since DD drew single lines for the arms, legs and tail, I had to make them a bit wider, and occasionally change the length a bit. Overall, their placement is the most important bit to keep the childlike composition of the finished softie I think. I also had to be careful to make them thick enough to sew, turn and stuff. The tail ended up being too narrow, and I had to cut out a second one.

Then I had DD draw the face on the pink material in pen (pencil would have been better, but I couldn't find one), and I embroidered it in 3 strands of embroidery cotton, then slip stitched it to the head piece, turning the edges under as I went.. I made the eyes slightly bigger, but otherwise followed the lines she had drawn. Which was quite a challenge, let me tell you. I'm a bit of a perfectionist, and spend way too much time trying to get faces to look just right. Of course, I think this one worked out just perfect, without any adjusting from me.

Then I put all the extremities right sides together, and overlocked around the edges. I had to round off the bit where the neck joins the head a little to get around it with the overlocker, but I wanted the pieces to be strong, and not start coming apart in a few weeks.

Then we turned them right side out (with the help of the end of the scissors), and stuffed them. DD enjoyed helping with the stuffing, although she did make them a little on the soft side, so I had to add a little bit to the ones she did. I left the ends a bit floppy because they're going to be sewn to the body.

I positioned the arms,legs, tail and head on the body again, using the picture to get the locations right.

Then turned them all to the inside and pinned.

Then decided to overlock them in place before trying to sew the body pieces together.

I also overlocked the other piece, then joined them on the sewing machine, leaving a nice big gap to turn it right side out.

Then we stuffed the body, slip-stitched the opening closed, and DD gave him his first cuddle. She's been carrying him around all day (by the neck!) and has now taken him to bed with her. I think it really means something to her that this is HER representation of a dinosaur, not someone else's, and that she helped design and make him.

Now, of course, she wants to make all the other types of dinosaurs...

Consumerism

I don't think I've mentioned it on here before, but we don't have TV. I mean, we have a TV, but we don't have the commercial stations, or the pay ones. We watch DVD's, but that's it. We also don't buy newspapers, most magazines, or other news/advertising media. I personally feel that the media over dramatizes things, and that watching/reading the news/current affairs really isn't good for us. And before you point out that it's important to know what's going on in the world, I do. I hear about the important events online via forums or newsgroups, or someone usually tells us if they think it's something relevant/of interest to us. We certainly don't live in ignorance, but we do severely restrict the media's influence in our house.

So it was quite an eye opener staying with my parents for a week, where my dad watches every single news channel, and many evening TV shows. In my media-deficient world, I thought that people were getting the message about peak oil, global warming, and the need to start caring for our world, but you see very little of it on TV. A few ads about greenhouse gasses, a few companies trying to sell their product as 'green' (when in reality it is anything but), but mostly, ad after ad trying to convince you that you need some new product, that your life won't be complete without it, or your family won't be safe/healthy/happy if they don't have this or that.

Then the news itself was filled with the news of the stock market falling and falling (interspersed occasionally with mentions of the latest murders/houses burning down and other maudlin stories, and you wonder why I don't watch it?) That, at least, was interesting to watch, even though much of it is beyond me. Governments and corporations are running around every which way trying to fix it. They want us to buy more, spent more, keep this artificial construct afloat. They way I see it, the stock market crash isn't the problem, it's simply a symptom of the bigger problem.

Near as I can tell, the stock market problems are due to the fact that people have just stopped spending. Thus profits from companies are down, meaning people don't feel it's safe to invest in them. So while people are busy worrying about the stock market and how to fix it, they're not seeing the real problem. People, the real people in the street, are struggling. The rising cost of petrol and thus food (which has to be transported using petrol), increased costs in rental and housing prices, and the over-reliance on credit to get through the tight spots, means everyday living for the majority of people is getting harder and harder. The stock market crash isn't going to affect these people, unless the company they work for goes under and they're out of a job. Yet for some reason, the stock market is the only thing the news, and the government, is worried about. Everyone believes that if only we can shore up the stock market, everything will be OK.

I don't believe it will be. Until we address the underlying issues of consumerism, and the need to have bigger, better, more, we cannot change this. And unfortunately, the stock market needs this drive to survive, it lives on people buying more and more, even if they can't afford it. And the media and advertising companies will manipulate people's minds until they can't really see the difference between a need and a want.

Since we began the process that has seen us move out here to our block of land and begin on this road to simple living and self-sufficiency, so many of our thoughts and ideas towards this have changed. We no longer feel the need to buy the latest and greatest, and though the withdrawal from the media and advertising has helped, it still would not have been possible without an underlying shift in our priorities. When we need something now, we first decide if we can make it or grow it. Purchases, when we do make them, are carefully thought out, and the options are gone over until we are certain we need the item, and that there is no other way to get it. I try to find second hand options if at all possible. Not only are these cheaper, but they are kinder on the environment. And if we do find that we need an item, and have to buy it new, we try to find locally made. We're far from perfect, but we are working towards a place where we feel happier with our lives, and more connected with the real world.

And what of the world situation? What is going to happen, and what do I think needs to be done about it? I have no idea. I'm not into solving the worlds problems. I can only work out what is right for myself and my family. We will survive this, whatever happens, because we have put ourselves in a position where we can. Despite the rising grocery costs, our grocery budget is going down (and I usually spend even a part of that on fruit trees!). Despite being further from town and petrol prices increasing, our fuel budget is going down. And hopefully, in the next 12 months, as the garden grows, we will become further along the path to supplying a large chunk of our own food.

Spring Quilting

It wasn't until I was editing the photos for this post, and trying to decide on a title, that I realised how well the colours of this quilt fit to Spring. The beautiful, bright rainbow really brightens up the room, and when you look at it, you can't help but feel light and happy. Perfect for a little girls room.

There's very little frugal about this quilt, it's made from (almost) all new material, and didn't come cheap, although the main body of quilting is made from material I have had in my cupboard since before DD was born. I didn't even buy it myself, my mum saw it in her local quilting shop, and couldn't leave it there. 24 fat quarters, hand dyed, all in carefully arranged shades through the rainbow. (Although we only used 23, several of the pinks were so similar I took one out, as the quilt was going to be very long anyway). I have put off cutting up this material, trawled through many quilting books and magazines for the perfect design, but eventually it was time to just give it a go, and we decided on a really simple design, that would show off the beautiful shading without any fancy patterns detracting from the simple beauty.

First step was to cut the material, not into squares, but into strips. We were going to carefully measure each one, but in the end, we just cut along the fold lines, giving us 4 strips very close in size to what I wanted.

I worried for a while about how to keep the colours in order, as some of the shades are very similar, and in the end we decided to lay them down in order. We pinned each colour (4 strips of each) at the top to prevent them blowing away. (This is on my mum's veranda, you can see the grass in the top left hand corner, so it was a little windy.)

This type of quilt is much easier (and quicker) to sew with two people. My mum sewed each strip together as I handed them to her in order. If I had been on my own, I would have had to constantly get up and down to get each piece, and I'm sure some of them would have ended up out of order.

I was a little concerned about how to keep track of the order anyway, as so many shades are so similar, but came up with this simple strategy to keep it in order. Each time I took a strip off the pile, I turned the pin the other way. That way I could quickly and easily work out which strip to grab next. It worked too, not a strip out of order.

Once we had joined all 23 strips, we then sewed the first strip to the last one, making a continuous loop like this. I hope the photo shows what I mean, as this is the step that made doing the staggered pattern so simple and easy. We made 4 of these loops.

Each loop was then folded into quarters, and cut into strips the same size as the origional strips (so that the patches would be square). As you can see here, there was a small bit at the end left over that wasn't big enough to make another strip, but those will get used later.

Then I unpicked one seam on each strip, moving one square through the colours each time, and sewed these together (as we went). This was a little tricky, as some of the colours were hard to tell apart, but in those cases I looked back to a strong colour change, and worked from there. Again, I did the unpicking/arranging, and my mum sewed. I deliberately arranged it so that the pink colours were around the middle of the quilt, as my DD loves pink. We picked out a pink border at the local quilting shop, and found some bamboo wadding for the middle. If you haven't heard about bamboo, it's a wonderful new alternative to cotton, which is grown with far less pestasides, making it far more gentle on the environment. And it has a wonderful, silky soft feel. Seems almost a shame to hide it away in the middle of a quilt!

Of course, the quilt isn't entirely new material. The backing is a white sheet I bought at the local op shop for $4! And the bias strip around the edge is the end bits left from cutting out patched strips. It was almost exactly the right size to go around the quilt, only 4 squares left over. Quite an economical use of material really.

Doesn't it look beautiful on DD's bed? She loves it, and has been sleeping in her bed again since we bought it home. She had had a run of bad dreams, and moved back in with us full time, and I was hoping this would make a difference, which it has. Not that we mind having her in with us, in fact DH and I both sleep better with her nearby, but I also want her to enjoy her own room, which she is now doing. We bring her in with us when we go to bed, so that she isn't waking up alone in the dark.

For anyone who is thinking of trying their hand at quilting, but is afraid to give it a go, don't be. My mum and I aren't perfect quilters. We don't measure things terribly carefully, and if we make a mistake, we don't let it stop us. For example, we cut off the edge of one of the last strips by acciden, so that it was about 5mm shorter than all the other strips, but carried on anyway, and in the end, you can't even tell which one was the shorter square. I also accidently bought about 2 inches less batting than we needed (I forgot to calculate for the wider border), so that it doesn't go right to the edge, and had a similar problem with the backing, but we just fix those up, and keep sewing. In the end, these little mistakes are unnoticable among the larger quilt, a quilt that never would have been finished if we'd let ourselves be deterred by simple mistakes.

Happy Sewing!

We're Home

We took the early train home this morning, leaving at 5:45, meaning we were back in Caboolture by 8:45. I think personally I prefer to drive, but there's no doubt the trip on the Tilt Train is far more pleasant for DD. We read books, colour in, eat the snacks we bring with us, and usually buy one treat (packet of plain chips or juice) from the galley, simply because it's another activity to pass the time.

The holiday was a week of new experiences for DD, beginning with buying her own small fishing rod, and going fishing! She's been playing at fishing for ages, every time she finds, or makes, a fish, she has to make a fishing line and go fishing too, so it was wonderful for her to get the chance to actually try it for real. (And look at our matching skirts! I very carefully resisted wearing similar t-shirts.)

Grandpa is an expert at fishing luckily, since I'm certainly not, and DH isn't keen on fishing at all! He baited the hook for us, and was very determined to catch DD a fish. It's very good to see her taking to him, as she has been scared off by is gruffness up until now. I think it was the My Little Ponies he gave her that did it. That was a great idea Grandma!

And yes, in case you're wondering, our persistence paid off, and we did finally catch this little bream. DD was absolutely thrilled. Unfortunately it was a tad on the small side, so he went back into the ocean, which DD was totally happy with. She wasn't too sure about actually eating a fish.

I actually enjoyed this exercise too, and now have at least some idea of how to set up a fishing line (I'm sure there's a technical term for all that tying lines and putting on hooks and sinkers, but I'm clueless as to what it is), so have another little skill added to my self-sufficiency checklist. Not that I'm sure there's anywhere to catch an edible fish nearby, but you never know.

While we were reeling in lines, baiting hooks, and casting out over and over, we noticed what we at first thought was a log floating past. Then we realised it was moving, and my first thought was "Crocodile!" (Not totally out of the blue, they'd been talking about finding croc's further south than usual on the news the previous night.) Luckily it turned out to just be this lizard/goanna going for a swim. He wandered up the beach, as if he was exactly where he wanted to be. Very strange.

The pelicans thought it strange too, and one even wandered after him to ascertain if he was edible, but decided his size was a bit of an issue, and wandered off again. They were far more interested in the chance of getting thrown some leftover bait.

On the last day of the holiday, we all woke up really early for a visit to Tin Can Bay to hand feed the dolphins. Despite the long drive (over an hour) each way, it was well worth the effort. DD loved it, and was only disappointed that she couldn't line up to do it over and over again, as she does with the elephants at the zoo each year. We've promised to go back soon and take Daddy too.

There is, of course, one more activity we did on holidays, another infamous holiday quilt, but you'll have to come back tomorrow for pics of that.

Sheet Wardrobe

I've been sewing up a storm the last few weeks, making some summer dresses for myself (in among making all those clothes for DD). So far I have these 6 dresses (can you tell what colours I like?). Some of the material has been bought new, but most of it is recycled, and about the only place you can get this much material in one piece is in old sheets! So what I'm wondering now, is can you guess which ones are the sheets, and which ones are the new material? Most of these I plan to wear around the house anyway, so it doesn't really matter that they look like sheets, but I am curious how many of them are obvious.

The patterns are from my Stitch House book, which I officially LOVE. All of these can be made with 2m or less of material! Pretty good for an adult dress. They're also really cool and comfortable, which is a very important characteristic.

I popped my soap out of the moulds this morning too. Well, popped is probably the wrong word, wrestled is more like it. But it's out, and it looks WAY better than the last lot. The picture doesn't show it, but it actually looks kind of green, not quite sure why, but the colour is even, and the consistency is right (the last lot was crumbly and patchy), so I think this lot is going to be great. I'm really looking forward to trying it out.

I'm off for a few days to a week tomorrow, visiting my mum, so probably won't be posting. But expect lots of crafty pics and op shop finds when I get back!

Rainy Days

It's been raining on and off the last two days, so we've spent a lot of time indoors. DD made this flower out of paddlepop sticks, all her own idea, although I suspect it was sparked by our flower collages a few weeks ago. I'm really impressed at her craft work lately, she's coming up with a lot of ideas on her own, and has the manipulative skills to turn them into actual objects. She also made some letters out of the paddlepop sticks, although she messed them up before I could take a photo.

We were really glad to see this rain, as it's the first we've had since the last lot I wrote about, over a month ago! Very unusual for spring.

I know, I write about the rain quite a lot. But when you're living simply, it really does have a big effect on your life. And not in the annoying 'I'm going to get wet walking from the car to the shops' kind of way either. We rely on the rain to fill our water tanks so that we have fresh water to drink, shower and wash with, and to water the garden. Nothing makes the garden grow so much as a good soaking from the rain. Somehow, it's totally different to being watered with the hose or a watering can.

The rain inspired me to spread the rest of the sugar cane mulch around the front garden. It's well and truly soaked now, as is the ground underneath it, so hopefully even if we have another dry spell, it will stay wet, meaning I will have to water less, and what watering I do do will be more efficient. I hope it hangs around long enough for me to get some more mulching done, although I have so much else to do in the next few days, not sure how that will go.

It also inspired us to jump in and do a job that has been needing to be done for a while, digging a channel down the side of the house to drain some of the water that usually collects there. A good half hour in the rain, and we had improved things substantially. And of course, both DH and I needed a good shower! DD had a ball playing in the rain while we worked though.

While we were out there, DH cleared the gutters again, as they were overflowing yet again, even though it was only a few weeks ago that we cleared them last. We were debating over whether the cost of professional gutter guard was warranted, but after seeing that, it's definitely necessary, so we'll organise that on Monday.

Today I also managed to knock over another few jobs that have been on my mental to-do list, making soap, and making yogurt.

This is my second attempt at making soap using the tutorial on Down to Earth. The first lot was definitely usable, although not exactly pretty. I think my biggest problem was that I was stirring by hand, and after more than 20 minutes, had still barely reached trace. That was solved though by my wonderful sister (who will have some soap delivered to her in a few weeks) giving me her old stainless steel stick blender. One of the seals was gone, making it unsafe for blending food, but still fine for soapmaking. I reached trace so fast I was staring at it thinking it couldn't have happened that quickly, and wondering if I'd done something wrong!

This time I used a slightly different recipe also, listed here, which cut out the rice bran oil, and used copha instead of coconut oil (which is very hard to find). All up, it would have cost about $15. I would expect there are at least 15 bars of soap here (I'll find out tomorrow when it's set enough to cut!), so that's a pretty good price for this quality of soap. It's also totally unscented, with no other additives, very very hard to find in the shops! Now just to wait impatiently for it to cure (up to six weeks, if we can wait that long!), then we get to try it out.

I'll post more about the yogurt experiment tomorrow, it's still... what do you call it when yogurt is making itself? It's not really cooking, is it?

Garden Post!

Finally, as promised, here is a garden update post. After a very slow morning in which we managed to lose a lot of time doing nothing much at all, we got out to try to get things sorted. This was the front garden at about 11am this morning. And tonight, it looks much the same, minus a few sugar cane bales that were moved around the side for potato cages. Most of our work was in the side garden today, but before I get onto that, I'll post a few more pics of what is going on here in the front garden.

Here's some corn coming up in the first no-dig bed in the front garden. Not as good a strike rate as I had hoped for unfortunately. I planted 2 or 3 times this many seeds. Hoping a few more will come up yet, otherwise I'm going to have to replant into the spaces.

These little Johnny Jump Up's provide a nice bit of colour, if you ignore the weeds...

I'm building up quite a collection of potted plants around the planter box. It's easier to keep them all in once space to water them. There is loganberry and a youngberry (I think) in the big pots, my male and female kiwifruit in the red and blue hanging baskets, some red kidney beans in a punnet waiting to be planted out, and some pigeon peas yet to come up in the other punnets.

And finally, this is the raised bed I built. The sides are 10 bales of sugarcane mulch, 3 on each side, and 2 on each end. I then filled it with alternate layers of lucerne, Searles plant food, compost, sugarcane mulch from the chookpen, and manure. It's already started sinking a bit as it all breaks down. Hopefully this will be a really nice place to grow some of those nutrient hungry plants.

So far I've planted some watermelon seeds in it, and they're just starting to pop up.

And along the front fence, the sunflowers are getting ready to flower. They're about as tall as DD now, and I think I'm going to have to stake a couple, (or tie them to the fence), as the wind is pushing them over.

I was planning on writing about the side garden, and posting a few pics of that, but it's late, and I really need to get some sleep. But it does give me something to write about tomorrow!