riveting

The night after I wrote my last blog post I dreamt that I died.

I was haunted by the visions of my death-bed scene all that weekend. I couldn't shake the feelings and conversations and finality.

Eventually, when I just couldn't let it go, I called my mum for an explanation and some reassurance, and hopefully no ridicule. You see I am the parent who finds the long, painfully detailed descriptions of my kids' dreams terribly tedious. More than once I have uttered the word riveting in a sarcastic tone when they have caught me somewhere and begun to share a minute by minute play-back of their last 10 hours in slumberland. Nine times out of ten it doesn't deter them and I am treated to every single gory detail and held captive until they are done; elephants and nakedness and school-yards and teeth and everything else their precious subconscious selves have thrown at them while they were slumbering.

So as you can imagine I didn't take my decision to call my mum, our family's chief dream interpreter, lightly.

But eventually I did.

Once we got over the riveting bit and I filled her in on all the death-bed details, she got down to business. 'A dream about a death is really about the end of something and the rebirth of something else' she told me. In this case she thought it was most probably my blog. And although this feels obvious now, it felt like such a relief at the time not to have to worry that it was any sort of premonition.

The end of something tho - was it really the end?

When I had sat down on that last Friday to write my blog I had had no idea that I was about to take a break from it. I knew that there were problems, I knew that it had started to feel like more of a responsibility than a joy, and I knew that that one woman's demand of my content had rattled me, but still I had expected to post some photos, write some words and press publish. I certainly had not anticipated the death.

But my blog knew what I needed better than I.

10 years had been a great run but the time had come to take a break to ask myself some questions. I felt relief as soon as I admitted it to myself.

In the past month I have not missed my blog at all. I have not missed the pressure to find things to write about, the guilt to read and respond to other people's blogs, the small but growing fear that my words could and might be judged and used against me, and I have not missed the time it takes to put it all together - the words and the photos.

Those precious blogging hours.

As a work from home/on the farm mother, there was so often a measure of guilt involved as I sat at my computer writing my blog on a Friday while the to-do list exploded around me. But it was a decision we had made, and although sometimes I did have to do battle with the lists in my head, I guarded those hours carefully and refused to allow them to be compromised.

After I published my last blog, my friend Penelope wrote to me suggesting that I spend my usual blogging hours on some other creative project. At the time I loved that idea, but I soon saw how useful those hours were at the end of the week on the farm or in the house, and then they were quickly gobbled up.

But then as my missed month of May became June I decided that I would blog again on the first Friday. Even if it was just to say goodbye. And then leading up to the Friday I began to notice all the things that I have missed: the community, the creativity, the precious few hours put aside for myself, the record, the writing itself and weirdly - the typing on the computer keys. All the nos I'd been feeling became maybes.

I had hoped to come back here today with some answers about my blogging future. I had hoped to have done some research about a new platform. I had hoped that once I sat down here this morning that the words would flow out of me and decide for me, like they did last time. But unfortunately I've had too many interruptions to give them a chance to make themselves heard.

So my plan is to keep blogging for as long as it brings me joy and as often as I feel like it. I suspect that I won't be here every single week, but I hope that I'll be here at least once a month. Ideally I'd love for it to be more often, but realistically I know that I need to give myself space to only blog when I have a story I want to share.

And I guess it needs to be said that as much as I value your thoughts and opinions, this is my personal blog and I will blog about what I want to blog about when I want to blog about it. If you have a problem with what I choose to write about please unfollow me, if you have strong opinions and thoughts about content please feel free to share them on your own blog.

And finally, I'd like to thank you all from the bottom of my heart for being my community. For reading along over the years, for caring about our family and our way of life, for writing comments and messages, for not scrolling past, and for reading my long posts in a world that favours the quick snippets. You guys are the best!

I don't know when I'll be back here again, but it might be sooner than later as I just bought a new camera and I suspect I'll take lots of photos as I learn to use it. And then we're going to visit Indi soon and travel blogs are always fun to write...

Big thanks also to Miss Jarrah who braved arctic conditions to model for me in my latest knit-in-progress The Sólbein cardigan , hopefully I'll have the sleeves finished and be ready to steek it (cut it down the middle) by the end of the weekend.

And with that I'm outta here! No longer dead but not quite yet reborn.

I hope you have a beautiful weekend my Foxslane friends.


Love,

Kate x

love

Hello honey bunches,

I'm just popping in quickly to let you know that I won't be writing a proper, full length blog today.

Instead first thing this morning, in a minute, I'm going to pick a big bucket of colourful dahlias to be used to decorate a wedding this weekend, and after that we're going to catch the train into Melbourne with the girls for the school strike for climate action.

I don't expect we'll be home until early evening and by the time we've fed the girls and done all of the farm chores it'll be too late.

***********************************************************************************

I wrote those few paragraphs a week ago.

Last Friday morning I woke up early, edited the pictures, uploaded them to the blog, wrote the words, and then ran out of time to publish them. I left the post open on my computer and hoped to tidy it up and finish it when I got home or on Saturday at the latest.

The flowers I picked were beautiful and the march was emotional and inspiring. We really had the most wonderful day. And then on the way home I learned of the Christchurch mosque shootings. The murder of 50 children, teenagers, women and men.

There were no words big enough to blog.

Jacinta Ardern, the New Zealand Prime Minister, this week refused to speak the perpetrator's name but encouraged the world to speak the names of the 50 victims.

Today in the precious time you usually spend reading my words I'd love it if you read through the names and stories of the victims instead. Our brothers and sisters.

Here in an article in the Guardian.
Here on Khaled Beydoun's instagram.

You can also donate to support the victims here.

Sending so much love out into the world.

Be kind to yourselves and each other.

I'll see you next week with more stories of flowers and fruit and beautiful wooden bowls.

Love, Kate x

sunshine in my soul

Over the past few months I've settled into this new sort of sleep pattern. After I have a shower and go to bed I read my book until I'm so bleary eyed and sleepy that I can hardly see the words on the page anymore. Sometimes I try to read past this point if I'm up to a good bit in the story, but mostly by now I recognise the peak tired point, I turn off my lamp, pop my ear plugs in and within 15 or 20 minutes I'm asleep. This is new for me, I used to find the getting to sleep part agonising.

Then I generally sleep to anywhere between two and four in the morning when I wake up, get up and go to the toilet and then repeat the reading bit. I can be awake at this point anywhere from half an hour, to the rest of the night til morning. 

I practise mindfulness, I practise good sleep hygiene, but I've never been a good sleeper and I probably never will be.

But the other night, about a week ago, I woke up in the middle of the night and had this realisation that everything right now is good. Now is one of those rare times in life where there don't seem to be any dramas. Everyone in my family is healthy and doing well. There are no big issues, no overwhelming stresses and nothing to keep me awake in the middle of the night. I went through each person in my mind and when I'd convinced myself it was true, I turned the light off and went back to sleep.

And somehow this sense of well being has stayed with me throughout the week. I feel like I've had sunshine in my soul.

On Friday after I wrote my blog we picked little tomatoes to toss over pesto pasta for our dinner, we picked cucumbers and nashis and sunflowers, and we spoke to our Indi while she decorated her kibbutz room with flowers in vodka bottle vases.

On Saturday we picked apples and plums and hazelnuts and tomatoes and cucumbers and flowers. Late in the afternoon I took a basketful of tomatoes outside, laid them out on the ground then stood over them and photographed them. 'Just like I used to do when I was an olden days blogger' I told my farmer boy. He laughed and asked me what exactly I thought I was now. Okay true, nothing's changed there.

On Sunday we strolled the aisles of The Daylesford Sunday Market trying to decide if we should have a flower stall soon, I bought some new kitchen knives and then we came home and celebrated them with super thin slices of tomato, cheese and pickled cucumber on toast. After that we picked huge bunches of straw flowers to hang upside down and dry, we picked tomatoes and cucumbers and we visited our bees to see how they were coping with the heat and if they were making any honey.

On Monday we spent time in the garden deadheading, weeding and harvesting. When the sun went down and it got a bit cooler I started stacking firewood in the woodshed - as much as I hate to think about it, I'm sure the first fire of the season can't be too far away. And I made the most delicious cauliflower and freeka salad from Julia Nishimura's book Ostro for dinner.

On Tuesday I started ceramics lessons and I LOVED it!! The first lesson was all about hand building - pinch-pots, coil pots and slabs. I made a few different styles of vases. It's so interesting to think that I've never enjoyed ceramics when I've tried it in the past and now I love it. Why the change? Why now? My teacher Kim sent us home with a chunk of clay to play with over the weekend and I'm hoping to have time on Sunday, I'm so looking forward to it.

On Wednesday we covered a few of the rows of the apple orchard with nets. It's been an incredibly hot and dry summer and despite the fact that we've been irrigating continuously, this year's crop has been small and disappointing. I blame the dreadful cold, windy and wet weeks we had last year when the blossom was out but the bees couldn't leave their hives to pollinate. If you've been waiting to see us at market or to pop into the farm gate stall, it doesn't look like it's going to happen this season. We're sorry and we're disappointed. But we do claim to be seasonal growers and some seasons are just crap.

This morning when we drove past the orchards to take Pepper to school the trees were FULL of white cockatoos holding apples in their hands eating them. The ground is littered thick with half eaten cores. We didn't feel like it was worth the cost and effort of netting the whole orchard for a disappointing crop, but hopefully we've saved a few rows of our family's favourites.

On Thursday apart from driving Jazzy to school, picking tomatoes, cucumbers and flowers and going to gym, we spent almost the entire day in the kitchen. We squished tomatoes and made an enormous cauldron of sauce and I made some more pickled cucumbers.

Every year just before our tomatoes start to ripen I have a panic and fear that we'll never have enough and end up buying a box from a local organic farmer to get me started and stop my worrying. This year I made a decision to be patient and to trust and not to panic buy.

Last year I made somewhere between 100 and 120 jars of tomatoes sauce and there are still around 15 jars left in the cupboard. That means I'd better get busy and fill that cupboard back up. I'm sitting on zero right now but I do feel so happy that I waited and that they'll all be ours.

To make - fry up an onion and some garlic, stir in the squished tomatoes, add loads of basil, bottle, seal, water-bath.

Rather than just bottling tomatoes by themselves, we add lots of other summer seasonal ingredients from our garden that we won't have growing later in the year

Which brings us to Friday, today. I took Pepper to school early, I picked bunches of flowers, tomatoes and cucumbers with Jazzy, I hunted through the dahlias for the grasshoppers that have been munching my flowers, Bren had a meeting with Dave and another guy about fixing our house dam and now I'm writing my blog.

Over the weekend I hope to start bottling the tomatoes (I'll keep you posted on the tally), keep knitting my socks, continue reading Abby's copy of Inappropriation by Lexi Freiman, start listening to the latest episode of Who The Hell is Hamish podcast, take Jazzy to the orthodontist, maybe speak to Indi, hopefully crochet something that's in my head, go to gym, fill baskets and vases with produce, and hopefully, hopefully, hopefully continue this streak of family wellness and wellbeing-ness.

And if at all possible I would absolutely love to order another week of this sunshine in my soul feeling. I'd love to order one for you too.

So how's your week been?
Did you get up to anything fun?
Are you making anything interesting?
Deciding on anything important?
Dreaming about something wonderful?

See ya next Friday.

Lots of love,

Kate x

i love summer

Hello honey bunches,

How has your week been? I feel like mine's had a bit of everything: a bit of culture, a bit of exercise, a bit of drama, a lot of flowers, some tears, some laughter, a lot of podcasts, a lot of discussions, an argument, a celebration, some preserving, a bit of this...a lot of that. 

It's midday now and all morning I've been wondering how to write a blog that captures this moment in time, that gets to the heart of it without the use of thousands of words, and then I remembered Pip's taking stock, perfect!

Let's get into it.

Making : socks. I never did get around to changing the name of this blog to Soxs Lane. At the moment the ones I'm knitting have blue toes, green feet and little speckley white hearts on them. Hopefully I'll get to the heels on the weekend. I also have a half knitted cardigan using wool I spun myself, but I've run out of the fleece and I'm not sure I can get anymore and now I don't know if I should continue or rip it out. I've made the whole body and only have the sleeves to go and I was planning to dye the whole thing once I'd finished anyway. Hmmmm I'm not sure about that one.

Cooking : stewed plums, zucchini fritters, steamed beans, and pesto. Hopefully the great tomato sauce cook up and bottle will begin this weekend.

Sipping : cold peppermint tea.

Reading: My Year Of Rest And Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh. I've read all sorts of things about this book but I'm only up to page 61 which feels a bit too early to decide for myself. I will be interested to see how this story develops though because so far it feels pretty stuck in one place.

Looking: out the window at the forest. Tomorrow will be the 10 year anniversary of the bushfire that came through our place in 2009. From where I'm sitting I can see the tall black trunks that are a constant reminder. On that day we evacuated into town to stay with friends. Our girls were tiny, my sister Meg came with us, as well as a little girl we were looking after who had lost everything in a horrific bushfire a few weeks before, and three of our big dogs. It's crazy to think that when Bren called me from our house to see what I wanted him to rescue I was so mentally unprepared that all I could think of was the market money and my Camper boots. It was before I had my own blog or instagram and could not comprehend it when Meg asked tour host if she could use his computer to update her blog and let her readers know she was safe. How things have changed. It was a terribly frightening time but unlike the horrific fires of Black Saturday a few weeks before, the damage our fire caused was minimal. We were incredibly lucky and returned home the next day to put out spot fires and count our blessings.

Wishing: for safe housing for all, for climate action to protect the future, for world peace, for racial equality, for equality and safety full stop, for enough rain and enough sunshine, for a bush-fire free week, for the health and safety of the bees, for access to education for all, for no-one to feel 'othered', for a world filled with loving kindness, compassion and empathy....and that's just to begin with...   

Enjoying: the abundance that comes in late summer. Baskets and bowls full of tomatoes, plums, cucumbers, zucchinis, eggs, apples, broccoli, carrots, cauliflower, beans, peas, silverbeet, basil and all of the flowers.

Waiting: for things to quieten down a bit on the farm so I can spend some time in my studio. I haven't even set foot in there for weeks.

Liking: the fact that I'm not coughing anymore. Thank goodness.

Loving: our updates from Indi. My Mum told me the other day that she feels so happy thinking about Indi because she is the best parts of me and Bren. I love that. I often tell people that it's a good thing that there's such a big time difference between us otherwise I might be tempted to message her much too often. As it is when we wake up in the morning she's already asleep and she doesn't wake up herself until late in our afternoon. Hopefully one day soon she'll write a guest post for my blog to fill us all in. It's pretty incredible watching the way she captures her new world. How she interacts with the people and places. It's wonderful to see her great big smile and hear her stories and it's humbling to hear her outlook when things get tricky. Gosh I miss that kid, but I am seriously so happy for her to be having this experience and these adventures and this time.

Needing: to pick Pepper up from school in an hour.

Wearing: work overalls and work boots and a grey tee-shirt. 

Following: the bees from flower to flower trying to work out their path.

Noticing: how much dirt there is under my fingernails.

Coveting: I can't think of one single thing.

Sorting: through the seeds I want to plant this autumn and making sure I have what I need.

Getting: excited for my beginner's ceramics course that starts next week. Although I absolutely adore buying and using other ceramicists' work, I've never really enjoyed the making much myself. I think it has something to do with the coldness and grittiness of the clay. But when I saw the course advertised the other day something changed in me. I feel like it's time to try again. Watch this space for some bowls and cups and planters coming soon (I hope).

Buying: a small sized guitar for Pepper now that she's started learning.

Watching: the autumn flowers as they start to bloom.

Hoping: that all of the winter seeds I planted this week will have enough time to get established before the weather turns and winter kicks in.

Listening: to Robin DiAngelo talk about White Fragility on The Wheelers Centre podcast. I've listened to this podcast twice and I'm about to start again now that Bren has heard it and wants to discuss it with me. This is such an important issue and I feel like everyone should listen.

Saving: seeds. So many seeds. 

Bookmarking: Brunswick Music Festival events and gigs to go to. Have I told you that my sister Emily Ulman is the programmer? STAR!!! It's going to be such an incredible event. So many wonderful shows, so much diversity and more than 75% of all the artists feature at least one non-male member. #proudestsisteralert!! 

Opening: the dehydrator to check if the plum fruit leather is ready.

Giggling: at everything the kitten does. He's such a wild little guy.

Feeling: thrilled that despite the cabbage moth infestation my cauliflowers and broccoli are looking glorious. 

Obsessing: over the dahlias. Each and every one brings me so much joy it's ridiculous. Our house looks like a colourful festival. Every vase is in use, every surface is covered, every colour, every shape, every stem length. We've been talking about having a party at the end of this year but this week decided to hold off until next Feb/March. Of course we're going to have to wait for the flowers.

Wow, that felt quicker than usual. I wonder if I missed a few. In any case I feel like I've taken stock and captured this moment right now.

Please feel free to fill in a few of the prompts yourself in the comments.
Your interactions with my blog are one of my favourite parts of blogging.

So what are you saving, obsessing over, buying, hoping, wearing, needing, waiting for, enjoying, making? I'd love to know.

I hope you have a beautiful weekend friends. Ours will be spent in the garden and in the kitchen no doubt.

Lots of love,

Kate x

third day photo

It took us three days to get the first day of school photo this year.

On the first day, Wednesday, the early wake up and rush out the door was such a shock to the system after the long summer holidays that everyone was way too grumpy for me to even suggest it.

Instead we all five of us bundled into the car, drove all the way to the big girls' school, sat through their morning meeting, and then the other three of us spent the rest of the day wandering through The Garden of St Erth in the rain and the wind. 

We had such a lovely time. Miss Pepper grabbed the map and took us on the tour stopping at each significant tree and pointing out all of the plants she knows the names of. As mixed family farmers who barely get a chance to look up from the spot we're weeding, it's such a gift to look through another garden. To notice how cleverly they've interplanted vegetables in amongst their shrubs and flowers. To observe that the forest they're surrounded by, is the same as ours and how the garden nestled into a corner feels like a lush oasis. To see how seamlessly they've incorporated structures like arches and benches into the gardens without making it look old and formal. To recognise some plants and to be completely unfamiliar with others. To discuss our garden and how we can incorporate perennial borders, under-tree plantings and paths through the bush.

On the way out we bought some flowers, of course, and I satisfied my need to have more echinacea plants in my world. 

The big girls had good days too which was a bonus.

I didn't have any luck getting that 'first day photo' on the second day either.

Miss Pepper was straight out the door early to pick flowers for her new teacher and her new principal, but someone else had terrible period pain and then it just got too complicated. Instead my mum took the big girls off to school and we went to Pepper's first day assembly. And then coffee, and then home to the quiet we had been imagining for days.

Only it wasn't quite calm, or relaxing. The fierce wind that had blown in with the cool change a few days before had knocked over so many of the plants and everything needed tying up and staking or composting.

After that we went through and picked the cucumbers and tidied up the (still unripe) tomatoes.

All day I felt restless and agitated and couldn't work out if it was my way of adapting to the demands of the new school year, if it was the super moon and its accompanying winds, if it was the irritating insects that we're having problems identifying who are eating our precious dahlias, or if it's just because - no reason, no conclusion.

But all girls came home from their second days happy. Indi drove half way home from school, we picked a box full of plums, we went for a walk through the forest and to my great surprise, everyone was in bed by ten o'clock.

And then guess what?!

On the third day I got my photo. A few actually.

This year Indi is in year 12, Jazzy year 9 and Pepper year 5.

This morning they took me by complete surprise and came into the kitchen chirpy and happy. All three at once. So of course I grabbed my chance, shoved my new flowers at them and snapped photos as they made silly faces and posed. YES!!!

After that I drove them out to school. On the way home I listened to a podcast without any interruptions (!!) and then sat with my farmer boy in the sun-room reading in silence.

And so it begins: the timetables, the alarms, the driving, the homework, the organising, the watching the clock, the after school activities, the meetings, the emails, the juggling, the 'what's for dinner?', the checking the family diary, the bed times...I hope I can keep up, I hope I can stay on top of things, I hope I can be everywhere I need to be, I hope I can find some time for me in there somewhere...

I hope that they learn a lot, I hope that they love a lot of what they learn, I hope the world opens up to them a little bit more, I hope they have lots of adventures, I hope they find ways to cope with difficult situations, I hope they are patient and kind and are met with the same, I hope they find opportunities to lead and be led and above all, I hope this year is a really, really good one.

And just quickly before I go;
I'm reading - my mum's copy of The Break by Marian Keyes
I'm watching - (well actually watched and loved) - American Folk - The Movie
I'm listening to - the Modern Love podcast
I'm eating - new season's Jersey Mac apples, so close now
I'm hoping - that the wind dies down so I can plant all of my new flowers in the garden this afternoon
I'm cooking - plum leather in the dehydrator from the foxslane archives
I'm knitting - the front of my Mirehouse

Just before they left for school this morning Pepper asked me to consider changing my blog day to a Monday so I'm not still writing when the weekend arrives, Indi suggested I write this blog about the ever elusive first day of school photo, and Jazzy put on a funny voice and recited some of the questions I would probably end with.

So here they are - to be read in your silliest, posh voice.
Do you have a first day photo tradition in your family?
Do you think it still counts as a first if it's on the third?
(It just occurred to me that this is the last year that there'll be three in the first day of school photo. Woah! Now I'm especially glad I persevered.)
Do you have any other start of school rituals?
Do you miss them when they're gone?

I hope you have a wonderful weekend.

Bye now!

Love, Kate x

ps I have the words 'unapologetically herself' written on my hand in pen. I read them this morning in a chapter of my mum's latest manuscript and cannot let them go. How good!