my story in eight

These are the last eight photos I took off my camera.

Mostly with photo taking, I take a bunch of pictures all at once and download them soon after and blog them not long after that. In those cases I pretty much know what to expect. And as the photos flash onto the screen, more often than not, the words that tell their stories come too.

Other times, my camera sits on the kitchen table or near the front door for days at a time, only picked up for a quick snap here and there. After these times the downloading is more of a surprise and more fun. Random snapshots that tell the tales of my life at a moment in time. 

As the eight photos in this post downloaded I was half looking and half eating a feijoa. As they popped onto the screen I noticed how autumnal their colour pallet is. I realised that I am so very obviously the Mum of school girls now as none of the photos has little kids in them. And I saw that although a huge amount more than these eight events has gone on in my life over the past few days, these photos do tell the story of my late autumn beautifully.

Photo one of the kitchen garden up there, tells the story of tiny little lettuces and spinachs trying to put on as much growth as possible while there is still sunshine and a bit of warmth in the air before winter really kicks in. Our kitchen garden is my happy place these days. I am always kicking my clogs on and picking some herbs or greens for a meal, doing a spot of weeding or transplanting or admiring. Yesterday we noticed the first few broccoli of the season which was cause for much excitement.

Photo two is of the loveliest, chunkiest wool I am currently using to knit my farmer boy a new beanie. I don't know about you but I find it very difficult to source really chunky, soft, pure wool. This stuff is from New Zealand, I bought it in Ocean Grove last week and now I'm thinking I should have bought more. Details here.

Yesterday I drove past farmer Bren on his tractor wearing two beanies at once, so I think next up once I finish this beanie will be a balaclava.

Photo three is of a marker for a seed tray filled with onion seeds in the hot house. On Tuesday we filled the hot house with trays of onion seeds and leek seeds. I'm hoping they grow big and strong soon enough to transplant them into the garden and leave us the space to start the tomato season all over again in August.

Photo four is of the bottle tree in Autumn. I love how that tree and its bottles tells a different story each season. After a summer of thick green foliage that practically hid the bottles from view, the leaves slowly turned golden and reflected in the bottles' glass. And now as the leaves fall to a carpet below the tree the bottles remain, swaying and occasionally clinking in the cool wind.

Photo five is of the basil seed we saved from this year's crop to dry out and plant again next year. There may not be any fresh, green basil leaves to flavour our cooking for some time, but our freezer is filled with containers of pesto for the winter.

Photo six is of the carpet of autumn leaves I mentioned above. I remember when I used to live in suburban Melbourne autumn was always filled with raked up piles of autumn leaves to be burned, composted and sometimes run through. The leaves on our farm are a bit more free range, blowing around, making a pretty mess and then disintegrating back into the earth. I think they are terribly beautiful and they make me happy even though I know that the leaves on the back deck and in the entrance way are a sign of my bad housekeeping.

Picture seven is of a big bowl full of green-manure seeds I mixed up before planting. Doesn't it look like soup mix! This mix of fenugreek, broad beans, peas and vetch went in where the tomatoes came out of the garden. Our garden worked super hard making the vines and fleshy tomato fruit over the past six months and this green manure crop will feed the soil and prepare it for next spring's plantings.

And picture eight I took a few minutes ago. Picture eight is of some gorgeous wool felt I bought off lovely Lizzie this morning at Mill Rose. I have book mark plans for this pile. Book marks with little vintage caravans parked on top. The publicity campaign for my book has begun and these book marks will be a part of it. I'm both excited and nervous. The release date is still a few months away but there's loads to do before then. Eeeeeeep!

I hope your week is telling a wonderful story.
I hope it is warm, delicious and pleasing to the eye.

Ciao x