Yesterday's harvest!

Look at this basket of goodies....



All out of our garden and Ben's aquaponics! There is also a heap of lettuce in the aquaponics ready for picking! yum!!

Just a quick post today, we got a new computer, we are only renting it though. One of those rent it schemes from Dick Smiths. Suits our budget right now and gives us a computer back!

Hope your all well, it's almost the weekend yay! We have Ben's work Xmas party tomorrow night so that will be some fun! Catch you all soon :-)

Garden catch up.

Firstly to the *NEW*






These are our potatoes and eggplant Ben harvested last weekend, and the avo's we purchased from a farm stall on the way home from fishing last week also. All tasted very yummy!



Yay some new tubs for more vegies!! We got these off my parents old house. Its a *borrow* the same way my dad has *borrowed* our gernie to do his cleaning at their new house! And not to mention at their old house for the last hmmmm 18 months!! lol



Ben decided the other day we need more vegie gardens but we didn't have the right spot out with the others to put it. So we shrunk the boys sandpit, and fenced off the new garden, so the dog doesn't dig it up! (the same dog stole Ben's fish he came home with yesterday whilst Ben and i were cleaning out the car and esky! see how things need to be protected from him lol) The boys are helping turn over the soil in here for Ben. They love being able to use daddy's tools!



Our already established Veg garden. The rest of the potatoes will be ready soon and more eggplant. The garden at the bottom of the photo, has the onion in it, they are slowly bigger.



The old veg tubs are doing great, i may have planted too many but hey they will survive i hope!



We need to plant some more seeds, so we use the toilet rolls to plant the seeds in and the old margarine container to label them! Ben clever idea!



The boys helping filling the tubes up.



Finished product with some labels in.



And the top view. Pretty cool.

Today is a public holiday, so i will be finishing on planting the seeds, and help Ben do any other garden chores!

A great start to the week

It's the start of the week again, and it has been a great start!





This is the latest pickings from our garden! They will go great with some chicken.



Our vegie gardens are going great, the eggplants have heaps of flowers, the potatoes and sweet potatoes are flowering and growing really well.





My seedlings have recovered from a helpful hand of blue eyes thinking it was picking time..



Our garlic and onion are doing good. And the boys helped me plant some more seeds in the little seed tubes.



But most of all, i did my theory exam for my acrylic nail yesterday and i feel i went really well. Only time will tell when it gets marked. And this morning while we were eating our breaky, i noticed the delivery man out the front of our house...

My KIT arrived! Finally with a few disgruntled emails back and forth i have it... It's only a starter so i will need to stock up again after i've done a couple of practices. But i'm so happy to finally have it!






My KIT!!


Oh and i got a phone call on saturday from the shoe shop, she wants me in for a second interview tomorrow morning.. SO a very great week has started!

Hope you all had a great weekend and your start to the week is a good one aswell! :-)

Another week been and gone.

Once again, another week has gotten away on me. There just doesn't seem to be enough time in the day and days in a week!!

I had my girly time away on the weekend. It was fantastic. Something i was needing i think. 2 nights away playing board games, a few drinks (maybe 1 to many for me) and some movies ( both of which i didn't watch, fell asleep on both). The Hens afternoon party on Saturday was excellent. Lots of games and some yummy cocktails. They bridesmaids even organised a male topless and pant less ( he was wearing a g-string) waiter for the hen!! We then went on to a holiday unit for some relaxing and some fun.
Then Monday morning it was time to come home. I did think about my boys while i was gone, but didn't miss them as much as i thought. Probably because i knew the boys would not give me a second thought, being able to have a BOYS weekend with daddy! As it thought they had a blast with daddy!!!

This morning we all did some gardening work together





We planted some winter seedlings in our old laundry tub garden.




Ben extended our big vege garden to pant the rest of them as well as some garlic. (note the potato plants going mad in the rest of that particular garden, i hope we get heaps from them!!)


My wonderful husband not only kept the boys happy and amused while i was gone, but kept up the clothes washing for me as well as keeping the whole house clean and tidy(isn't he wonderful!). So today i did not have as much to do. So decided it was time to re-organise the pantry. It's been getting worse by the day and I've been putting it off, which just makes it worse as its the cupboard most frequented in the whole house.



So this is the BEFORE...






TA - DA, the AFTER

The boys of course helped me out, and i must say i feel alot better after having done it. I have a smile on my face now every time i open the pantry door!!

It's bed time for me now. I hope you all had a great weekend as well!

Time at home!

We had some great time at home on the weekend. Ben got heaps of jobs done, i got most of mine done, except washing! Rain :(. But when the sun was shining we tried to get outside and do some jobs. Ben got the mowing done, i pulled the pumpkin vine out, and we both discovered our eggplant plant was bearing 2 eggplants Woohoo. Poor plant has been hidden by the pumpkin vine, but now its free!! Now it's time to get our vege garden re-fueled and planted for some winter vege's!! mmm yum can't wait!!




This is our little vege garden. It needs some work. The pile at the bottom of the photo is the pumpkin vine!





Poor plant. This is our Egg Plant plant. Even though it has been neglected, it's producing! The pumpkin vine grew around it and was hard for us to get to it. The grasshoppers have enjoyed the leaves, I don't know if egg plant is fruit or vegetable, but ours are doing great!





The boys pretending to mow with their wagons. (trying to help daddy out!)




Bruce getting in on the fun!

Hope you had as good weekend as we did!

Out in the sunshine.

It's a beautiful hot sunny day here today,

so i thought i would take some photo's of our vegies.

They are starting to really power along!

Corn is going great gun's!

The pumpkin grows a few inches everyday!

And has lots of little pumpkins starting!!

This is one of our palm trees out the front. Not sure what it's called.

But it is flowering and every bug wants a piece of the action!

Native bee's as well as the normal kind of bee you see and

ant's are trying to get some sweetness!

Our Beets have settled in and are now starting to take off.

One of the small tomato plants that emerged from our potting mix fell over and

died so we picked the tomatoes and let them ripen at our window.

We ate them today on our lunch and they were delicious!

We purchased a new umbrella for shade over our outdoor area,

seeing as the first storm we had destroyed our gazebo's..

We moved the table up next to the house,

so everything is a little more protected during our wild storms.

We also were not sure how much the wind would pick up through are yard,

especially after getting under the house built, so it can't go straight under anymore!
Now we know we can prepare and buy things like this wonderful umbrella,

that can easily be put down and moved if need be.

We were thinking of moving the sand pit, to under the back stairs.

But after having all the boys toys in the big pit the last few days,

i kinda like the idea of everything being in one spot for them to dig and play!

Although shade is a problem, it's in the middle of the yard away

from all the shade tree's.

I purchased a beach umbrella ($60) and it's not as big as i had hoped,

and doesn't give as much shade as i would like.

So am thinking of getting something else, easy to move incase

of a storm. So they have some shade at either end, and don't have to fight for it lol.

Tonight myself and the boys are out to dinner with my brother for his birthday

(He turns 30 on Sunday old fart hehehe) Shall be a good night.

My brother has 2 kids and a step daughter, so the boys will have a hoot.

And the place we are going has a kids corner (heaven).

Too bad Ben has to work :(, but he is going for some drinks at a workmates

place after work tonight.

He lives just around the corner so not to far away!

Hope you have all had a great week, bring on the weekend!! xo

Around the house this week.

The boys new paddle pool.

I now think i need to buy a second one

so they can both lay down and swish around without

hitting each other.

Blue eyes trying to turn the water pressure up for daddy,

while daddy was watering.

Daddy getting him to stop, by hosing him down!!

Talking to Bruce thru the fence.

Probably teasing Bruce that he is playing with water

and Bruce isn't!

Playing in the pool together!

Our Vege Garden reno has started. We got some
Timber for the outside from Ben's mum
and Step-dad. Just need to wait
for the vege's at the moment
to finish then we can top it up and screw all the timber
together.







I have no idea what this tree is called, it spends most of the year
without anything on it (it looks dead).
But in spring without fail it gets foliage and flowers and
then it all disappears again!
(oh and its the tree in the middle of the pic that looks more
branchy than leafy)






This is its leaves and flowers. it's very pretty.

I purchased a new bag of bread flour the other day.

It was the last one at the wholesalers.

The lady managed to put 2 holes in the bag

when she picked it up of the pallet..........

So she gave me almost $4 off the normal

price for the damage!!

Hardly any flour leaked out anyway, but i was very pleased

with a saving!

This is all the flour in containers. I had to find some high places to put them

so the boys wouldn't play with them!

~~~~~~~~~~

I hope you all have a great weekend, we have a busy one 3 party's to go to, and some more work around the house!! Can't wait!

At our house today..

Here today, it is oh so nice and quiet! The boys are at daycare (Nana's house). So today while i don't have any little helpers, i got stuck into finishing organising our cupboards. I had the bathroom and the boys blanket box to do, and was surprisingly not as big a job as i thought! Last week Ben and i did the cupboard in the toy room... Oh my i had stuffed alot of CRAP in that cupboard over the last year (and only year so far of us living in this house). There is still alot in there. Alot of books that i am not yet comfortable with the boys playing with as they are still in rip mode while reading... We got 2 big piles out of there, rubbish and Vinnie's bin. Alot of toys went to Vinnie's, mostly toys that the boys are to big to play with anymore and wont miss. But don't worry i still kept alot of their toys!! We also have alot of blankets i need another cupboard for (hint hint honey) to free up the blanket box to then turn into a toy box. As of the moment i have about 3 or 4 different little baskets keeping all the toys together and they are sitting on the old baby change table. Doesn't look that neat.. We will get there, my first step was to get rid of the CRAP we don't use/need anymore. I think i can successfully say i managed that!

While sitting and typing this, it is so nice and quiet here, i can hear the birds singing... Now with the boys being away, i could put my own tv shows on i want to listen to while working, or music for that matter. But there is always something going when they are home. So when they are not here i like it to be as quiet as possible, and to be able to hear the birds (the odd car driving by as well) its bliss!! (i can think for a change!)

~~Now to outside of our house today~~

Today Bom (Bureau of Meteorology) says we are to get to 30c, at the moment we are sitting on

27.5c and 38% humidity, doesn't sound to bad, but the sun is very damn hot! I now have to start remembering to put sunscreen on before going out, especially with a big load of washing to hang.

http://www.bom.gov.au/products/IDQ60801/IDQ60801.94566.shtml

Being spring, we have alot of flowers out, Ben will shoot me, but i can't remember the variety of Jasmin this is, but it has finally flowered. last year it didn't give us much. Hasn't really grown much either, considering the other variety is about 3/4 over the arch. But it still smells lovely!

And yes again, can't remember the name of this plant either. (why i choose to do garden post's while Ben is at work is beyond me..) It is pretty though!

Our veggies are taking off. The pumpkin is starting to get runner's off it and we think there are some flowers coming up off it already! And the corn has doubled in size!

Ben's potted lemon has gone nuts this time round, it has at least 10 lemons on it! I'm going to have to find some lemon recipes! YUM!

This is a very blurry photo, but it is of the tomatoes we have growing in pots with native trees. Now we are not really sure how they got there. There is alot of little tomatoes appearing, some a different shapes, oblong like Roma and normal round shape. We think there could have been seeds in the potting mix Ben topped up the native trees with. Doesn't matter a great deal, we get tomatoes out of it anyway!

The 3 native tree pots with the tomato plants taking over!

This is a view to the very back of our yard. Over the last couple of weekends the neighbour's have been doing some extensive pruning.. You see the whole of the fence line did have alot and i mean alot of shrubs blocking the view to our yard. Nice and private. Well not anymore. they have pulled everything away, what they have done is all along the fence line, so i'm hopeful they might being doing a new fence.. fingers crossed. They have always been busy out in the yard so i haven't wanted to interrupt them and be a busy botty neighbour and ask them what they hell they are doing with my privacy screen... Nobody lives there at the moment, haven't for quite awhile, so its probably a rental house. They may sell it after doing it up who knows..

We have 2 houses backing on to our back yard, the fellow in this house has also lost some privacy screening, now we can see directly to his house..

Hope your having a great week, I'm off to tidy up the toy room! xo