a few days ago

A few days ago we walked down the path at the back of our farm to collect armfuls of daffodils from the forest floor. Every year we visit this patch to admire the golden flowers and yet we have no idea who originally planted them. They're just outside our back gate and across a forest track with no other house or property in sight. Just miles and miles of Wombat State Forest. Sometimes it feels a bit eerie being in the middle of the forest, just on dusk, with the wind whispering through the trees, but then it also feels quite comforting to know that someone once lived there or passed through there in an autumn gone by and planted fat bulbs to flower for ever more.

We picked three bunches and left the rest for the forest. The girls laugh about how they'll one day tell their kids how they were always being photographed for my blog, but I know they love it. Moments like these feel like a gift to our future busy selves; laughing, dawdling, exploring, wondering, bickering, dreaming, singing.

A few days ago I filled up the tank of the brush cutter, pulled the cord at the top of the driveway and started making my way down. Usually I listen to my headphones while I do this type of work but this time I didn't want to waste the time it would take to find them. As I swept down the hill and around the bend I started remembering the story of a family of a boy on the autism spectrum who spent his days running around his backyard dragging a belt. It was strange but I could almost hear the father's voice telling his story and I could feel all the emotions I had connected to the story, vividly. 

It took me a while but eventually I realised that the story was a podcast interview I had listened to the last time I had cleared the gorse and blackberry and bracken from the same spot. My brain had connected the podcast to the position without me even knowing it. As I continued further down the driveway I remembered another story about a family of girls whose father had died. Without thinking I could feel their love for him and their great loss. Another podcast, another place.

I often worry about my brain. Coming from a line of Alzheimer's disease sufferers I guess it's inevitable. Sometimes I give myself little memory tests, sometimes I panic when I forget words or even how I've arrived at places, and then mysteriously my brain does something quite remarkable like connect entire stories I've heard to the places I heard them. What a mysterious organ.

A few days ago Miss Pepper got on a bike and taught herself to ride. I do know that ten is pretty old to be learning that particular skill, but somehow living on an unmade road in the middle of the forest way out of town, it just never happened. It did amaze me how quickly she took off though. It was like she decided, she wobbled a bit, fell off and grazed her knee and elbow, and then that was it, she was off. And has been riding around tractors and cars and mowers, up and down the driveway, ever since.

A few days ago Facebook told me that this time last year Indi was in Montenegro, this time last year I was swearing about all the rain and desperate for some sun, this time four years ago we caught a bee swarm, and this time four years ago I was on ABC radio's Life Matters promoting my book Vantastic and talking about life on the road.

A few days ago I had my hair cut into a long bob that just touches my shoulders and I love it. It feels fresh and easy and while it doesn't quite all fit into a pony tail anymore - I was so sick of wearing a pony tail every day anyway.

A few days ago we finished watching series four of Transparent and while I definitely didn't love it as much as I loved the first series, I really enjoyed it. 

A few days ago we started planning the celebrations for our Jazzy's fourteenth birthday. The year I started this blog she turned six and had a cupcake party and my dad wrote this comment that included an email Bren wrote just after Jazzy was born, under my post;

farmdocOctober 9, 2009 at 3:15 PM

Here is an email I received on 13.10.03:

Hi all,
I'm sitting here with my beautiful baby girl on my lap, listening to her tiny hiccups and watching her wonderful facial expressions.
She is just divine, an angel, a fairy.
She is 5 days old now.
She was born at 2.40 on Thursday 9-10-03 and was 7 pound and perfect.
Mum and baby are doing really well. They got back home last night and we are getting on with life with 2 kids.. WOW..
Indi is coping really well and will make a very good bossy sister..
If you didn't realize from the subject of this email we have named her
JARRAH ULMAN EISNER.
Jarrah is the Aboriginal name for the majestic Eucalyptus marginata, native to western Australia.
Hoping you are well and as happy us we are..
All our love
Bren Kate Indi & Jarrah.

If Jarrah brought joy back then, now she brings a million times more. To every one who knows her. Happy birthday to you, darling Jarrah. xxxxx

Gosh the other comments on those 2009 birthday posts bring back so many memories of sweet blog years gone by.

A few days ago on a long drive somewhere we stopped at a petrol station to use the toilet. As I passed through the fast food restaurant and saw the huge, plastic playground to the side it occurred to me that unusually, I'm okay with the approaching birthday season this year. I'm okay with everyone growing that little bit older and I'm okay with not having babies and toddlers anymore. I spent years and years in those toilets with my little girls, trying to distract them on the way back through from the sugary treats and then waiting for tedious hours while they yelled at me to watch them as they climbed up the plastic structures and slid back down again. Although I adored those chubby little toddlers, and although the teenage years are anything but straight forward and simple, I do feel better equipped to deal with them. I feel like a better mum for them. I really enjoy parenting them. And most of all I love closing the door of my own service station toilet cubicle on them.

A few days ago Bren and Jobbo pulled down the ugly carport that's been shading our house. They then took all the wooden beams from it, put them through the thicknesser and then bolted them to the kitchen wall. Since then we've been pulling things out of the pantry and filling up those shelves. Our clever architect friend Annabel has been trying to convince us forever to pull down our pantry next to let even more light in, but I'm just not sure if we're neat or minimalist enough.

A few days ago we spent the entire day clearing up around and inside one of our old sheds so we can use it again for storage and shelter. All day long we pulled the long vines of blackberry from the rafters and burnt them in the fire, dragged old treasures out, sorted through them, neatly stacked some of it back in again, gave some of it away and took the rest to the tip. Some seasons it feels like we're so crazy busy that we're only ever running trying to catch up, for some reason this year feels different. The orchards are looking good, we have lots of seeds planted, a new renovation under way and still time left over to catch up on long forgotten bits of the to-do list and maybe even tick some off.

I love how during the cleanout we all found own roles. I was in charge of blackberry removal and burning &%$#, Bren took charge of all the old farm bits and pieces inside, Indi was away, Jazzy came out occasionally and sang to us, and Miss Pepper made musical instruments out of old bits of pipe and built the cart above.

A few days ago I looked at four skeins of wool that Hannah from Circus Tonic Handmade sent me about a year ago and cast on a cardigan. My thoughts were that 400 grams probably wouldn't be enough yarn, but I could always make it a bit mixy matchy with something else once I ran out. So I downloaded a pattern that only went up to an eight year old size, cast on, added a few extra stitches here and there to try and make it a 10 year old size and off I went.

Looking at it now I think the front could fit well once the button band is knitted, but the back seems all kinds of boxy and baggy. Now I can't decide if I should continue and hope for the best or pull it apart and knit something more risk free that is graded to her correct size. Ahhhhh what would you do?

And that's me from a few days ago all the way through to now. About to post this and then take the girls to get haircuts, about to grab a couple of rice crackers for lunch on the way out, about to swap my gym clothes for town clothes - not in that particular order.

How about you? How have your last few days been?
Could you get rid of your pantry and live with open shelves?
Would you continue knitting something that possibly may not ever fit?
Would you feel sad if your long haired girls wanted to be medium haired girls?
Do you have anything fun planned for this weekend?

See you next week.

Love Kate x

forest dancing

Hello honey bunches,

How are you feeling? How's your week been?

It's so gorgeous to have you here. I'm imagining you sitting in a comfy chair with your shoes kicked off. I'm imagining you've made yourself a hot drink and grabbed your lap top and have claimed these next few minutes for yourself. It's quiet, you're warm enough, nobody needs anything from you, there's nothing to do, you're here with me.

I've been sitting here scrolling back and forth through these photos wondering what I'm going to write about today. I feel good. I feel like my week's flowed from one thing to the next and I've kept up with it.   No major breakthroughs, and no major breakdowns (on my part anyway).

Maybe I should take you through the highlights...

I had my car serviced in Ballarat, we took the girls to Melbourne to buy overalls for Jazzy, we watched and fell in love with Given the movie, I drove the girls to school a bunch of times, I baked bread twice, and I went to gym three times.

I almost finished and have LOVED reading a book called Lab Girl: A story of Trees, Science and Love, I was emailed by lots of businesses wanting me to create content for them for free, I collected kindling from the forest, split lots of wood and kept the home fires burning and I started knitting another Guernsey Wrap for my Mum.

I planted peas, lettuces and leeks in the green house and broad beans and onions in the garden, I watched Bren and Jobbo build the most beautiful open shelves for the kitchen wall and I started to fill them up with jars and plates and bunches of flowers and I spent the most magical time in the top orchard picking daffodils with Miss Pepper.

I comforted all three of my girls who were upset at different times. I also woke them up in the morning, cooked them food, listened to them, laughed with them and kissed their sweet cheeks as they went to bed at night. I tried my hardest not to let the incessant rain bother me too much, I froze my toes off and I listened to and loved the Reply All podcast - The Case of the Phantom Caller.

I had an accidental coffee with my Mum, we had a pizza dinner reunion of the cast of Pepper's play and we remembered that this time last year we were flooded in and so even though it feels wet, it can't be that wet.

I watched the garden finally start to show some growth again, I saw so many joeys in kangaroo pouches and I felt optimistic in my heart for this growing season. I lay awake a lot in the night, I listened carefully to the sounds of the night, I tried again to meditate and I hoped that none of my girls inherit the bad sleeping gene.

We waved Miss Jazzy off on a five day hike, we waved Miss Indi off on an overnight trip to Melbourne and we picked Miss Pepper up from school a bit early because she had a tummy ache.

I counted five days for Pepper and nine days for the big girls until the end of third term, I dreamt of a break in the routine and of all the extra things we'll be able to fit into our days. I found chewing gum all through a load of washing, I hid in my bedroom in a grump and I felt grateful when Bren and Indi helped me scrape it all off.

I voted YES for marriage equality, I bought the sweetest Love is Love pins from My Bearded Pigeon, and I wished for a world where everyone feels equal to be who they want to be, love who they want to love and marry the person they love. It's that simple.

How about you? What have you been up to?
Have you listened to any good podcasts?
Have you had any great ideas?
Have you needed to hide in your bedroom in a grump?
Or dance to loud music in the street?

And with that I bid you farewell so I can go and look after my sick baby girl on the couch.
I hope your weekend is wonderful.

Love Kate

xx

the girl in the forest

Late last Sunday afternoon Indi was away camping, Jazzy was up at the house, and Pepper, Bren and I were hanging out by the windmill dam. It was the end of a stinking hot, dry day and just sitting by the water's edge, listening to it gently lapping at the sandy shore, was soothing my frazzled brain and cooling me right down.

Pepper was floating out in the middle of the dam and Bren and I were chatting about something or other, or nothing, when one of us noticed that our dogs at the top of the hill were barking more than usual. At first we dismissed it and kept talking. But when it didn't stop and we listened closer, we heard another sound in amongst the barking. Bren thought it might have been the peacock that has recently made our garage roof its residence, I thought it might have been someone walking past on a forest track, or perhaps it might have even been a car coming up from our back gate.

But the barking continued and we still couldn't identify the other noise.

So Bren got in his car and drove up to the top of the hill to check it all out. By the time he got there the dogs had calmed down a bit but he could still hear shouting coming from somewhere in the forest and although he couldn't work out what it was about, something didn't feel right. So he went inside the house, put boots and socks on, grabbed his phone, some water and the first aid kit and drove out into the forest to look around.

Meanwhile Pepper and I were still down by the dam when the noise we'd heard amid the barking, suddenly became a very distinct scream. High pitched and terrified and LOUD! It was a girl's voice and she was screaming for help and the immediate phrase that jumped into my mind was blood curdling.

Every single hair on my body was sticking up and my heart was about to jump out of my chest but somehow I had to remain calm for Pepper. And as she screamed I imagined she was a girl who had been kidnapped years ago and held in a dark room somewhere but had now escaped and was terrified and running for her freedom. (Bren thinks I read too many scary books).

Even though the screaming continued, Bren meanwhile was much calmer and more rational than I. Thank goodness for Bren. His first thought was that someone had been bitten by a snake.

He drove out the back gate and slowly along a forest track when he saw the girl wandering through the trees looking quite distressed. He approached her carefully and cautiously. The sun was burning down, she was wearing a sun dress and had scratches all over her arms and legs.

As soon as she saw him with her big terrified eyes she started screaming. She was screaming for help, for her boyfriend, and for all sorts of other stuff too. That's what we must have heard down by the dam.

He told her that she was safe. He told her that he lived close by and had water for her to drink. And he asked her if she was hurt, or if she had taken any drugs, and what her name was. She screamed and screamed. And in between screams she told him that she had lost her friends and her boyfriend, SCREAM! She was 18 and from Melbourne, SCREAM! She wasn't on drugs but had borderline personality disorder, SCREAM!

In the middle of all this I called Bren, he'd been away for far too long and we were scared and stranded and worried about him. I never expected him to answer his phone, but thankfully he did. He briefly told me the story of the girl in the forest. He'd given her some water but she refused to get in his car. I told him I was going to call an ambulance.

In all my life I have never called 000 for emergency before but I'm pleased to report that I stayed calm and even though I couldn't answer a lot of the questions they asked me, I told them what I knew and they told me that they'd call Bren to fill in the blanks.

Meanwhile Bren had been surprised to watch as the distraught girl accepted his phone and using her two thumbs pressed in her boy friend's number. He was sure that her shaking fingers wouldn't have been able to hit their targets, but they did. He called the number twice and no one answered but then tried a third time and the boyfriend did.

The distressed girl was sitting on the ground crying. Bren was on the phone trying to make sense of what her boyfriend was saying, and then the ambulance called him, and then the police, and then just to add another call to all those he was juggling, me.

After he told us that he had spoken to her people and that the police and ambulance were on their way, I got Pepper out of the water and we walked barefoot back up to the house. She was intrigued and wanted to know every question the emergency services had asked me, and what my answers had been. She was fascinated by all the details and didn't seem frightened at all despite the thumping heart next to her, the hand gripping hers tightly, and the tears that streamed down my face as I told her about the poor, frightened girl in the forest.

When we'd been in the house for long enough for me to shower her off and make us both a cool drink, Bren came back home. We threw questions at him fast and wanted so many answers, but it took him quite some time to be able to respond. Poor thing.

The ambulance people had asked him a lot of questions on the phone and then told him what to do. He wasn't to give her any food or more to drink just in case, but he was to keep her safe if he could. When he worked out that the local police woman didn't know the forest tracks as well as he did, he'd made a plan to meet her on the main road. Luckily by this time he'd calmed the girl down enough to get her into his car, but she was very distressed when she learnt that the police were involved. She was worried she'd get into trouble.

When they arrived at the road they were met by three police cars, which is unheard of in this area, and the boyfriend and his family. The police interviewed Bren on one side of the car and the girl on the other. The boyfriend and his family were kept completely separate. She was still pretty upset and had her head in her hands, but they wouldn't let Bren answer for her, even the details he knew.

After a while they helped the girl out of the car and they let him go. Just like that. No one thanked him, or told him what had happened, or even what was going to happen. He just drove away.

Not long after he'd arrived home and finally started telling us his story, the ambulance arrived. Ours was the original address they'd been given but we'd assumed they'd be redirected when the girl had met up with the police. They'd even driven past all the police cars on their way to our place. We gave them all the information we knew and sent them on their way.

Half an hour later when we drove past on our way into town for dinner, all signs of the story were gone.

Had they taken her to hospital? Had this happened before? Where had she come from? Had she run away from them, or them from her?

Later that night as we got into bed my farmer boy couldn't close his eyes without seeing her. The next day when we went back down to the windmill dam to swim we listened for her.

I just hope that wherever she is, she feels safe.



x

seventeenth

Over the past few day I've had a bit of a funny feeling in my tummy. Indi is away, Bren and I have been working like crazy, and the little girls have been pretty much left to work things out by themselves.

Admittedly they've done pretty well, they've played every board game in the house, they've choreographed an entire show and made invitations and costumes, they've written songs and laid around talking and eaten us out of house and home. But every now and then when I kick off my dirty boots and come inside I feel guilty. Everyone they know is off doing fun things and they are stuck here.

Bren likes to talk about the fact that traditionally kids got these long summer weeks off school to help with the harvest. Summer is busy times on farms and we just can't get away.

This morning we walked through the forest, pulled some fences out, and picked some wild flowers on the way. I tried to make both of the girls join us but only one was interested. The other stayed home and wrote a poem. The guilty feeling returned. I carried it around for hours. It was silly I understood, but it just sat there uncomfortably.

And then the strangest thing happened. I got a message from my past self. My self of exactly one year ago, in the form of a Facebook memory. 

Last year on this date I wrote a blog about this exact feeling. This is what I wrote;

The other day, before we went to the beach, we were out somewhere when I overheard someone asking Miss Pepper if she was enjoying her school holidays and what was the best thing she'd done so far. I heard her hesitate and then tell this person that she hadn't really done much at all, just lots of hanging out with her sisters on the farm, playing and doing jobs. 

When I heard her say that I felt a bit guilty. I imagined her in a classroom full of students on the first day of school listening to stories of big fancy adventures and cool outings, and of her sitting there quietly, feeling like she had nothing to compare, nothing to share. Pretty much the same way I cringe inside every time I hear a grown up ask my non Santa visited children what Santa brought them for Christmas. 

When we came home they resumed the game they'd been playing for days. And as I watched them in the golden light and listened to them giggling with sister glee, it occurred to me that all busy year long, these are the times we dream of. These slow days that meander along from one activity to the next, going to bed late and waking up later, eating when we are hungry, getting dressed in dirty farm clothes, wearing yesterday's braids, reading an entire book in one day, listening to an album so many times that you know every single word by heart, playing games that go on for days and days, picking fruit still warm off the trees, eating berries and plums until the juice runs down our chins and our tummies ache, walking through golden grass to feed the animals, spending time together without the demands and responsibilities of the school year. 

These are our summer days. These days are golden and just right.

Amazing right! Can you believe I'd even started fretting about what they'd tell their classmates about their holidays?!

So here's to the next two weeks of golden slow days. Here's to sunshine and games and kitten cuddles and letting our minds wander. I feel so much better now.

I hope things are settled and smooth and sweet in your world.

Lotsa love,

Kate

xoxo

PS Photo credit to Miss Pepper for the one of me and Bren!!

a birthday in the forest

It's funny how time changes us. How the years help us to rearrange our priorities and see cracks in what we once held as truth. Seasons pass, and we experience, and we learn, and hopefully we grow. And sometimes the things we once thought to be law are not the only way any more.

Sometimes it's hard to let go, but often we have no choice.

Three years ago after planning and preparing and throwing 25 birthday parties for my girls, I wrote a blog post stating my 10 ingredients for a top birthday party. Since that post we have celebrated seven more birthdays in much the same way; themes, invitations, crafts, activities, games, food, cake, presents.

Some of my fondest childhood memories are from my own childhood birthday parties and some of my best parenting moments are from parties we've thrown for our girls.



But this year something felt different. Something had changed.

I'm not sure if it was the fact that we had just spent three months away from the farm and were feeling completely overwhelmed with all that we had to do upon our return. If maybe after 32 birthday parties we felt burnt out and in need of a change. If the fact that four of our birthdays fall in a five week period would mean that planning and throwing parties would be all that I would have time for upon our return. If the thought of 10 or 20 kids running wild for three hours with their inevitable sugar highs and lows didn't feel all that appealing. If we needed a break from planning and playing the same old games...I don't know.

But once I had allowed myself to acknowledge the doubt, there was no turning back.

And then a couple of months ago in Greece, after overhearing the intricate and in-depth plans for a Harry Potter themed eighth birthday party, I made my decision for certain. This year would be birthday extravaganza free.
 

I have to admit there were some tears and a MASSIVE tantrum to begin with. Birthdays and friends and treats and presents have become a package deal.

And there was a huge chunk of guilt on my part too. I knew that our decision was right, but it hurt my heart to deny my loved ones what they so desperately wanted.
 

But what I wanted and what I looked forward to, was a complete change of plan. I wanted to reinvent our way of celebrating, even if only for this year.

I wanted to really focus on the handmade; for presents, for activities and for snacks. I wanted to keep it as small and as intimate as could be. I wanted to put an emphasis on this beautiful environment that we are lucky enough to call home and gorgeous springtime that makes our special days sunny and bright. And mostly, I wanted to look at the birthday person and plan a celebration that suited them.



On the weekend we celebrated Miss Indi's birthday, with a pancake breakfast, a hand knitted crown (raveled here), a pile of hand made cards, a tiny spoon necklace carved from apple-wood and lots of freshly cut bunches of flowers.



In the afternoon we five and her grandparents took a table into the forest and had a picnic made up of some of her favourite foods. We made gods eye's, we listened to her favourite music (which is also her grandparents' fave music), we started stringing up our forest weaving loom and farmer Bren carved the beginnings of a sycamore spoon.

It really felt like we were all gathered to celebrate our freshly turned 15 year old. It felt like we had time, that we were really ourselves and it made me happy.



And even though I have no idea how we'll celebrate next year, I have loved this year and hope that some of our new found ways of celebrating each other become family traditions. The week's lead up making cards and presents, the bush walk, the chocolate chip cookies, the picnic, the hand knitted crown, the pancakes, the birthday person as DJ, the forest craft.

The simple yet perfect celebration of someone we adore.

Five instagram Fridays

Five Fridays have passed since I first told you about The Centre of Contemporary Photography's instagram competition. Five weeks of wondering and exploring the one word prompt given to us, five weeks of taking lots of maybe shots, and five weeks of considering the way I use instagram, the way the other contestants use instagram and what that all means in the scheme of things.

And of course it means five Fridays of uploading the final photo, five Fridays of refreshing my feed constantly to see what the other participants have posted and five Fridays of second guessing myself, of feeling happy, of feeling unprofessional, cliche, inadequate, proud and pleased.

So let me take you on a journey back through those last five Fridays and tell you a bit about the story behind each of my photos.

WEEK 4 | STRANGER

I had spent the few days before the fourth Friday at The Slow Living Workshop and even though I'd had my phone out taking pics the entire time, and even though I had an idea that I'd like to submit something with flowers, I drove out of there thinking that I would have to post my entry a day after. That a Saturday photo would have to be better than no photo at all.

But late that night, sitting in my car waiting for Indi to finish her school production, I found this one amongst the millions I'd taken that week. It felt perfect. Like it represented the theme and my few days exactly. The stranger in black, the contrasting yellow of the wattle and the incredibly beautifully styled table.

I captioned it - I find these internet friendships we form so interesting. We are strangers yet we know intimate details about each other's lives.



WEEK 5 | TIME

My caption - These two and their sister. Their wobbly teeth, their birthdays, their new centimetres, their new tricks, their insights, their favourite songs, their squabbles, their seasons, their accomplishments, the books they finish, the year levels they complete, each day, each hour, each minute.

I woke them up at 5.30am that Friday. Jazzy wouldn't get up. Thankfully these two did. And thankfully the greys turned to blues, turned to golden orange and became awesome. Hand holding children and sunrises are totally cliche, but for a good reason I think. There are not many more humbling experiences than watching night become day, then watching it through their eyes, and then watching them become who they are to be.



WEEK 6 | UP CLOSE

No caption this week. No close up of beach washed up pebbles, no close ups of tropical flowers or leaves or fruit.

Our Indi. On the walk through the jungle from the beach back to the house. Sandy hair, holiday face, content.



WEEK 7 | MIRROR IMAGE

It took me a week to get this shot. Each morning for a week I'd run past the Port Douglas marina at 6.30 and hope for the best, but each day it was too windy and the ripples in the water disturbed the shot I hoped to take.

Until the seventh Friday. On that day I ran, I photographed just in case and not until I got home and flicked through my photo stream did I realise I'd gotten it. I flipped it for fun, didn't caption it and posted it before 8am, record!!



WEEK 8 | CONTRAST

Last Friday morning I walked through our forest with a bucket of watered down clay we had taken from our dam and a paint brush. I chose three blackened trees, loaded some podcasts on my phone and got to work painting stripes.

I borrowed this idea from our wonderful friend and local artist Petrus Spronk. A few months ago he came over to our house and shared a DVD of his own works using clay to paint the trees near his home. He is fascinated with the horizontal stripes in the vertical forest. And we all loved hearing the stories of his beautiful images as much as we loved looking at the photos of them.

Totally and completely inspired, I asked his permission to paint some of our own blackened forest and to my delight he agreed.

So on the eighth Friday I painted, and while it wasn't exactly easy to make even stripes on the charred bark, it was meditative. And when I finally stood back, I liked what I saw. And I photographed it and then I came down the hill to the house and posted it. I love that I can see the stripy trees from my kitchen window when I am doing the dishes.

My caption reads - Horizontal lines in an otherwise vertical forest. White dam clay against the 2009 bushfire burnt trees. With love and gratitude for the concept to my artist friend Petrus Spronk.

And that's it! Until this Friday of course. Better get my thinking cap on.

If you are following this on instagram I'm sorry for the repetition.
If you'd like to see my first three pics you can check them out here.
You can click on the #ccpsalonig hashtag on instagram to see what the other nine grammers are posting.
And if you feel like it you can even join in too by posting your own responses to the prompts using the #diyccpsalon hashtag.

Phew, did you get all that? I hope so.

I also hope you are well and happy.

Until next time, may your light be just right.

Big love! xx

cutting the firewood

Life in the forest is funny. Practically the moment after we finish worrying about the threat of bush-fires, we start lighting fires.

One day we have bags packed at the front door filled with our valuables, we have water pumps filled with petrol ready to go and we have a list on the fridge with every one's task, should the worst come to the worst and we have to evacuate.

And the next day the temperature drops and our priorities change. Just like that. Now instead of worrying about fire, we're worrying about the fire going out.

In our little home in the forest, the fire cooks our food and keeps us warm. Over the wintry days we are always scrunching up bits of newspaper, gathering twigs and sticks for kindling, splitting chunks of wood and constantly opening the cooker door to make sure it's still going and burning hot.

When we first moved here I used to cry every time a tree was cut down on our farm. I used to mourn the habitat and the beautiful part of our environment. 13 years later I am more practical. I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad, it just is. These days I know that living on the edge of the Wombat State Forest, with 20 acres of bushland as our own, it is important to manage our trees. I know that we need to get rid of trees that grow too close to our house, that occasionally we need to thin out small sections of the forest in order to let some of the trees have more access to sunshine and thereby grow, and I know that we need to use these choices to cut firewood to heat our home and to cook our food. I also know that each year we plant hundreds of fruit, nut, native and exotic trees in unforested areas of our farm.









Over the past few days we've been cutting and splitting and stacking the wood that will do these important jobs in 2016. For wood to be hot burning and efficient it needs two years to season and dry out.

Last week my farmer boy carefully selected the six trees to come down and marked them. Bob the tree man came early on Thursday morning and cut them down. We built a bonfire as tall as a house with all the small branches and leaves and watched and listened to it crackle as all the oily leaves caught and burnt. Then Bob cut the trees into rounds and we split them, carried them and stacked them, me and farmer Bren and my dad.

This year for the first time we hired a hydraulic wood splitter. In the past we've always done it by hand which is certainly quieter and more idyllic. Farmer Bren still thinks he can keep up by hand but let me tell you that after watching this thing slice through a one metre round as if it were butter, I'm never going back.

So far we've done 16 cubic metres, with another eight still to split. It is heavy, loud, dirty work. When we come in at night I have to take my overalls off by the back door and shake all the wood chips out before I come inside. It is hard to imagine my hands will ever be clean again.

But there is nothing quite like the satisfaction of coming inside after a hard day's work. That feeling and knowledge that the effort we are putting in now will keep us and my parents warm and fed in two years time. That we are looking after ourselves, planning for the future, teaching our children practical life skills.

On sunshine-filled autumn days like these days, I feel so happy to be living like this. It makes so much sense.

I hope you have a gorgeous week my friends.

Big love,

xx