foxglove love

After our exam week away in a house in Macedon, after Indi's 18th birthday, after cocktails and dinners and dancing in the city to celebrate her, after Camberwell market, and after finally picking up our Jazzy from the airport, we came home. 

As someone who lives her life in bite-sized manageable portions, for weeks it had felt like the night of Sunday the 18th was when one portion stopped and Monday the 19th was a new beginning.

I dreamed that I would wake up on the Monday morning with the happy, comforting thought that all of my people were under our roof, snuggled up in their warm beds. And then I would go out and get stuck straight into my garden. I hoped to spend the next few days planting out every single pot in the greenhouse. I couldn't wait to begin.

I got dressed in my overalls and work boots, I popped a podcast in my ears and off I went.

But when I got there what I found wasn't exactly what I had expected.

What I found was a jungle. Weeds so thick I could hardly see the plants, grass so high I was scared I would step on a snake walking down the rows. There was no way I would be planting anything in that garden that day. I didn't know where to start, I couldn't work out what to do, I stood there feeling upset and out of control for a very long time.

After a while the words in my headphones started filtering into my brain and my consciousness. Coincidentally I was listening to a podcast that was talking about how feelings of anxiousness and panic can be compared to a working dog with no sheep. All that energy and enthusiasm and focus and drive, with no place to go. 

I was the dog, I needed to move my sheep/seedlings into their new paddock/garden, I needed to get practical, I needed an outlet, I needed a job.

So I mowed all the paths and I weeded some of the beds and when my farmer boy came over we pulled out some old crops, planted some more and then mulched them. After a while I began to see that things were looking more manageable, I felt less overwhelmed and I started to calm down. That evening I worked until it got too dark to see.

On Tuesday it poured with rain and the temperatures plummeted. I couldn't risk exposing my seedling babies to the elements, nor did it look like I should as the forecast for the rest of the week only looked colder and wetter and windier.

So the week that was supposed to be all about planting and staking and irrigating, instead ended up being spent mostly indoors...

spending time with our traveler. Looking at her pictures, listening to her stories, asking her questions, cuddling her, admiring her and feeling so grateful for the adventures she had and to have her back home.

Spinning fleece into wool. I'm still not great at it but I'm completely obsessed. I wrote once about how I was scared to start spinning my own yarn because it would take time away from the all important knitting. Well I'm here to report that it has. Absolutely! Apart from Indi's birthday crown, I've hardly knitted a stitch in weeks. And I'm okay with that. Happy even. It feels like it's adding to my knitting process rather than subtracting from it. I can't imagine how extra special it'll feel once I start creating something from what I've spun. I guess it's making a slow craft even slower but also so much richer. Lucky I'm not in a hurry.

I've been reading my sister Abby's copy of The Nowhere Child which is fast paced and suspenseful and completely unputdownable.

In between showers I pulled up one bed of garlic and then decided to leave the rest for another few weeks.

We finally divided our dahlia tubers. I would have loved to have planted them already but with all this rain it felt like too great a risk. Hopefully tomorrow.

I watched our poppies about to pop and begged them to wait until after the rains and it looked like they might have listened.

 I picked huge posies of roses and sweet peas and irises and peonies to brighten up the house.

And I've LOVED spending time as a family of five again, listening to Jazzy write a song on the guitar about her trip, watching Indi rediscovering life away from the pressures of school, walking through the garden collecting treasures with Pepper, admiring Bren's ongoing shed renovations, spending time in my studio, watching my girls comforting and cuddling and encouraging each other, and trying to remember that all this rain is such a blessing just before summer.

And sitting here right now writing this I can see that although this week didn't turn out how it was meant to, case in point being the still full to bursting greenhouse, it did turn out pretty wonderfully. Except for the cold, I haven't liked one single second of that.

Enough about me, how about you?
How has your week been?
Has it gone to plan? Or veered off wildly?
Can you relate to that sheep dog without any sheep feeling?
What flowers have you been picking from your garden?
What podcasts have you been loving?

I have to go now, Indi, Jazzy and Bren have come into my studio. Indi is trying on outfits for her graduation tonight and I need to focus.

Have a beautiful weekend my friends.

So much love to ya!

Kate x

Friday night blog

One of my girls told me the other day that she wondered if she was spending too much time on social media lately looking at people having fun in the sun on the other side of the world at the beach and by swimming pools. She wondered if I thought it might be a problem. The funny thing in our house, is that our girls are so much more responsible and aware of their social media habits and the impact they have on their lives and thought patterns than I am.

After we spoke about it for a while I realised that I've been doing the same. I'm not looking at cute teenagers in vintage bikinis under umbrellas on pristine beaches, but I am most definitely hunting for photos of brightly coloured rows of summer flowers, farmers and gardeners working in their fields and orchards in the sunshine, women and families in summer dresses, and other pictures where the light streaming in looks warm and golden.

It's freezing here. It's often misty, the skies are white and there's icy cold moisture in the air. My face hurts from the cold and when I go outside I have to wear so many layers of clothing and scarves and hats and gloves that I can hardly move.

The following photos that I've taken over the past few days, one week after the solstice, one month into winter, are the exact opposite of those that I've been gazing dreamily at; they're dark and they're moody and they look cold, but maybe if you've  been sweltering in the sunshine on the other side of the world, they'll be exactly what you've been looking for to cool you down (yeah right!). They tell the story of our season anyway.

Our big girls have been on school holidays for the past week and there has been non-stop guitar strumming, lyric learning and melody writing going on. It's been such a joy to have their music floating through the air, down corridors, from behind closed doors, in the lounge room, in the kitchen, in the sun room, in bedrooms. Once I had to ask for a few moments of silence so I could concentrate on a piece of writing and follow a thought through, but the rest of the time I can't stop smiling and singing along and wondering if they know how lucky they are to have this passion and how awesome it is that they can share it, and wondering how things are going to change now that Pepper is on school holidays too.

As I wrote at the end of last week's blog, my farmer boy got on his lathe and turned a couple of door handles for my studio. It took him a few goes to find the right wood, and then the right shape, but now that they're complete I'll be reminded of him and his craftsmanship every time I open and close my studio door. Bespoke door handles...seriously!

And speaking of my studio, this week the insulation went into the walls.

I spent a few days with my farmer boy pushing floor boards from the old Malvern Star factory through the thicknesser.

Then Jobbo cut them to size.

And then they started lining the interior walls with them. They'll need another light sand to smooth them down, but gosh they're looking great. And by the end of today they'll hopefully be close to done and it'll be time to fit out the inside. Can you imagine! Honestly I'm not sure I really can yet. It feels kind of huge and unbelievable. But also ridiculously exciting at the same time.

And despite the icy cold air, we've been out farming. We finally finished pulling the nets off the trees, I pulled out masses of summer flowers, started digging up the dahlia tubers, planted some more bulbs, some sweet peas and some hollyhocks and finished with the wood splitter.

Mostly, once I'm out and into a job I quite enjoy it, once my blood is pumping, and once I'm making a difference, but psyching myself up to get out in it is another thing entirely.

I've almost finished knitting another pair of Uppsala slippers for Bren's dad John.

I've been reading and really enjoying my Mum's library copy of The Good Brother.

And we're watching Friday Night Lights again but this time with our big girls who are loving it.

I was just about to sign off for the week when I heard a bit of activity outside and decided to go and check it out for myself. And then when I saw what everyone was getting excited about of course I had to go and get my camera and include you too.

The beautiful hand-nailed Malvern Star floor wall, the windows, my farmer boy builder, and the chairs that I had seen outside a shop in town today when we were driving home from Pepper's parent teacher interview. I screeched to a halt outside but there was already a woman there buying them. I sat in the car wishing for her to change her mind while Bren went out to negotiate. He asked the shop owner but she said he was five minutes too late so he started walking back to the car.

I can't tell you how disappointed I felt. I've been scouring the internet for months for these chairs and then here they were outside a shop in our town. It felt like a sign.

But then, what do you know, the shop lady came to the window of the car and asked for our phone number because she wasn't convinced the other lady would buy them. And then as we were hunting for a pen and piece of paper she decided that she wouldn't. They were too much of a risk for her Airbnb. They were ours! Some for the sun-room, one for the deck of my studio and maybe one for inside. I'm thrilled!

Thrilled! If only it wasn't hurting cold outside I'd move in immediately.

I had a conversation this morning with an old blogging buddy of mine from eight+ years ago. She stopped making and blogging years ago and it felt a bit weird to say that I'm still here, still creating, photographing, writing and still pressing publish. She's moved on but I've stayed in the same place. After all this time, after all these posts. But then as we hung up and I plugged my card reader into my computer and sat down to write today's blog, I felt so pleased to be here. It felt like coming home. Who knows how long I'll go on for, but for now I'm happy to prioritise Friday blog day and I guess that as long as it feels good, I still will.

So tell me lovelies, what have you been working on today?
What's the soundtrack to your life at the moment?
What's your favourite way to deal with weather that hurts you?
And what are you still doing after all this time?
Do tell.

See you next week!

Love, Kate x