bliss is...

Success, is bliss.

I have had a very successful week. I sold all my felted items, "finally" you may say, but to me it has reaffirmed that I am walking the correct path.

It was the kick up the bum I needed. In two days I have made 2 items. One baby blanket and one scarf. The blanket is adorable, and I don't know if I want to sell it, or not. It is made from a luxury blend of fibres; Angora rabbit, Silk, mohair, organic superfine merino, plus Angelina and glitz, to give a bit of sparkle.

Everything seems to be moving along quite nicely here. I do have a couple of secrets that I am keeping, but they will have to wait to be revealed. Spent some time with my horse, Issabow, yesterday. I was pleasantly surprised by the bond we have achieved... in fact I was so comfortable I considered riding *bliss*

I will leave you with one thought "what will be, will be."

click go the shears

They say home is where the heart is. To me home is where the heart sings. And my heart is a-singing.

Don't get me wrong, I really enjoyed my time away. I especially enjoyed the social aspect. Plus Sarah has a great library, I think I was reading 92% of the time!! I even held a small felting workshop and all the ladies seem pleased with the wonderful scarves they created.

Upon arriving home yesterday I was greeted by 5 escaping lambs(sheep), who then had to be juggled to another yard. In the end I "dumped" them in the narrow no-mans-land between two paddocks, it adjoins the dam so they are set for water and some yummy fresh grass.

I said a brief hello to all the GG's and gave quick scratches. Got a glimpse of the cows.

So, while away, having caught up on reading I was also introduced to two great American magazines. Grit & Mother Earth News. I think they will be highly complementary to my Australian subscriptions of Small Farms & Grass Roots.

Came across an interesting article worthy of mentioning. It suggested stripping the interior of an old car and converting it to a chook/poultry house. I LOVE this idea as it is an already secure environment with existing doors. I am now dreaming of an early model rusted out car, complete with windows and doors. I may have to settle for the '92 Toyota van that is sitting up the back rusting and being a haven for giant huntsman spiders to breed. I will be able to create a ramp for ease of entry and some decent nesting boxes. But how simple!!!!

I also had the pleasure to be gifted with a hand whittled dibber for planting my bulbs. I am looking forward to using this, infact I may use it to plant some tulips today.

warm & fuzzies

As we were sitting down to dinner last night I realised that 80% of the food on my plate was produced right here on Beauty Farm. Sausages, pumpkin, potatoes, chutney. I had only bought cauliflower and carrots. Gives you a warm and fuzzy feeling to know that you are achieving something you set out to do.

Today I did a, bad, bad thing. I bought an Alpaca fleece. Raw and unworked in any way. It is the first clip from a youngun, I am looking forward to using such a beautiful, natural, soft fleece.

Also I thought I would mention the site that taught me how to wash wool. The author, Holly Shaltz, goes into great detail. Thus it is quite long winded but after reading it in its entirety I felt equipped to knowledgeably go and clean some fleece. When I cleaned my first fleece(which was a practise fleece) I did notice a small amount of clumping and that the last batch was not as well cleaned as the first batch, I guess I became a little slack in my haste to finish. I also realised just how important it is to pick through the fleece and discard any lower grade pieces. Please visit the HJS website for the detailed instructions.

politics

If I may I would like to take you on a little, tiny, journey. Back a few weeks to a post I wrote about all the preserves we have made over summer. The post was entitled "Preserves" and you can see the entire post by clicking here.

I said a few nasty things about the oh so humble white vinegar and I would like to retract these statements, in particular the one that declared I would no longer be using said vinegar in my chutneys, pickles and other assorted preserves. We opened a jar of tomato chutney today and it was absolutely divine. It was also from the batch that I made using white vinegar. Seems that if you let it sit over time it mellows, and ages quite like a fine wine.

While I have not tested the batch that we made using the other, more fancy, vinegar I would like to think that those bottles are also sitting up there forming robust flavours, and creating a taste explosion for our toasted cheese and chutney sandwiches.

So, plain ordinary white vinegar, please accept my most humble apologies. I will not judge you at face value again.