While I’m aware that there are much bigger problems on the world stage this week, in our little corner today is a sad day. We lost a beautiful member of our farm and family.
Redford, the bantam chook that the previous owner asked us to adopt when we bought this house, was savaged by a dog this morning.
It seems silly to feel this blue about a chicken, but she was one of our motley crew, and the circumstances surrounding her death play heavy on my heart. Animals suffer in the wild, but I was proud of the happy life our chickens lived, roaming our garden, the true definition of free range, not the supermarket definition of free range, which if you actually look into it is not very free range at all. Continue reading
It is a hard task to change the fundamental aspects of our character. They say the first seven years are most important, for those years are the foundation upon which the rest of our lives are built. In my early days, I learned that it was a sin of such mammoth proportions it would bring great shame upon our household, if I were to be a foodie fuss-pot. Asking for seconds was a compliment to the host, making room for pudding was a masterclass in etiquette, plates were to be scraped clean. Wolf it all down, child. Continue reading
Knock knock. Who’s there? Your cash cow. And your cash gecko.
Cast your mind back to the mid 90s. If you were of a certain age and predilection then, you may have been sucked into the impressive PR stunt that was Beanie Babies. Old muggins over here certainly was. ‘Buy now, cash in later!’ was basically their slogan, as far as I recall.
To help illustrate how valuable my Beanie Baby collection is, I enlisted the help of some friends… it’s a Beanie Baby / Sylvanian Family mash up! Continue reading
Oh Lindz. I feel your pain.
Social media, you little tyke. You have sucked me in and shown me for what I truly am: nothing but a flagrant show off, strutting my stuff online before I even think to fact-check. I’m like Lindsay Lohan Instagramming an Arabic message that she thought read ‘you’re beautiful’ but actually read ‘you’re a donkey.’
I feel like a bit of an ass myself right now.
Because like Lindsay, I just want to inspire my Instagram followers (all 70 of them – beat that, Lohan.). Continue reading
In which I make some Gooseberry Cordial. While getting sloshed.
Ok, so city folk have got their transport connections and 24 hour access to ice cream, but I’ve got a gooseberry bush, so there.
This time last year, my mother-in-law came in from my garden with a bowl full of gooseberries and informed me I was the, less proud, more unaware, owner of a gooseberry bush. I didn’t take much interest. What the goose are gooseberries good for? It’s not like they were strawberries or something I actually bought from shops. So I generously invited my mother-in-law to take them home with her, for she was far less likely to put them in a corner and leave them until they started to ferment. Continue reading
So, you know about these little guys, right?
Redford and Newman, the stupid little chickens we love so much. We were quite happy with two chickens. Bantams are more for ‘novelty value’ than egg production, according to my excellent chicken rearing book, A Chicken In Every Home.
They are pretty novel. Newman, AKA Godzilla, and her special little trousers. Redford, my favourite, sitting on your knee, as tame as a dog. Continue reading
