Far too windy today to do any gardening as can be seen by my grown from a cutting Lavender bush. It is sailing to the left.

The plan had been to spray the Roses again for scale to really kill those suckers before all the new leaves appear on my for now Winter hibernating bushes. I am so looking forwards to my Roses flowering again in the warm months.
Just like this Rose in all it’s summer glory!

What could be better today than soup.

Open fridge and find goodies for the making of Real Food.

A veritable feast of bargains. Reduced priced goodness. The best shopping.

Large packet of soup vegetables …mine was 1kg and included parsnip which sells for $10kg on special at the moment.

Large bag of Beef soup bones ….mine was 1kg

Find largest cooking pot or crock pot…my crockpot was out on loan.

Whilst quickly peeling and rough chopping vegetables, heat pot with a little oil and toss bones in for a quick brown

- add chopped onions and stir for a slight brown
- add rest of vegetables and stir for a quick mix
- add 8 cups water and stock powder for that quantity. Or use packaged stock liquid.
-add a glug or two of Worsestershire Sauce

Even quicker is to pile all the ingredients into the pot without any frying, but the taste will not be as rich.

Bring to boil and skim off scum that rises to top for the first part of cooking.

Simmer till meat is tender enough for you. The longer the better.

Remove soup bones from soup liquid and cut meat off.

I then mashed vegetables with potato masher to squash them somewhat. You could use a stick blender being careful as soup is hot

Return meat to soup.

As I wanted to make a slightly thicker soup I made a brown Roux kind of thick sauce and added some to the soup.

Then we devoured it for lunch with only a little left for a small snack.

Wholesome food.

The best taste.

Love my soup….

Then a reduced price afternoon tea treat at a fraction of going out for coffee.

Even better was that we sat in the afternoon sun in our enclosed verandah soaking up the warmth

Till later

Such has been life….

Moving into another house. Loving it here. A snip of a Rose here, finding a home for this. Food for a group , or just for one. Trying out this magic Thermal cooking machine the Bellini Intelli and Skinnymixers recipes or filing these papers(sigh).

Oh the garden is calling me again.

Sad to see the roses slowly finishing their season in the sun

Thinking of dear ones who are not with us any more, or ageing mother far away.

Time marching on.

Are we really that old?
I am young inside.
Yet today I seem to creak.

Fun visiting the farm

Were we ever that young?

But go it has!

I was reading through some old diary notes and this one struck a chord. March 2015. Fourteen long months ago.

Utter joy

U.N.F.O.R.G.E.T.A.B.L.E

Fast forward to yesterday morning.
Walking in the Botanic Gardens.

Two older preschool cousins and little Austin walking across rustic stepping-stones. Perfectly placed for little boys.

Us Singing songs, counting steps, pretending being on a bridge in a creek. I say “Can you hear the water?”
But children have such imagination with no prompting needed from adults!
I turn around and see…
Boys lying on stones , pretending to be on the deck of a boat.
Toes to head, head to toes.
Three little bodies all in a row

Repeat again and again.

Singing the ABC song as the stones were stepped upon.

Following the leader and singing the song. Little Austin chiming in and singing too….Bailey stopping mid stride and looking at me as if to say “how can little Austin know this song” ….

In all seriousness he wisely said “I learned him the song”

Infinitely P.R.E.C.I.O.U.S.

Just an ordinary day sharing morning tea.
Definitely not ordinary.

Finding a thing of beauty through the eyes of a child.

Budding artist and his abstract number flowers

Courtesy Pennywise@morgueFile free photos

My kitchen table
Bare feet
Perfect for sitting and thinking
Door open to the back garden
Slight breeze from outside
Slow whirling fan on the other side

How blessed

Washing on line showing off its drying flip flying dance

Courtesy SavaMatkovitch@morguFile free photos

I can just sit and ponder
At nature, even in a small suburban back yard
Dreaming of the country

There is nothing earth shattering here
Just peace and contentment
Clean and fresh scented sheets for this evening

Now a battered straw hat by my feet
A garden inspected and watered
New growth shooting forth from recently planted hedging

Mud dauber wasps with their dangling long legs
Searching for that perfect bit of mud and soil
Ponderously flying like a water laden fire fighting plane
In orange and black hues
Beware they say to me

Thinking back

Where have the years gone
Our very first experience of grandparent hood
Joy and adventure
Seventeen years and a few days
The birth of our first granchild, Renee

Courtesy GaborfromHungary@morgueFile free photos

A new era
Precious
All of them
Family

My five minutes of contentment on this day
Enjoyed doubly by writing
Hoping you too found a moment to pause.

Joining With some Grace
For Flog Yo Blog on Fridays

Courtesy chelle@morgueFile free photos

Whilst having a quiet day home today I came upon an interesting article.
It made me think.
About life, people and things.

But let’s take a few steps back some years to when my son and his wife came visiting from Texas.

Texas shares it’s border with Mexico, so naturally there is quite a connection with its food and culture.

There is beautiful pottery. Colourful designs and patterns. So many differing styles. Rich earthy or clashing hues.

Courtesy hotblack@morgueFile free photos

Courtesy hotblack@morgueFile free photos

Courtesy rosevita@morgueFile free photos

Our loved ones brought over two bowls ever so carefully wrapped. One smallish bowl in earthy hues survived intact and still now sits facing me as I type today.

The other larger bowl sadly was in a few big pieces plus slivers!

Yet I still held onto it wrapped in plastic, for an age.

One day I decided that there would be no harm in trying to glue it back together.
Needless to say it took me a long time needing much patience.

Because many of the pieces were slivers it was impossible to make a perfect join. There were sections where I could see through. Gaps. Dots of glue holding this fragile beauty in place.

But I had my thing of beauty.
Imperfect.
Fragile
A labour of love twice
A tenuous connection with family far away

I looked at this dish often when I walked past, even more so as it had a real emotional hands on tug at my heart .

It was not to be a perfect gift, instead there was a better gift.
Lasting through many years of fragility it finally died, but it made an impression which when reading this article brought it all back to mind.

Thank you Mike and Denise

Perfectness does not make us.

Now go and follow the link and read the article by Tim Willard
“Beauty in brokenness”

IBOT Linking with Essentially Jess

We wouldn’t have it any other way
Wonderfully blessed
Making memories

AUSTRALIA DAY AT HOME
Jan 26 2015

A hard day here
Sitting on the back verandah on this Australia Day

Australia a land of contrasts indeed…
Deep fried in the intense heat yesterday
Grey, cool and overcast today
Wishing it was a trifle warmer with the sun showing its face
( we are never ever satisfied are we! )

Egg and bacon breakfast cooked by husband dear
Minding two grandies in their parents home
Children happy and content
Grandparents enjoying the luxury of a Verandah

Savouring the view over green lawn to surrounding bush
The old lush mulberry tree
Listening to the birds and their different melodies trying to out sing each other
Hearing the old hens give their distinct call

You know this is a home to a busy family
Basketball on the lawn
Tractor truck on the verandah
Bags of potting mix next to plants waiting to be potted

Long strips of curled up bark from the gum tree lying on the veranda from a made up and now discarded game of hop scotch (grandma did not want to be the first to draw with chalk on newly re painted decking)

Little boy calling out, grandma, I’m hungry

Joys of being a grandparent in this little corner of Australia

Our laid back Australia Day

Words for this day in Australia. Resilience. Support.

Life can be fragile ….like the poppy.

My version of resilience in a tough environment.

Planted nearly fifty years ago on a farm. An apple tree.

Love and care.

Wordless Wednesday

Courtesy Pennywise@morgueFile free photos

Last night just thinking of myself and craving a snack I found a recipe for Chocolate Chia pudding.

I pottered about in a hum drum sort of way and put the prepared healthy pudding in the fridge to soak ready for the next morning.

Morning arrives and with much anticipation I prepare to be delighted by a delicious sustaining meal…..

Oh dear. I discovered that I had used Quinoa instead of Chia. Ahhhhh!
Not to be deterred I strained out the Quinoa and added chia seed and returned it to the fridge to do its soak.
The Quinoa will be experimented with another day.
And yes my pudding did turn out. Cold, thick and refreshing on a hot day.

In between it seemed we lived in a different world, a parallel universe.

By pippalou @morgueFile free photos. With thanks

As the stars in our vast wide country heavens so brilliantly pulsated last night, and most of Australia slept, a scene of unimagined horror climaxed and exploded in the madness of the Martin Place siege.

In a Lindt Cafe.

A happy place, a refuge and a meeting point on an ordinary Sydney day.

For ordinary people starting their day.

Instead, horror and the resultant aftermath.

A day to be forever remembered.

Lives forever changed.

In my life, thankful for our safe families sleeping in their own beds free from danger. By God’s grace.

For support network of friends when in times of need after the event.

Courtesy kamuelaboy@morgueFile free photos

Courtesy wallyir@morgueFile free photos

For those who give their lives
For those who save lives
For those who protect
For those who mourn
For those traumatised

Forever thankful for memories of quiet peaceful times at the Thomas family Moorlands farm.

For the silence of growing grain in our vast land.

For the old apple tree with battered lichen encrusted branches still quietly sending out delicate blossoms and the resultant apples.

Peace

Joining #IBOT

Courtesy Jaeb@morgueFile free photos

Having just arrived home from a lovely driving visit interstate with family and friends I came across a refreshing recipe. It would be wonderful as an entree or for a gathering of friends and supper. Light, but I would say very moorish.

I would add a delicate sprig of fresh Dill as well for its wonderful scent and aroma.

My dream raised garden

Dill brings back memories of my dear mother when she still had her own garden and little herb patch. Whenever we visited Mum always chopped up some Dill and added it to her wonderful mixed salad and home made dressing….between us three girls there would almost be arguments over who got more of this delicious trademark salad

Here is this refreshing recipe of Salmon Rillettes

Alternatively you could experiment just with some smoked salmon and flake it instead of the fish stated in Downtownshift.
I seem to recall a friend of mine does this, or is it potted shrimp…..Keren if you are reading, is this how your mum makes her dip?

…and so I’ll sign off for now and maybe do a bit of unpacking. The painful part at the end of a trip…..but I have many wonderful memories which will spur me on:)

From country to city and back again, day by day.

Courtesy Peonia@morgueFile free photos

Australia is indeed a spacious land. A safe Haven mainly, where we can explore and wander and discover, if we are so inclined.

Courtesy pshubert@morgue file free photos

In the 1950′s Australia was billed as a Land of Milk and Honey to migrants. A land of untapped wealth and needing workers. So they came, to help build the infrastructure and to discover. In a way they were pioneers with sight, prepared to make a better life, learn and work hard in a strange land. They were from all walks of life and prepared to take any work.

Courtesy taliesin@morgueFile free photos

Look at a few of these examples. Migrant City folk who had to learn about the land, agriculture, livestock, farming, animal husbandry. Or farming folk, homesteaders in their own country having to adapt to an extremely different climate. Australia being a land of flood AND drought. A vast land. Then the labourers, brick layers, hardy men on their own hoping to bring family to this new country and working hard to save.

Old Photo courtesy BThomas

Old Photo courtesy BThomas

We were privileged because our family was befriended by kind and generous Australians who taught my parents about the new country. My mother was a city girl and my father knew or had learnt tool making. Both longed for a new safe place to call home, raise a family and were prepared to work for it. So thanks to the family of Mr Malthouse a hard working farmer near Bradbury, South Australia our family started their life in a new country. I feel sad though because as happens in life we lost contact, and this is my mother’s constant regret in her age where she has time to reflect.

I was a child in a strange land and it was only later as adults did we truly realise the blessings we had and have around us. The abundance, even when making do. We knew no different. There was freedom of space to discover and learn.

Courtesy stweedlie@morgueFile free photos

We also learnt that if it rained and we missed the bus to school we had to walk in the rain. There was no car! Instead, with raincoats and gum boots on we set off remembering to beware one particular bend on that narrow road near a Beech Forest in Stirling. A dip in the road where a monstrously long puddle formed next to the footpath. You see we had to strategically plan this stretch because if we didn’t take it at a run from one end to the next we were bound to get drenched. I know I got soaked at least once when I didn’t see a truck approaching the bends. A snaking road past ancient, dark and looming trees on a huge property. Huge and menacing to a child and it hasn’t really changed much now.

Courtesy gracey@ morgueFile free photos

So now a few generations on as my little grandson and I take a walk…

I have learnt how to go walking with toddlers
I have learnt how a grandmother can alleviate cabin fever
I have discovered exercise can be fun

…to be continued in Part 2

Joining in with Our World Tuesdays

morgueFilefree photos

My gratitude for today was being able to go out with all of my grandchildren ages 16 to 3, just me and them. Grandpa has another week of work till his temp work is finished.

Off to the park we went with all the requirements to keep little ones fed and watered and older ones occupied.

Like a long string of colourful beads we wound our way along the footpath. Two scooters and correctly garbed excited little boys. Colourful Bicycle helmets atop sun hats. Cool dark sunglasses on and exposed tender skin slathered with sunscreen for the adventure. Big lads with their scooter and bike in the lead for safety followed by one little scooter after another. Then grandma and sixteen year old granddaughter following each other and running to keep up with the fast fun happening ahead. We are pushing prams for the homeward journey when little scootered out legs are tired!

Scootering is serious business for little boys. Full throttle and whizzing down hills and across a causeway over the creek.

One little boy remembers to stop and listen out for the frogs he heard the other day near the creek. It’s a little bit hard to put your hand behind your ear to listen when you have a sun hat and a bike helmet on. There are no frogs today.

Courtesy binks@morgueFile free photos

Along the track we whizz, one on this side of a split track and me on the other as I try to take short cuts to keep up.

It’s fun. Then there are the many exercise stations dotted around this park where all the boys have to take a turn to try out. Scooters and bikes on the grounds in lazy abandon. The biggest one can manage a high chin up because he has the height of a man but the others still want a go. Little boys are lifted up so they can feel that they are “big” too.

Trying out

Did I say it’s fun?

Now the playground and lunch and playground again and then to watch the eels. Those ugly things living in the lake along with various ducks, moorhens and lone pelican. I wonder where the swan was that lives there? Maybe it was nesting time somewhere in the reeds as it is spring here in Australia. Saw a family of ducks and their brood of ducklings sticking close together ….they weren’t on the agenda for the little boys today. It was a boys, cousins action day of fast fun time.

From here the older boys went home with friends to ride some more bikes at a pace more fitting older lads!

For the little boys then time to head home with grubby little faces and hands that had been washed numerous times already with wipes. They scootered for a while but then into the prams they gladly hopped for their chariot rides home in style. Scooters were slung over the top of prams, helmets on laps and cold bag from the lunch was slung over grandmas shoulder. Along we walked, my granddaughter and I, pushing those prams homeward bound and to brave the territory of that swooping bird again protecting its young…. It was my turn to be bombarded and swooped upon this time. Luckily I had my hat on and only felt its wings crash into me!

I did say it was fun didn’t I! On top of that it keeps me young and moving…although I do admit that I flaked out afterwards at home:)

But most importantly I am ever so grateful to have had the privilege of time to spend with family.

Do you have a small yard for the children?
Do you feel cooped in?
Do make time to find ways to get out in the fresh air and get those legs working. Those lungs pumping and those eyes finding new sights. Discover new horizons, they may be just around a few corners. Listen to the laughter and the yelling. True joy!

Make the time
Take the time
To connect
Have gratitude for today

Courtesy of B Thomas our brother in law. Circa 1955

Courtesy B Thomas our Brother in law. Circa 1955.
Time to connect

This link has some interesting thoughts. I found it when Googling for another meaning of gratitude.

Joining in for a Thankful Thursday

Joining in a bit late for IBOT with Essentially Jess