The First of Many......

I've had my first volunteering experience with the CWA......Australia Day found me up at 5:30am for a 6am start at the local church...helping serve up free breakfast to 60 or so lucky souls...sponsored by the local council, Anglican Church, Rotary and the CWA.....following the breakfast I also served free tea and coffee at the Australia Day festival in the local civic park from 5:30pm until 7:30....these old country girls really know how to look after the locals......I loved it !!

A few of the CWA ladies taking a quick break with a well earned cuppa..

Some attendees singing along with the band to Advance Australia Fair..

It really warms the heart to help out among the community...I was so glad to be a part of this lovely group of committed country women...there's so much I can learn from them all...kindness and generosity of spirit just for starters.

Those Darn Apron Strings .....

Is it ever to late to have an epiphany about your relationship with your children??....Recently I have realised that I still try to control  advise my adult daughters occasionally.......always unintentionally ....but now finally understand how frustrating this must be for them.   They are grown women and I need to let them make their own decisions regardless of what I think...and stop voicing my own opinions on how they do things....my comments are always efforts to help them and protect them....but it really is time to cut the apron strings and let my beautiful girls live their lives without mum's two cents worth giving them grief....let them work things out in their own way and stop trying to protect them (from whatever it is I am trying to protect them from?).....It's time to realise that perhaps mum doesn't always know best....even though she thinks she does.

Letting go is never easy....but it feels good to finally recognise it .

More Than Just Tea & Scones......

Yesterday I joined the local Country Women's Association....they were just fabulous....admittedly I am a decade or three younger than the majority of members...but what an amazing bunch of elderly ladies they are....so motivated, focused and welcoming... I was a little disconcerted when one of the gorgeous septuagenarians sat down at the piano and belted out a verse of the national anthem and they all sang along....this apparently happens at the beginning of each meeting...but I'm sure I'll get into the swing of things....... .I'm really excited to be joining the group.  Have already put my hand up to volunteer on Australia Day at a memorial breakfast at the local church hall....6am start !!...these old country gals really do an amazing job...fingers crossed I wont let the team down...hope I can keep up with them....seriously...they are very enthusiastic and committed and what they lack in physicality they more than make up for in endurance !  I'm also hoping to gather a few delicious recipe's ...... the afternoon tea yesterday had the most amazing slices...watch this space .

The insignia for the CWS....a great bunch of ladies.

Spent this morning in the vegie garden and am slowly getting a bit of variety growing out there....the beetroots have started coming up, my first cucumber, early snow peas and silverbeet....I need to find  a good recipe to use the silverbeet as I'm not really a big fan...but have made a commitment that we eat everything that we grow. 

The garden is finally starting to show some results

Currently reading the 2015 Pulitzer Prize winner...All the light we cannot see....the author is definitely an incredibly gifted writer and the story is fabulous...but the continual flipping back between time periods and characters made it a less enjoyable read for me...would still recommend this as a great book and well worth the effort.

2015 Pulitzer Prize winner...always a controversy over the winning novel.

It's going to be stinking hot here again tomorrow....41c and then some in other areas....this is the hottest summer I can remember for quite a long time.....hurry up and grow trees in my yard !

Keeping it Simple......

I had a quick burst of zucchini's which now unfortunately seem to have halted...I think it's the weather...very hot and very windy days are not the friend of many of the vegies in the garden.....did manage to make a vegie lasagne using up the four zucchini's I had managed to grow...had a mixed "left over" vegie layer, pumpkin, tomato and zucchini and a spinach and ricotta layer...topped off with cheese sauce.... washed down with a glass of sav blanc....not too shabby !

 

Last night's vegie lasagne....wasn't brave enough to make my own lasagne sheets just yet !

All the vegies are good for you....not so sure about all that lovely  melted cheese though.

The old charmer over the back fence is back from his Queensland holiday and popped his head over when I was out feeding the feathered girls......he had a couple of ears of corn he had grown so I swapped him for a capsicum from my garden.....he also bought over  a pile of silverbeet that went to seed while he was away which he tossed to the chooks....we talked tomatoes and cucumbers before he  headed back home....my tomatoes are a bit lacklustre.....there are tomatoes but the plants are still very small....hhmmmmm....I am blaming the weather again !!...although old Les tells me it's because I'm not planting basil next to them and using magnetics like he is.......maybe next year.


Tomato and chilli from my garden....swapped the neighbours corn cobs  for one of my capsicums.

 Today was also bath the dogs day......they hate the bath and it is quite the struggle....I think I get more water on me and the laundry than I get on them....final result is two lovely white fluffy girls....impossible to get a picture of them together....they won't sit still long enough....they are a pair of characters and nothing alike in personality...one easy going and one very highly strung...I have a favourite...I know ...it's wrong....but they don't know so it's ok....I love them both.

Daisy always smiling...

Daphne  nervous as always....

A New Year....A New Day

2016 arrived without it's usual bells and whistles for me.....I had a tough lead up to Christmas and wasn't really prepared... or in the festive spirit...very unlike me. But the start of a fresh year always rejuvenates me and inspires me to get back to basics and doing the things that make me most happy.  I have finally had a go at making my own pasta with the machine that has been waiting expectantly to be used for quite a long time......I definitely need a lot more practice ...it looked okay but I think the texture was not quite right ... my lovely husband ate it anyway, but I thought it was very ordinary.  Hopefully practice will make perfect and I will keep at it.

I have planted out the existing vegie beds as we await for major yard construction to be started.  We need to add additional retaining walls as the new yard is quite steep and I want more vegie growing room...you can never have too many vegie beds...The soil here in Gippsland is reddish clay..... needs a fair bit of help to get stuff growing in it.  It's also quite windy here, something we are not used too, and the garden takes quite a battering. 

Have managed to grow a couple of zucchinis and capsicums already.  I had to place some lavender plants around the place as we had quite a bee shortage....hardly any to be seen and not a lot of pollination was going on...the lavender have bought a few into the garden but I definitely need more...my own hive is hopefully on the agenda very soon !!