Archive for October, 2007

Wool Away at the Treasures

Shearing time again and what a year! What a treat to see the ultrafine fleeces come over the table as I classed them.

Because of the drought, so much of the country’s wool clip will be low yielding, full of dust and tender.

Not our Tassie wool! It was ultra fine, vegetable matter-free, light on for dust and super sound. My top line was so desirable I could’ve shifted from the house to the shed to sleep on it.

With our friends Darren & Fenton shearing and star-rousie Lucy on the board the jokes and fun ran thick and fast all day.

Especially loved the joke about the canoe — but this is a kid-friendly webpage so I’ll have to share it with you some other time!

Stupendous Shearing Shed Stezza

Our shearing shed goddess, Lucy brought her giant stereo in for our wether shearing this week. What a blast …

A little bit of Lee, a little bit of Adam, some Dolly, loads of Slim, a sprinkling of Dixie Chicks, a splash of Sunny Cowgirls with some Johnny Cash thrown in, and a slow, soothing last run with Sara Storer.

Not one ounce of doof-doof. Just 100 per cent country! A whole lot of fun!

Where there’s a wool, there’s a way!

We were having a chat with our neighbour last week when we noticed, as woolgrowers, we sure do wear a lot of cotton and polar fleece!

That’s why I’m always thrilled to find some great woolen-wear to spend my dollars on. Last Saturday our country-crew got together for a hilarious trip to town.

The girls and I visited Hobart’s famous Salamanca Market where I found Merino thermal tops for my John and these beaut socks for Dad for Chrissy. (Don’t tell him.)
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We’ve got no beef with Chilli

Here’s more animals making moo-o-o-ves on each other this spring.

My daughter Rosie has named this bully bloke Chilli. We now call him Chilli Beef.

He’s a dead-sexy Jordon Poll Hereford Bull with a show pedigree that makes the girls swoon.

He’s such a sweetheart and loves a good scratch on the head.

Our friends, Chris and Deb from Jordon Poll Herefords have leased him to us for joining and once again their animal handling skills have come to the fore.

Chilli Beef is trained to be led for show and has such a beautiful temperament.

He also has trust, yet respect for humans.

We’re almost as excited as our cows and it will be great to see the results of his labours in nine months time!

If you want more info on Jordon’s cattle click on the link on your right.

Lambs aplenty

We’ve been really pleased with lambing this season.

We’ve hardly had to pull any and so far we haven’t had one poddy come into the house. Phew! (They are such hard work.)

Because we were lightly stocked and got the footparing contractors in well before lambing our ewes have been in top notch health.

Even though we really need a good soaking rain, the scuddy little showers that have come through have been enough to give the animals some green pick ahead of them.

October is a busy month with shearing and lamb marking. Let’s hope it rains some more so that January can be busy too with hay making!

Self-reliance starts at home

We don’t realise how reliant we are on ‘systems’ until they stop working.

That’s why John and I have a couple of tricks up our sleeves to ensure we can be self-relient should the systems collapse.

Today because of gale force winds we’ve had many power failures. That equals no oven to cook with.

And tonight we also ran out of gas. I was too slack to go out in the cold wind to change the bottles over, so instead I turned to my trusty woodheater.

The stove top is the perfect place to get the dinner cooked. In winter I use it frequently.

Cooking on it and keeping wood up to it is a nice reminder of how easy we’ve got it these days and what women must’ve gone through in days gone by to get meals cooked for hungry mouths.

Love is in the air

Springtime has heralded many lovesick animals round this place. Akbar has a harem of two at present with his blonde girl, Jess, and his silver haired lady, Edith.

Once he’s done with these girls, he’ll be off to Gippsland, Victoria to John’s Dad’s farm in Gippsland where his horsey harem will expand to around 10 Waler mares.

In the words of Adam Brand, “Oh What a Life!”

That really stinks!

Supermarket shopping at Woolworths yesterday left a bad taste in my mouth!

I found the garlic on the shelf, admired the large sign that said, “Proudly Australian”, checked again on the package that said, ‘Australian garlic’, then read the teeny weeny print that said, ‘Grown in China.’ How dodgy is that!?

My mum began growing garlic a couple of years ago in enough quantities to supply our whole family after she read about the frightening stuff that’s used on Chinese grown garlic.

I’d run out of our home grown garlic, and as you can see our next batch of garlic isn’t ready, so I thought I’d buy some Australian garlic.

I tried two organic stores … they were honest enough to say there’s none left till harvest in November/December. Then I tried the supermarket — and you’ve just read about my experience.

Over breakfast this morning John pointed out that the supermarkets are only supplying demands from customers.

Most people don’t care what they eat or where it comes from. Our society has become so used to getting any kind of food when we want it that of course the big multi-nationals are going to supply it for us!

But I’m taking a bit of control back for my family and growing as much of our own as we can. Thanks to Dad’s vegie garden, a barter system with other neighbours and our new kid’s vegie patch, we’re back to basics and loving it.

Good health, good exercise, good fun.

My Writer’s Room

Ever wondered where I write? Here’s where I spend hours, sweating, stressing and bleeding over my novels … and now that I have my new Mac thanks to my ‘Wonderful Webmaster’, I also have fun in here!

It’s a tiny room and I share it with the farm bookwork and John’s teaching office work so most days you can’t walk in here.

You may notice on the left my TV Week McLeod’s Daughters calendar with a half-naked Riley entertaining me for October.

And I’ve got my favourite mug given to me by my beautiful Publisher, Ali at Penguin Books, for my home made mint tea.

Also, I’ve got two views of gum trees out one window and the ute and washing line and dogs out the other. Almost perfect.

With the washing machine behind me and phone next to me, plus two crazy kids, I’ve decided I need a little more peace.

The plan is to find a little hut to stick in the garden so I can have my own space.

Check out some other writer’s rooms in England.

I was pleased to see other writers are as messy as me … but I believe mess and clutter can be aesthetically pleasing if the house containing the mess is also a place filled with love and laughter! (Well that’s my excuse, so I can write instead of vacuum floors.)

Food for thought

People talk about the urban/country divide — the media and government policies certainly reflect that there’s a major misunderstanding. However, I can’t see how there can be a gap … after all everyone eats!

As farmers we are painfully aware of how dire the seasons have been in food production terms. Wheat harvests worldwide are dangerously low, with Australia facing another shocker season and water shortages and frosts have meant other food products will be limited.

If we don’t get spring rains soon on our farm, our hay season will be non-existent for another year and there’ll be a very poor market to sell our surplus livestock onto.

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