by Krista | Jul 3, 2018 | Winter
It’s dark and quiet this winter morning. Roosters just started crowing, heralding the imminent arrival of the sun. Soon sheep and goats will gather at their gates to be let out to the fields to eat, Fergus and Merida will start bleating for their first bottle of the morning, and Fezzik will be galloping around the farm yard, getting the wiggles out after a good night’s sleep.
Quiet moments have been precious and rare lately, stolen between meetings and classes, projects and feeding, gardening and writing. I treasure every one, for they are the moments that nourish me for the next thing, whatever that happens to be.
Growing up in Canada and the northern US, winter was always down time. Gardens slept under the snow, people hunkered indoors around roaring fires for long evenings of games and reading and movies, heading outside only to skate, sled, or go to work or school.
Things are different here.
Summer is now my down time, when it’s too blazing hot to be outside save for early mornings and late afternoons, and winter is the busiest time of my year. I practically live outside, loving the absence of flies and mosquitoes, using these cold but beautiful days to tackle all the farm projects that get set aside when outside feels like an oven.
We had an extra long growing season this year, so I just finished harvesting the last of the capsicums and leeks, and there are still mountains of chillies waiting to be picked. Bear and I fried up the capsicums and turned them into luscious pasta sauce, and yesterday the leeks joined a pile of onions in the frying pan and became a huge batch of French Onion Soup that freezes beautifully.
The kitchen is covered with jars and bottles filled with all manner of concoctions we’ve been making: honey from our bees, multiple batches of apple cider vinegar, port wine steeping with cherries and sherry steeping with peaches, plum wine vinegar, date wine vinegar, demijohns of apple wine, rosella syrup, mulberry liqueur. The list of deliciousness goes on and on.
There are also jars of medieval and herbal medicines that look like something out of a mad scientist’s laboratory. Tinctures of hawthorn and yarrow, pastilles of rose leaf, rosehip, and mint, and bottles of oxymel, an ancient Greek preparation of vinegar, honey, and herb of choice. At the moment I have thyme oxymel and rosemary oxymel brewing, thyme for sore throats and coughs, rosemary as a lovely tonic for strengthening the immune system and protecting from bacterial infections. These and others will be in my display and demonstrations on medieval folk medicine at Abbey Medieval Festival. I love making these things, using them, and experiencing their positive effects on our health and well-being.
Last week the sheep broke into one of my gardens and devoured nearly all my carrots, beets, radishes, silverbeet, calendula, and lemon balm. Sigh. So I salvaged what I could, then decided it was a good time to redesign all the gardens.
I wrote a list of the veggies, flowers, and herbs I love most, then started digging. And digging. And digging. I created borders with hardwood planks and the innumerable rocks I unearth in my digging, and started filling each section in. Elderflower hedges, a massive asparagus bed, and plenty of room for huge artichokes. I planted sugar snap peas, shelling peas, and sweet peas, golden beetroot and striped beetroot, black radishes, and nasturtiums. I divided and transplanted all sorts of things: spearmint and peppermint, feverfew and sorrel, borage and fennel and coriander and hollyhocks.
Bit by bit, everything is coming together, and I love it. I’ve left several garden beds open to fill with tomatoes, capsicum, cucumbers, beans, and other things this spring, but for now, the gardens are done.
This week is all about medieval preparation and finishing up work projects so we can turn our farm over to our caretakers and spend a week of pure fun at the Abbey Medieval Festival. There are articles to write and garb to sew, food to make and pictures to edit, animal feed to stockpile and the house to clean. There is wood-burning to finish and book orders to ship, laundry to do and wine to bottle, and it makes me laugh just to look at my to-do list, let alone imagine completing it, but we’ll get there, we always do.
And in the meantime, we’ll take these quiet moments and sip our cuppas while watching the sunrise, or sneak in a nap mid-afternoon, or have lunch on the veranda and watch the birds.
It’s a crazy life sometimes, but a good one. xo
by Krista | Jun 16, 2018 | Winter
Winter is here, and I feel it in the crunch of dry grass underfoot, the billows of fog blanketing the farm in early mornings, the plunging of temperatures just before sunrise.
I love winter in Australia. Yes, mornings are frigid, but once the sun comes out, it’s like a scrumptious Autumn day, cold, crisp, and utterly refreshing.
There are no bugs or sweltering heat, sunrise arrives at a more humane hour, and the early afternoon darkness is such a lovely excuse to head indoors for cozy evenings of books and movies and multiple hot cuppas.
Winter is also hard.
We’ve had no rain and our paddocks are dry and barren with little for the animals to forage. The cold temperatures mean newborn goats need to be housed indoors, and our tiny home echoes with the bleats of hungry kids and the pattering of their little hooves tap-tapping along the kitchen floor.
But the sunny days are glorious, and once those first rays of light hit the farmyard, we bundle up our armloads of babies and take them out to the sun-drenched goat playpen where they can nibble on grass and take long, luxurious naps in the sunshine.
During this barren time, my gardens are a haven. With no rain to keep them thriving, I’ve cut back to a few essentials, rainbow silverbeet, root veggies, and loads of herbs.
It’s so lovely to open the gates and wander along the straw-covered pathways, breathing in fragrant lavender, thyme, and rosemary, delighting in the daisies and feverfew that manage to blossom even in the dead of winter, and resting my eyes on green, glorious green.
With icy winds blowing in and freezing temperatures in the forecast, it’s a lovely weekend for hunkering in with hot soup and cozy sweaters, old movies and baking, writing for my luvs at Plum Deluxe, and reading beloved favourites from John Buchan, L.M. Montgomery, and Enid Blyton.
Mostly I’m looking forward to medieval mates arriving for a weekend of medieval projects and good visits over hot bread rolls and hotter coffee. They do my heart so much good, and their hugs are the best.
What are you looking forward to this weekend? xo
by Krista | Jun 14, 2018 | Winter
The sky is just starting to lighten. Roosters are crowing, the cuckoo clock is ticking, and Fezzik is snoozing happily beside me. We have two wee goats in the house too, brother and sister twins whose mama died giving birth to a third. I hear the patter of their little hooves and small cooing noises as they wake and decide it’s high time I give them another bottle.
I love early mornings at home. They are sacred to me. No matter how crazy the day ahead is, these moments keep me grounded and peaceful and able to handle the day better. They’re especially nice during winter, when lamplight and a heater beckon me to sit awhile longer before donning warm clothes and heading outside into the frosty air to feed sheep, goats, chickens, geese, dogs, and a turkey.
We arrived home a couple of days ago from our medieval week, exhausted but happy. Bear and I have been working very hard the past few months, so this week we took a much-needed rest.
I wake up each morning and ask myself, “What do I need today?”
Sometimes it was extra sleep, others a good walk outside. I’ve made soup, stopped work and watched movies with Bear, crawled in bed early with the electric blanket, an audio book, and solitaire on my phone.
The best part has been waking early every day to spend time alone with my journal and a pen that works, a cuppa and the heater, a dog snoozing beside me as I write and draw and write some more, getting all the thoughts and feelings out so they can be sifted through.
There have been huge changes in me the past few months, and I’m still sitting quietly with them, letting them sink down to fill in the cracks and do their work of making me whole and strong and thriving.
I saw a dear friend over the weekend who looked me in the face and said thoughtfully, “You’ve changed. You look…happy. No, that’s not it, you’re always a cheerful soul, but you look…content. That’s it. Content.”
And I feel it. Down to my bones. I feel comfy in my own soul. I feel safe and loved and understood and accepted in my own self. Life is still as crazy as it ever was, the same old stresses and sadnesses and pain, but my insides are different. I am my own safe place, and that is so precious to me for it’s not something anyone can take away.
In the past I’ve heard of self-love, but didn’t understand it. I was raised in a world where self-love was evil, selfish, contemptible. Instead, self-hatred was prized above all things. We were constantly reminded how evil our hearts were, how deceitful, dirty, and utterly without goodness we were.
They’re such despicable lies.
Lies designed to manipulate and control, for when you hate your own self, it makes you dependent on people and deities for your peace and security. Bad people love to have that control over others.
I’ve spent the last year rebuilding a relationship of trust with myself, trust that was shattered so long ago I didn’t even know what it looked or felt like. I started by proving to myself that I am here for me, always. That I will do whatever it takes to heal, protect, look after, delight in, forgive, cheer for, and grow myself. No matter what.
I am on my side.
And rebuilding that trust has been the most strange yet wondrous thing. It has broken my dependence on others and given me glorious freedom to figure out my own weird little self and embrace her with a whole lot of love and compassion and patience.
It has been a Great Undoing, a dismantling of lies and shoring up of truth, of facing each little choice and decision and figuring out what is me and what is programming. Each bit of understanding and clarity leads to a bit more, with grieving along the way for missed chances and lost moments, and gratitude too, for fresh, new days to live and choices to make from a soul that is getting stronger and braver and wiser and grateful-er by the day.
So this morning I ask again, “What do I need today?”
Connection with a kindred spirit or two, a bowl of hot soup, time to write and draw, and perhaps a few moments in warm, winter sunshine, soaking up light and comfort.
What do you need today? xo
by Krista | May 16, 2018 | Autumn
After a beautiful early morning walk at Cataract Gorge, Launceston, my friend Shirley and I headed south through brilliant Autumn sunshine to check out a World Heritage site we’d seen a sign for on our way up from Hobart.
We took our time, stopping to take pictures, keeping a weather eye open for market stalls selling new season apples. If we accomplished nothing else on our Tasmanian adventure, we were determined to eat our fill of crisp Tasmanian apples.
As we drove, we spotted an unusual tower poking out above the trees to our left, and decided to investigate. We headed along a deeply rutted gravel road that meandered up the hillside, and emerged to find this beauty of an old church looking out over the surrounding countryside.
I love stone buildings, and this one is a stunner with its red roof, arched windows, and intricate woodwork.
Not far away we spotted a graveyard, and decided to visit.
I’ve liked graveyards since I was a child. I’d cycle out to the cemetery in Three Hills, Alberta with my cousins, and wander the aisles reading headstones, imagining the lives and adventures of those who’d gone before us. I found it comforting somehow, to connect with their stories, to be reminded that we are bound together by shared human experiences.
This graveyard was also comforting to me. It doesn’t matter if anyone remembers us after we’re gone, all that matters is now, loving and being loved. That is a life well-lived.
Soon we were on our way again, heading for Brickendon Historic Farm and Convict Village.
Built in 1824, it is one of the oldest farms in Tasmania and has been run by the Archer family for 7 generations.
It is a lovely spot set along the river, dotted with historic buildings and stunning heritage gardens, and surrounded by verdant hedgerows filled with edibles.
The berries below are haws from the hawthorn, and the herbalist in me was aching to harvest every single one of them for drying. Haws are amazing, used for centuries to heal and support the heart. They have a lovely citrusy flavour that makes for beautiful teas and syrups.
The hedgerows at Brickendon also have towering elderberry bushes heavily laden with ripe elderberries. I wanted to harvest them too, and turn them into elderberry cordial, tea, wine, and liqueur (so good for sore throats, colds, and supporting the immune system).
Brickendon is such a great place to explore. Before you begin the heritage walk, you get to watch a fascinating documentary about the history of the family and the property. Unlike many heritage properties, this one is run by the owners, and Mrs. Archer was the one to greet us at the massive barn door, offer us crisp apples she’d just picked from one of their trees, and bustle about the place feeding ducks and chickens.
I loved the old barns best of all, with their blackened exteriors and cavernous interiors perfect for dances and weddings and jolly parties.
Brickendon was home to many convicts in its early days.
Convicts arrived in Tasmania, known as Van Diemen’s Land, by boat, and were assigned a master or mistress who would oversee their sentence.
Brickendon acquired convicts skilled in farm labor, blacksmithing, carpentry, and domestic duties.
Many of the buildings available for touring were where the convicts lived, cooked, and worshiped during their sentence at Brickendon.
The farm is still a working farm, and it was so nice to wander around and be followed by inquisitive chooks, or turn a corner and find horses blinking at me.
This is inside a convict cookhouse, where many a hearty meal was prepared to sustain the men working hard in the fields.
This is the massive fireplace that covered one entire wall of the building. Tasmanian winters are bitterly cold, so I can imagine the roaring fires here would have been a haven to convicts warming numb fingers and toes after laboring in the frigid wind and freezing temperatures.
This is the chook shed, and a more posh chook shed I have yet to see. Even in the dead of winter those thick stone walls would keep the straw-strewn interior snow-free and warm.
The Archers have done an amazing job of preserving their family heritage in a way that educates and delights the public, while enabling them to continue with a way of life that has been going continuously for nearly 200 years.
I find it so inspiring to see how other people have lived and worked over the centuries. I returned home with great ideas to incorporate in our own farm, and have had fun implementing them a bit at a time.
I’ve started with flowers. Lots and lots of flowers.
by Krista | May 14, 2018 | Autumn
When my friend Shirley was diagnosed with cancer last year, she and I talked about what we could do to help her through it. She said she’d love to have something to look forward to, something to focus on through all the blech she knew she’d face, and when I suggested a trip to Tasmania to Eat All The Things, her whole face lit up and we knew we had a winner.
So that’s what we focused on. That’s what we brought up when I’d take her to an appointment or she’d stop by for coffee after she’d been to one. It’s what we dreamed of when her hair fell out and the effects of treatment knocked her flat. We’d picture Tasmania In Autumn with crisp apples and falling leaves and weather cold enough to need sweaters and scarves and cute boots.
But by the time the trip rolled around, life had happened for both of us. Finances were tight, I was ill with an unknown thing that would land me in hospital 2 months later, she was exhausted from recovery.
So we sat down with cuppas at our kitchen table, discussed all the reasons it was more sensible to stay home….and decided to go anyway.
I’m so glad we did.
There’s something rather lovely about traveling when you’re not at your best. Your expectations hover somewhere around “Get up in the morning, see something new, go to bed”, so you really can’t help but be delighted with each day no matter what happens.
We made things as easy as possible for ourselves. Instead of staying in new rooms each night, we rented two holiday homes, one near Launceston and one near Hobart. This allowed us to have beautiful and quiet places to rest, kitchens to cook up the gorgeous food we collected on our travels, and it was much cheaper than hotels. We also got a rental car so we would always have a place to rest while on our adventures, and didn’t have to depend on public transport if we were wobbly.
Our first nights were spent in a lovely cottage in Hadspen, just outside Launceston. It is a charming spot of lush gardens overlooking the river. It was small and cozy and run by the loveliest couple who chatted with us, gave us all sorts of ideas for where to visit, and treated us like family.
On our first day we each bought a bottle of Tasmanian wine (white for her, red for me) a gift box of Tasmanian cheeses, fresh bread and butter, and we were set.
Each evening we’d watch the sunset over the hills, discussing our favourite experiences of the day, plotting our next adventure. We read books and magazines, took naps, had early nights and leisurely breakfasts, and made it a holiday to suit us, just as we were.
We began our Tasmanian adventure in Launceston, driving over the mist-shrouded river to Launceston Cataract Gorge & First Basin, a gorgeous place of spectacular natural beauty and fun things like a cherry red chairlift that whisked us off our feet and took us on a beautiful ride over the water and up to the mountain.
There were lovely gardens to amble through, surrounding a wonderful gazebo nearly hidden in the towering pines.
Shirley and I both love gardens. Shirley has her degree in horticulture and has taught me so much, so we happily wandered the twisting pathways, taking pictures of the peacocks and wallabies who live there. I sighed happily over the hydrangeas, the flowers of my youth in Canada and Washington State, and the magnificent pine trees that swayed gently in the wind.
We looked over the map of criss-crossing trails, and chose one we hoped would be beautiful.
It was.
It wound along the mountain side, curving sinuously around rocky outcroppings and sheer cliffs. Multicolored stones guarded one side of us, while the glistening river flowed serenely below.
I never cease to be amazed at the plants and trees that can grow and even flourish in utterly inhospitable ground. A landscape of boulders would be the last place I’d choose to plant myself, but somehow, things grow here.
Since we arrived early in the morning, there were hardly any other walkers along the trail. It was so nice to find benches like this along the way where we could sit in the shade and watch the river and breathe in the scent of moss and damp leaves.
I loved the mottled rocks covered with lichen and moss, looking so solid and ancient. They gave such a lovely feeling of security and safety.
And these wild daisies delighted me no end, perched on the edge of a cliff with the barest shimmer of earth to sink their roots into. Yet they flourish. Sometimes all we have to do is hang on, and that’s enough to keep us living.
As we walked through the early morning sunshine, the sound of bagpipes suddenly echoed down the gorge. Old spirituals and Celtic tunes danced among the rocks, making us feel like we were in a medieval fairytale instead of a few steps away from bustling Launceston.
The water tumbling over rocks was mesmerizing as I peered over the ledge watching birds swoop and lizards scuttle.
Clouds started rolling as we headed back to the chairlift, turning the forest from shimmering glades to something out of Germany’s Black Forest.
We walked slowly, willing the trail to last a bit longer, and we both agreed that if this was all we saw in Tasmania, it had been worth the trip.
Thankfully, there were many more beauties to come.
