Art for Heart's Sake

A Busy Week

Hi everyone I hope you had/are having a wonderful weekend with family and friends.   I so enjoyed the sunshine yesterday and stood for a moment just basking in its warmth.  I got the potting area in the farmshed tidied up and we went for a walk on our local gorgeous beach, only 5 minutes drive from here.  Just stunning!  Didn't take my camera but I do have an older photo that I will find and post for you.

This week is busy busy busy just when I desperately need to relax, relax, relax!  I will just have to find some quite moments each day to b r e a t h e!  Am off to Zumba this morning (yippee), then need to work on a newsletter I am putting together for someone for the first time ever using a program I don't know at all - wish me luck!  I also have a meeting here with the woman I grow herbs and tomatoes for from July through to April.  Phew... I'm tired already and it's only 8.43am!

More later... Smiles..

Yippee the Sun's Back

Well, we woke this morning to a slight frost, blue sky and sunshine!!  After several days of rain and cloud it is gorgeous to see that big yellow ball in the sky.  The garden is literally glowing and everything looks fresh.

Today I am putting new straw in the bottom of one of our chook houses (I did the other one before it rained).  We have a red house and a blue house - I must take a photo of them for you - and I love it when I change the straw.  The chooks have such fun kicking it around and it keeps them amused for days.  We freerange (unless it's raining) one lot one day, and the other lot the next.  I'm going to pick up the old straw and put it on our compost heap as it will have lots of very fine chook manure in it which is fabulous for composting. 

My next task will be to hit the farmshed and tidy up my potting bench area - no mean task I can tell you.  It got into quite a shamozzle by the end of summer and I need it to be tidy so I can start potting on all of my perennials.  This is a major task and I've realised what is really putting me off starting is the fact that my work space is such a MESS!!!  Action is required.  Smiles...

A lovely Evening

Hi well it's Saturday afternoon and we've had a busy morning/early afternoon.  We have friends coming round for dinner tonight and I've done most of the prep already!  Isn't that neat.. I love doing things that mean I can spend quality time with them when they get here instead of being tied to the kitchen.

We had a lovely evening with our neighbours/friends last night.  We went to a local rustic rural cafe called Jester House and had pizza which was absolutely delicious!  It was a rotten night, raining cats and dogs but the atmosphere was pretty warm and cosy!

Here is a photo of a tree we can see in the distance, through our bedroom window.  We really love it and call it 'the running man'.  If you glance at it, it looks as though a man with a top hat on is jumping over the top of the tree - or could that just be our weird imaginations??  Sorry the photo is a bit fuzzy - it was taken through a window in the early morning.  I've also posted a photo of more gorgeous autumn colour.. this is Prunus serrulata (I think) 'Kanzan' - aren't the colours amazing!  Hope you're all having a lovely weekend or the start to a weekend.  Smiles...

Flying out the Door!

Yikes, it's 8.50am on Friday already and I have to fly out the door at 9.30am, so this will be short for now.  Yesterday it turned phlipping freezing - well freezing for Nelson - we only got to a high of 9 degrees C (not sure what that is in degrees F) and it went down from there..!  I stayed in this lovely studio snuggly and warm as I had the heater on.  Luckily it's only a small space so doesn't take much heating.  It is still cloudy and dull today and very still.   The mountains around us will certainly be getting a good dusting of snow.  I would give ANYTHING to see snow.  At least then you don't mind being cold. 

Today I'm off to an office to do some editorial work.  I am a bit nervous because I'm hoping I don't have to try to fit the typing into their newsletter template as it is a program I've never used before and I don't want to go down that road.  Am very happy to edit and write things, love doing that!  Am hoping I can work in conjunction with someone else who is putting the information into the template and telling me what I need to edit to fit!  Keep your fingers crossed.  Didn't sleep very well at all last night so my brain is on slow mode...gulp!

I'll write some more later and I have another couple of photos to share with you too.  Big smiles...

Raining Again

Hi, well it's raining here again today which is just lovely!  I love having the excuse to be in my studio and not in the garden.  I adore gardening, as you know, but I also love being in here.  I really should (ewwwww don't like that word at all).. ermmm could be in the farm shed potting on my perennials.  I really have to start doing that el pronto, as I am having a stall at a local alpine show in September and I have loads to do.  Okay, now I feel guilty for being in my studio.. sigh...!  I may have to venture into the farmshed now.  In the meantime here is a photo of the broadbeans in the kitchen garden.  They have put on really good growth even though the weather is gradually cooling down (and so is the soil).

excuse the weeds!  I grew up being tortured with big, dry, wrinkled, grey broadbeans for dinner in the middle of winter - blugh!!  I love them when they are young and we eat them pod and all, just lightly steamed.  As they get bigger I blanch them in boiling water, then throw them in cold water and peel the skins off.  They are beautiful done this way in salads, or in pasta.  Yes I am a broadbean convert - thanks to the italians!  Smiles...

 

 

 

Sun's Out Again

Yippee, we got some soft rain for a few hours yesterday pm and overnight - not much but it has freshened everything up (including me) beautifully.  I love it when the sun comes out after it's rained and everything sparkles - with the autumn colours, the property looks really pretty.  I took a photo of Prunus 'Kanzan' yesterday - the colour of her leaves has to be seen to be believed - will post it as soon as I can.

Yesterday pm I finished a gift tag for my dear friend who turns 70 in early June.  I can't post a photo of it yet, in case she sees it.  I am so so happy with the way it has turned out.

I also did some writing for the first time in ages!  I am a garden writer and I used to write for the Nelson Mail but because of editor issues I needed to be true to myself and my readers and quit - gosh that must have been around 2 years ago now!  How time flies.  I have found it difficult to write since then because I was left feeling rather demoralised.  How wonderful it felt to be working with words again - I haven't lost it after all.  This may be just the spur on I need to start another dream of mine - my gardening book.  I have so many ideas spinning around inside this head of mine that I find it really hard to know where to start.  I know - at the beginning - is the best spot, but where's that, giggle!  I must try to write an outline at least as I'm sure that will help. 

I have realised that the rest of this year is going to be fairly frantic.  I need to repot all of the perennials in my nursery and split up some of my parent plants.  I really love doing this, but the thought is a little daunting to say the least.  It's like everything - it's the starting that is the hardest part.  It's a wonderful feeling putting plants into new potting mix and splitting up existing clumps.  You can almost hear them breathing a big sigh of relief.  Imagine being stuck in a pot for a year or so - crikey!

Well I'd better get going.  I need to hang out the washing and I'm making home made potato top lamb mince pies for dinner for the first time ever so need to get the lamb mix on to cook.  Apart from that I'm doing nothing today.  Giggle.. 

Rain at Last!

Hi everyone, well the weather bomb they were predicting missed us TOTALLY!  I waited and waited with bated breath and NOTHING HAPPENED... grrrrrrr..  giggle.  We hardly ever get exciting weather events here which I know is a good thing.. but sometimes I'd just love something phenomenal to happen weather-wise.  I've always loved weather patterns and adore clouds too!

Here is a close up of some gorgeous bright lights silverbeet, also known as rainbow beet.  It is like silverbeet or chard but has a much sweeter flavour and is perfect for children because the stems keep their colour when it is lightly cooked and we know how much kids love colour.  The stems can be hot pink, orange, yellow, white or red.

 
What makes this rainbow beet extra special is it was developed by a home gardener in Lower Hutt, Wellington, New Zealand!!  I've forgotten the man's name but after he died his family sold the rights to the seed to an american seed company.  If you haven't tried it, do!  It is so delicious and very pretty to look at in the garden too.

Well it's just started to rain and I must say the temperature has dropped a lot!  Time to light the fire in the house and crank up the heater, here in my studio.  Smiles..

 

 

Photos of Kitchen Garden

Hi, I've been promising you photos of the kitchen garden and so yesterday I finally got round to taking the camera out there.  This productive garden brings me such joy and is the fulfilment of a dream I've had for many years.  I've always admired the English kitchen gardens of old and I am so glad my hubby took a leap of faith and agreed to the mammoth task of starting this garden from scratch!  We had to get the turf scraped off for each garden by a neighbour with a digger and this was done about 3.5 years ago in the autumn.  That first summer the garden was pretty much a disaster as I didn't have the time to really concentrate on it.  I remember at one stage, John said - 'just bulldoze it.. you just don't have time to make it work' (or words to that effect).  Giggle, that was like a red rag to a bull and made me even more determined to make a success of it. 

Now we are reaping the rewards of one heck of a lot of ongoing hard work.  This gorgeous kitchen garden provides us with a myriad of vegetable all year round and I just love spending time out there.  Of course, everyone laughs at the term 'kitchen garden' - it's in our paddock and a good leg stretch from our kitchen, to say the least!!!  I am establishing a hornbeam hedge around the garden which is a long, slow process.  Some of the hornbeams are growing really quickly and others aren't, mainly due to the soil and the slope of the land (it gets drier in some places than others).  Here are the photos, hope you enjoy them.  Smiles...

Rough Weather on the Way

Heavens to betsy, it's cold here in my little studio this morning!  'Serenity' as my studio is called, is separate from our house and is my little haven.  This morning however it's like a little icebox! 

It's one of those cloudy, chilly autumn mornings and I am about to leap out into my glasshouse and clear out the old tomato plants, weeds etc and dear hubby is going to waterblast the outside and the inside for me.  I normally put in winter crops after I've cleared it out as they grow really well in there during frost weather but this year I've decided to give the soil a much needed rest.

Yesterday afternoon I went slightly mad in the kitchen garden.  I planted 47 red onion plants (the bundle I bought said 20 plants so the extra 27 were a grand bonus!) and then started weeding part of a couple of the other vegie beds.  Before I knew it I was also attacking the convulvulus (bindweed) that tends to ensnare my globe artichokes.  I love getting out invasive weeds.. there is something so satisfying finding all those fat, white pieces of root!  Of course I have to make sure I put them all in our bin or on the neighbours bonfire (to be) as each little piece can sprout.  Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

Well I'd better get outside.  There is some rough weather on the way over the next couple of days. It's supposed to be okay today, bit of drizzle later I think, but tomorrow all heck is going to break loose apparently - heavy rain and gale force winds.  ah well that will mean more time in my studio - YIPPPPPPPPPEEEEEEEEEEE.  Smiles 

First Rays of Sunshine Today

 
Isn't this gorgeous!  I hopped out our bedroom door to take this photo early this morning... brrrr it was chilly but just love the way the very first rays of sun lit up our gorgeous prunus tree.  So pretty!

Yesterday was a busy day.  We popped out in the morning to do a few errands and before we knew it we'd been out for around 4.5 hours!  Good grief!  After a brief spell at home we went out to a local pub for a meal with friends - delicious pizza and salad, washed down with a lovely Australian shiraz... yum!

Today (Saturday) we are in the garden.  There was a very heavy dew this morning so may have to wait for it to dry off a bit.  The light today is just gorgeous - I really adore autumn!  Wishing you all a great day/night wherever you are.  Smiles...