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Onward and upward.

Well so the saying goes “Onward and Upward”. To this end we have decided to move upward, that is North. From the very south we are moving 1.5 hours north. 

It came as a bit of a surprise, we had not expected for everything to happen so quickly or to find the right place.

Rick has quit his job and we will be moving during the end of June to a a different way of life. No more shift work and no more city life. We have taken a farm job and will be living 30 minutes out of a more country town in Southland. We can certainly see Gods hand in this as it all unfolded, which shouldn’t have come as a surprise but did. We had made the decision to look elsewhere for a job that didn’t have shift work and would be  better health and family life. But the path that lead down was unexpected, we will be working on a dairy farm, milking cows and doing general farm work.

Certainly no shift work , and outdoors( good for your health) and lots of time with family. Having to get up to cows at 5 in the morning is not everyone’s cup of tea but certainly will be ours. The goats and all the animals will come along and I’m sure if they knew the brand new homes that await they would be very excited too. Paddocks for goats and chickens and new digs for the rabbits well perhaps no digging but new homes and a run for them. The bees get to have a whole new banquet and the dog and cats all have new and exiting places to hide and run.

Our girls will have new things to do and learn, younger girl gets to go to a new school and older one will perhaps learn other farming things.

We still will live by our general homesteading principals, and definitely more so since there is no shop down the road. Lots to learn and appreciate about being in the country.

 

 

On the hunt.

The great thing about being a cat with human who have a big garden is the chance to go bug hunting. Percy the kitten thinks its great to hide and pounce on unsuspecting bugs in the garden.

Busy buzzy bees

Went to check our hive that is out in native bush area.
Massive amounts of bees and new queen cells.
Great timing as we needed a new queen for another hive and we got a quite decent split from that hive as well.
Out where that hive is it is quite sheltered and lots for them to eat so they don’t appear to have been suffering as badly with the awful weather we have been having.
A nice shot of all the bees.

The Tui also came out to greet us.

Lunch time.

Pizza inspired savoury scones for lunch.
Fresh basil from the garden. Yum. Warm with lashings of butter.

Jam I am.

Oh what to do with all that fruit leftover from Christmas time.
Well make jam of course.
This is what I like to call “Leftover Jam”.

Easy as. Equal amounts of fruit to sugar. Add some lemon juice as well. Put the fruit and lemon juice in a heavy based pan and simmer for 10 to 20 minutes depending on the type of fruit. Add the sugar and stir over a low heat till the sugar has dissolved. Turn the heat up till it boils then with out stirring leave it at a rolling boil for 20 minutes or till it reaches 105 °C. Test to see if it sets. If it is all good bottle in sterilized jars.

Guess what’s for dinner tonight.

This is Sandy over at Creative Me Creative You

Creative Me Creative You

We bought 100 kilos of beef this week so there is no guessing as to what is for dinner. Beef!

For tonight Rick has requested Beef Wellington. So thanks to Lorraine Elliott over at Not quite Nigella I will be cooking Beef wellington for dinner.

http://www.notquitenigella.com/2010/11/18/easy-individual-beef-wellingtons/

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Hungry babies

With spring it the air we seem to have babies jumping all over the place.
With the baby goats jumping on everything that they can, and the baby rabbits generally hopping all around the place it is quite a jumpy backyard at the moment.
Here is some of the 6 baby rabbits tucking into their dinner.
My favorite if the grey and white one you can see it the middle.
Not looking forward to these little guys going to new homes around Christmas time.
My consolation is that they will make some little child very happy.

Pasta drying.

Megs pasta, made and drying out a bit before cooking.

Teaching for life

Having taught Meg how to make pasta here she is making some.
She decided that she wanted to cook her friends lunch and having no real idea as to what she wanted to cook I suggested she make pasta for them.
Well she did a great job making both the fettuccine and the vegetable sauce to go with it. Clever girl.
I feel confident that when she leaves home she will at least know how to cook something other than toast.