Two simple days

December 25th. Paper-making for P with some help from M, then M and I made a doll and I sewed a water bottle carrier for her. I also put some new elastic in the pyjamas Grandmama gave M for her first Christmas so that A could wear them. No photo of that because he was snoozing in them.

What a blissfully simple, happy and productive day.

Followed by another almost as simple on the 26th when we finished the day by all strolling around together in the mist foraging a salad to accompany dinner. Yes, really. That was a lovely holiday!

Changing rooms

P and I are swapping rooms. He is moving his meditation and painting into the teeny space off the playroom which was previously the sewing room. Which means I now have a big big room for sewing/office/guest space. As always, moving into a new space brings piles of good intentions for being super organised and productive. We shall see. Hmm.

Breastfeeding mothers always face their baby while cosleeping

except when they turn to face the larger and much more restless (and more like a purple fairy) child. And yes, I was sleeping on the gap (ow!).

Garden Update

The chickens have been banished from the main vegie beds. As you can see, one at least ignores our decrees. Actually she is looking for a place to lay. Yesterday we cut out all the weeds from around the compost bin then Paul built a new bed and spread the compost out init before moving the bin. While I was clearing the weeds I found a little nest with seven eggs in it. When I let the chickens out this morning she ran straight over and through a gap in the fence we hadn't noticed then started looking frantically around for her sheltered laying spot that was no longer. Guess she'll have to find somewhere else (maybe even in the luxurious nesting box we provided for her)

Two things

Playing and dishes. Actually, I wanted to write Dishes. I think it needed a capital. Playing and Dishes. There you are, that's better.
Robin Grille's book Heart to Heart Parenting contains an exercise to address the feeling of complete disinterest in or frustration with playfulness that involves remembering how it felt to play as a child. Specifically at the age your child is now. It goes on to give suggestions of how to deal with any negative emotions that may bring up perhaps around not being allowed to play or getting in trouble for being silly etc. Guess what? I can't remember playing. Not at all. I have plenty of early memories, some hazy, some not so. But I can't remember playing. Not until I started school. No wonder I struggle to play with Meri. Do I have emotions that come up around that? A little bit of fear perhaps, that life from ages 2 - 3.5 really sucked for me. Anger, a little.
The good news? I'm finding it easier and easier to engage with Meri's fantasy play. The fog is clearing. Now if I could just enjoy the silly splashy messy play just as much.
And Dishes? I hear you asking. Well tonight I cleaned the kitchen before Paul cooked dinner. The mess wasn't made by me and most of it wasn't even from a meal I had partaken in. Yet, I offered to clean it up. In fact, I wanted to clean it up. I wanted to give him the gift of a nice clean kitchen in which to cook. Then, after dinner I did the dishes again (I can't really say I cleaned the kitchen again because he is a rather neat cook most of the time). Without grumbling, even inwardly. I do admit though, that the second time was more motivated by me wanting everything clean. Weird stuff to write about you think? This is HUGE for me. Resentment about housework was an enourmous part of my life from age 15 until I got kicked outof "home" in first year Uni and kicked out again in second year (long story....). It continued into my future relationships including with Paul until recently. Come to think of it though, the dishes still seem to be an issue in that household. Well, they still seem to be constantly piling up around the kitchen whenever we visit despite me no longer being resident to play scape-goat. Hmmmmmm

Garden Update continues

Pea teepee

November Garden Update 1

Berries etc yet to be planted

One of two cold-frames made by Paul.

Rental rainwater harvesting

Happy chookies who have just started laying!

A boy and his placenta

Here are some of the little boy's newborn pics I haven't shared. We weren't neccessarily convinced about Lotus Birth before we tried it but now I'm so glad we did.

Chooky chooky chooky

We have chickens! Three 12 week old Australorps. Photos were taken in my excitement but I'm struggling with transferring and uploading now that we are all sharing Paul's computer (mine had a little accident), it's very time consuming for one. So no pics to share yet sadly. Be assured though, our days are being spent in a lovely chicken watching haze.

Raspberry Observations

This morning Paul noticed little buds on the raspberry cane I planted on the 25th of Feb so that's almost exactly four months for nature to show her stuff.
Life with a new babe is rocketing along. He speaks the same language as his older sister did. This morning he said "ungah" in just the way she used to when she was tired so I popped him in the sling & off he went. ZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Bring forth new life

Ten minutes from here

to family

Garden Update

Mermaid's cave

Nothing much to say except THIS is just down the hill from where we live. Nice!

Garden Progress

First, the box seedlings. Growing growing. Brassicas under attack from cabbage moths but nothing too perilous.
Then, our first no-dig bed...

The frame.

Newspaper, cardboard, lucerne and grass clippings.

Then comes the cow poo.

The finished garden bed.
First to be planted were some strawberries that have been waiting for a week for a new home (I hope they're ok!).

Green Things

In the past I've been rather hopeless at keeping garden records. Here is as good a place as any I guess, so I can happily report that yesterday Meri and I planted our first raspberry cane (how exciting!). Our "box" seedlings seem to be doing well despite visits from the local cabbage moth population. I removed some eggs this morning but no caterpillars.
On another, even more exciting green note - here is Paul's Green Tara mandala that he got back ready to hang last night!

Finally our new abode

First, the driveway. Somewhat of a feeling of seclusion don't you think? That's Nellie the Elephant sitting at the top of the driveway.
Next, the front garden. Sloping but relaxing and lovely. Although the agapanthas and the orange flower in the foreground are actually classed as noxious weeds in the bush up here.
Now this...
garden bed at the side of the house was a lovely overgrown thing when we inspected the property. Full of potential we thought. After we picked up the keys we discovered this monstrosity of white gravel had been dumped (and planted with natives, ok) here and on the driveway. Sticking out from the edges we could see that they had not lined it with weedmat or plastic but old lace curtains. Um, how will that stop the weeds growing through?
And of course, the backyard. There are more photos but blogger seems to have had enough. To the right of the shed there is a gap in the hedge which leads to a lovely shady overgrown patch which needs to have chickens installed in it post-haste. We just need to manifest somewhere for them to sleep.

Quinoa soup?

In an attempt to move away from the excesses of the solstice period I made a menu plan today. Tonight's fare is Peruvian Quinoa Soup. I'm not sure it'll be a hit.

A little fear released

Today I bought the first item for the new baby! Although I had stuff I'd picked up in various disastrous pregnancies I didn't buy anything at all for Meri until after the foetal anomaly scan. Not having any ultrasounds this time means a whole different way of dealing with that fear.
We were in the local op-shop and Meri was looking at swimwear meaning I had to browse near her or risk her running out of the shop which she had done in a deli five minutes earlier. Having a choice between baby clothes or men's suit jackets I went with the baby clothes. Lo and behold, right there in front of me was a little top and pants set in perfect condition. That would be good for EC I thought, remembering our desperate shopping trips to find pants for teeny Meri when we discovered how useless all in one suits were for taking a baby to the toilet. When I picked it up not only was it not an all in one suit, but the pants were split-crotch! Perfect. So since split crotch clothing is virtually impossible to find unless you have it custom made (or make it yourself) or know someone who lives in China, I had no choice but to "feel the fear and do it anyway".