Thursday 27 February 2014

Sitting down and peeling the beans

From The Minor Adjustment Beauty Salon by Alexander McCall Smith (Number One Ladies Detective Agency series)

"Mma Ramotswe decided to sit down.  She was not particularly tired - it was simply one of those occasions when she felt like sitting down.  There was no reason why one should always be on the move.  That was half the trouble with the world, she thought:  not enough people took the time to sit down for a few minutes and look up at the sky or at whatever it was that was before you - a herd of cattle, perhaps, or a stretch of bush dotted with acacia trees, or the sinking of the evening sun into the Kalahari.  You did not have to sit for long; even for a few minutes was enough to remind you that if you spent your life rushing about, then the years would slip through your fingers without your really noticing it until suddenly they were gone and you were old and before long it would be that moment that comes to everyone - the time to leave Botswana forever."

If you haven't read any of the Number One Ladies Detective Agency books by Alexander McCall Smith I would highly recommend it.

I have been enjoying a bit of a sit down lately - peeling the black beans.



My other  favourite sit down is here with a cup of tea.  This is an interesting read about the perfect cup of tea.

Monday 17 February 2014

Important matters and trivialities

"Barrabas came to us by sea, the child Clara wrote in her delicate calligraphy.  She was already in the habit of writing down important matters, and afterward, when she was mute, she also recorded trivialities, never suspecting that fifty years later I would use her notebooks to reclaim the past..."
                                                                                 House of the Spirits by Isabelle Allende

Some people like to take notes, to  keep diaries and journals.  I am one of those people. I guess blogging is merely a modern (and public) form of ones diary, journal or notebook.  (Except you can add pictures, videos, links and more!!) A record of daily life and interests relevant at that time.  Just when I think I'm not really going to continue with this blog I read something and get inspired to do it again.....

I read this recently on brain pickings .....   (I love brain pickings!)

"Why did I write it down? In order to remember, of course, but exactly what was it I wanted to remember? How much of it actually happened? Did any of it? Why do I keep a notebook at all? It is easy to deceive oneself on all those scores. The impulse to write things down is a peculiarly compulsive one, inexplicable to those who do not share it, useful only accidentally, only secondarily, in the way that any compulsion tries to justify itself. I suppose that it begins or does not begin in the cradle. Although I have felt compelled to write things down since I was five years old, I doubt that my daughter ever will, for she is a singularly blessed and accepting child, delighted with life exactly as life presents itself to her, unafraid to go to sleep and unafraid to wake up. Keepers of private notebooks are a different breed altogether, lonely and resistant rearrangers of things, anxious malcontents, children afflicted apparently at birth with some presentiment of loss."
                                                                        - Joan Didion on Keeping a notebook (from  Brain Pickings)

I am not sure if I am an anxious malcontent nor do i have a presentiment of loss , but I do think taking notes is a 'peculiarly compulsive one'.  I have had journals, diaries and notebooks nearly my whole life - since I could write anyway. My mum always takes notes too - maybe it is inherited.  To me it has got to do with thinking, ordering my thoughts, reflecting on life, philosophizing and remembering and recording ' important matters and trivialities'.

Here is an  event I never got round to recording and with my slightly dodgy computer skills at least I will have these photos safe here. It is the crazy hail storm of last year.  See I have already forgotten even what month it was in - maybe Nov/Oct.  





We were just observing that very morning how glorious the jacaranda trees were looking, so we took a photo....  lucky for by that evening not a flower was left!!


It really was the most crazy storm I have been in, very exciting, so much hail and such large hail stones. The noise on the tin roof was deafening.


After it finished it became very misty and freezing cold.  It looked beautiful and we were all a bit excited running around looking at it all.




Here are the jacaranda trees again.  No more lovely purple flowers!


Massive bean bag sized collections of hail were all through the garden.  They stayed their for a day or two.


We collected quite a bit of hail and put it in the freezer.  We ended up using them to make our drinks cool over the coming summer months.  Unfortunately the hail did smash all the developing oranges and mandarins....  so we won't have many this winter.   Anyway it was an exciting event of nature , one I was glad to be a part of.

Sunday 19 January 2014

Sunny's Birthday









It was  Sunny's 4th birthday in  December. 
 (I can't move forward to this year until I finish a few things from last year!!!)

Sunny, Granny and I went by train into the city and had high tea at the Queen Victoria Building  tea rooms. Very posh and la di dah!!

Monday 16 December 2013

Nelson's 9th Birthday


My beautiful Nelson is 9.  How did that happen?  It was months ago, back in October.   He chose a lemon meringue pie.
 
 
 

He had a slip and slide with cousins....


and he had a slip and slide party with his school mates.  (It was his turn for a party!)

 
 
 




 Also a pinata in the shape of an Egyptian god (Nelson's latest interest).



These are his favourite songs lately..





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Wednesday 18 September 2013

Berry Good (part one)

 
 

Last week my lovely friend (and neighbour ) and I built this berry structure.  I have never built anything before and with Kim's help I have now drilled, cut using an electric saw, dug 50cm deep holes, tamped down the soil, measured, clamped bits together and checked for levels. (all with three little ones under foot!)
 It isn't finished yet....  can't wait to harvest some berries in the future!!

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Friday 30 August 2013

I love food!



I love food. I love growing it, cooking it and eating it!    And that is just what I did this evening....
I grew it, cooked it and ate it.  The entire dinner came from the garden - potatoes, cabbage, brussels sprouts, kale, shallots and garlic.  (OK there were a few extra ingredients - olive oil, salt and pepper and a few spices.)  Food miles - about 10 metres!  It was a simple dinner but delicious.  It was a recipe from
 Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstal's - River Cottage Veg Every Day. (Curried bubble and squeak).

 I love this cookbook.  I am trying to work my way through it - I made lots of soups over winter and there is still so much I want to try!


PS it isn't all healthy vegetable eating here....while I am at home eating vegetables the boys are off camping -eating sausages, marshmallows and beer....