by Krista | May 23, 2017 | Autumn
It’s a quiet and sunshiny morning on our farm. Our resident tawny frogmouths have gone back to bed after hunting through the night, perched just outside the hollow where their clutch of eggs is hiding. They blend in so perfectly with the branches of the huge gum tree, that it’s a game for Bear and me to find them every day.
I’ve learned that life on a farm is a mix of inspiring beauty, simple pleasures, and gutting loss. Newborns and fresh produce and breathtaking sunsets go arm in arm with devastating hail storms, flooding, and death. This week a fox, or two, dug a hole under the chicken yard fence and went on a rampage, killing everything in sight. Only one turkey and four chickens survived. We were so sad, yet also thankful for the plucky survivors, including our favourite hen who hid for two days before showing up at the gate ready for some lunch. We were so happy to see her alive and well.
We mourned the loss, then took a deep breath and moved on, making the most of a bad situation. We’ve been wanting to shift the birds into new pens so we could plant the old ones with all sorts of greens they love to eat, then cover with specially made elevated grates Bear designed which will allow the birds to have access to fresh grasses and plants without being able to scratch out the roots. Now we don’t need to shift the birds, and can plant nearly all the pens right away. They will be lush and green when it’s time to rebuild our flock, providing them with a constant source of nutritious foraging.
We also get to plan our new flock, choosing the varieties we want most, and bringing them home as we find them. I’m so excited about that. I love going to farms and acreages, choosing the birds to join our little family.
Amidst the loss there is much good. I took the last week to spend more time looking after us. Making sure we’re getting enough rest and relaxation, ensuring “we” don’t get lost amidst projects and tasks. It’s been lovely. We’ve been watching French cooking dvds while we eat breakfast, getting thoroughly inspired with delectable ways to use the foods we grow and raise. We’ve turned errands into dates, making an animal feed run an excuse for lunch at a bakery and a gorgeous drive in the country. We’ve taken naps and sat around the campfire with dear friends, getting our bodies and hearts revived and restored.
Personally it’s been good too. Getting in bed early each night so I can read a bit before sleep has done wonders for cutting down on nightmares. Choosing light-hearted fare – Amelia Peabody, Phryne Fisher, Enid Blyton – gives my brain happy things to focus on and ensures a much better sleep. There’s something about feisty heroines and adventurous children that put my heart and mind in a good place.
My gardens continue to bring me much joy. This incredibly warm Autumn has plants and fruit trees all mixed up. I’ve been harvesting peas for weeks and our apple trees are flowering. Tomato plants are popping up everywhere and my elderflower hedge is getting blossoms again. Winter is only a week away, but you’d never know it with all the Spring growth everywhere.
Yesterday I spent an entire afternoon outside. Pure bliss. I dug new garden beds and transplanted rainbow chard and Red Russian kale, and planted caraway and meadowsweet. The radishes, coriander, red onion, purple carrots, and leeks I planted earlier are all sprouting beautifully. Striped eggplants, capsicums, and chilies continue to produce, and I’ve been harvesting purple-topped turnips, sugar snap peas, and snow peas nearly every day. Beetroots and red carrots are nearly ready to harvest, and romaine, mustard greens, and silverbeet are getting bigger and bigger.
My herbs are thriving after the good rain we had last week. I’ve started making borage tea and will be adding it to our apple wine to see if it really does give courage like medieval people believed. I made a huge vat of comfrey tea yesterday, and will let it ferment for the next while until it’s ready to pour over my gardens and give everything a good feed. I’ve been shoveling manure and hauling straw for mulch, lugging bags of feed and picking up trash a naughty dog scattered hither and yon. It feels so good to be outside, sun on my shoulders, wind in my hair, geese, dogs, and goats coming to see what I’m up to.
Today is a writing day and I’m looking forward to it. I’m tucked up in bed with a view of trees and blue sky, ready to spin sentences and string together paragraphs, edit photos and submit articles. It’s going to be good.
How are you taking care of yourself this week? xo
by Krista | May 12, 2017 | Autumn
It’s dark and quiet, only one lamp shining so I don’t wake Bear who is slumbering beside me. Work is done and I’m winding down with a cup of tea and a Phryne Fisher novel.
We’ve had a lot going on this week, and it’s lovely to just sit and look back and be thankful for all that’s transpired.
Our goat herd is smaller now, and although it was hard for me to say good-bye to our big, gentle billy and some of our girls, I’m at peace because they went to a good home with good people where they’ll be safe, loved, and well cared for.
We moved our geese into the apple orchard where they can eat down the weeds that have been flourishing since the big rains. When they’ve cleaned it up, we’ll shift them to the big orchard where they can continue to eat and fertilize our grape vines and citrus, plum, and peach trees while they’re at it.
I dug and watered new garden beds, and will plant them with meadowsweet, caraway, angelica, and marshmallow soon. I used up my latest harvest of chili peppers and eggplants by making a range of hot sauces. Some made my eyes water and nose run, while others were mild but flavorful. I also harvested half of my horseradish, and made a creamy horseradish sauce to go with our slow-cooked beef tonight. So fresh and zingy, I loved it.
My favorite project this week was picking olives with Bear.
It was beautifully dark and cloudy, just the sort of weather I love for working outside. The chilly winds sent the olive branches dancing, and I was glad for a snug sweater to keep me warm while I worked.
We picked and picked, gliding our hands down the slender branches, hearing the satisfying plop of ripe olives into the containers strung around our necks.
Sometimes we worked alone, picking our way carefully through brambles, taking care to avoid the occasional cluster of paper wasps. Other times we were side by side, visiting amiably, pulling down branches so we could harvest the dense clusters of olives that always seem to be just out of reach.
Picking olives is meditative work, gentle, steady, and quiet. After a couple of hours we were tired but peaceful, so excited about the mounds of olives ready to start curing. We thanked our friends for sharing their bounty and balanced the buckets of olives carefully in the car so they wouldn’t tip over on the way home.
Today I started the soaking process. In ten days I’ll put them in a salt brine, and a few weeks after that, I’ll put them in crocks with a light brine flavored with garlic, bush lemon zest, rosemary, fresh dill, or anything else that takes my fancy.
Now, though, it’s time to snuggle in bed with my book.
What is your favorite project from this week? xo
by Krista | May 9, 2017 | Autumn
It’s cold tonight, and I’m tucked up in bed in a nest of blankets, garbed in flannel pjs with a scarf wrapped snugly around my neck.
It’s been a strange few months for me. Some things in my world have gone topsy-turvy, upsetting cherished ideas, plans, and commitments, forcing me to look at myself, my future, my life in an entirely different light than I have before.
It’s been scary and unsettling and, eventually, after tears and freak outs and finding the courage to stare it all in the face, rather exciting.
It all started with one unscrupulous employer. Then another. Then one more. (When things come in threes, I tend to sit up and take notice.) The first was merely unreliable, the second a sexual predator I reported, the third an international scam artist I had to report to the government so they could launch an investigation. Seriously whackadoodle stuff that shook me more than a little bit and left me broke, feeling rather adrift, and none too keen to trust new people. It also triggered some rather dreadful memories from my past, and I had to take some time to process things and figure out what I was going to do next.
I spent a lot of time outside, letting gardens and animals and wind and trees and sunshine and campfires and walks do their healing, strengthening work.
I read a lot, letting stories and poems and the musings of others help me navigate my own thoughts and feelings until I could see clearly instead of through a heavy fog of fear and uncertainty.
I reminded myself of the collaborations that I have with people who truly are wonderful, reliable, and a joy to work with. (Andy, Carrie, Cory, and Rowan, I’m looking at you. XO)
Yes, there are spectacularly awful people in this world, liars and cheats and plain ol’ disgusting wretches, but there are supremely marvelous people too, ones who inspire and support and cheer. Encountering the bad ones has made me treasure the good ones even more.
After the initial shock wore off, I could see the situations with genuine pride. In the past when I was treated poorly I just took it. I let abusers and manipulators and nogooddirtyrottenscoundrels trample all over me. Not this time. This time I stood up for myself and made them accountable for their behavior by reporting them to the proper authorities. I wasn’t a victim, and that feels really good.
Those situations also made me look at myself differently, and see if there were ways I could be brave and expand my own business to be my main business instead of a sideline.
So I’ve been brainstorming and talking with business friends and crunching numbers and making plans and sketching out big dreams. Slowly but surely things are coming together, and I’m so excited to share with you what’s ahead.
I won’t say too much yet, there are still a few more important details to be sorted, but I wanted to let you know I’m excited. My spirit is happy dancing and whenever I think of it I smile. Pretty sure that’s a good sign.
In the meantime I do the work I have with beautiful collaborators I love and trust, I learn how to stretch pennies further than they’ve ever been stretched, and I practice living in hope instead of fear. I also do little things that make me happy: medieval projects, picking olives with Bear, and making way too many bottles of hot sauce.
Things are going to be OK.
xo
by Krista | Apr 26, 2017 | Autumn
I never cease to be amazed at how much good a little rest does to my body, mind, and spirit.
This week I was tired to my bones. Nightmares returned a few weeks ago, the worst nightmares I’ve had yet, filling me with fear and anxiety before my head even hit the pillow. Instead of waking up rested, I woke screaming and crying with Robbie shaking me telling me I’m safe, he’s here, the dreams aren’t real. The rapes, the torture, the beatings of my nightmares weren’t real.
I’ve learned that when nightmares return, it’s my body’s way of telling me, “OK, luv, it’s time to heal more. It’s time to go deeper.”
I dread it every time, but I’ve learned that the only way out is through, and on the other side is light.
In the past I’ve tried all sorts of things to make the nightmares stop. Nothing works. They stay until they’re ready to leave.
Instead I’ve learned to prepare myself to handle them better.
This time I’ve sat quietly with myself before bed and ask if there’s any unresolved issue that needs to be addressed, memories I’ve blocked out that need to be looked at, feelings I’ve been stuffing down that need to be aired and validated. There’s always something, sometimes big, sometimes small. And when I take the time to sit with that issue – no judgment, no shaming, no suppressing – just sitting and looking and being with that issue, the pressure is released, like letting air out of a too-full tire.
I don’t stay in that place long, just long enough for the pressure to ease, for the truth to be spoken, for my feelings and thoughts to be heard, seen, and validated.
Then I look at books of beautiful gardens or artwork or illustrations, things that calm and soothe, comfort and inspire, and remind me of the good things I treasure.
And before I go to sleep, I remind myself that no matter what I dream about, the truth is I am safe, I am loved, and light will come in the morning. The light will always, always return.
The nightmares left two nights ago, and this time their departure was amicable rather than abrupt. In a strange way it feels like we’re partners now, not enemies. They’re messengers and guides who help me face things I wouldn’t otherwise face. In their own way, albeit brutal, they help me heal and reveal my strength. With their darkness, they reveal the tremendous light in my life, and help me treasure the people and experiences that make my life so precious and rich.
This morning, as I wait for the sun to come up and listen to Bear pottering in the kitchen making cuppas, I feel thankful that this time the nightmares didn’t cripple me. They’re awful, yes, but they don’t last. They don’t stay forever. And in their wake they leave deeper healing, greater strength, and much more courage.
xo
by Krista | Apr 20, 2017 | Autumn
The wind is howling today, sending leaves and feathers skittering across the farmyard, creating a dance of shadows on the grass as tree branches bend and swoop.
The animals are hunkered down out of the wind, finding calm, sunny spots to snooze the afternoon away.
I’m staying warm under a blanket on the veranda, writing my weekly newspaper column and updating an article on smoking techniques in between dashes to the oven to replace trays of tomatoes and garlic I’m roasting. I marinated a brisket in garlic balsamic vinegar, Worcestershire sauce, olive oil, salt and pepper, and a bit of liquid hickory smoke, and as soon as the tomatoes finished, popped it in the oven to slow roast it for dinner. The house is smelling wonderful.
I’ve been working in my gardens, taking cuttings of my favorite herbs – pineapple sage, spearmint, lemon balm – and putting them in water in tiny glasses all along a sun-drenched windowsill in the kitchen. Most of them have little roots already, and that thrills me to pieces. Soon I’ll transplant them and tuck them into my greenhouse for the winter to grow and strengthen until spring.
Other herbs have made their own starts – tarragon, common mint, and yarrow – and I’ve been dividing them and planting them in new spots so they can grow nice and big.
Yesterday we picked up a few I don’t have yet – German chamomile and lime verbena – and an extra elderflower because, in my opinion, you can never have too much elderflower. Next week I will tuck the first two in my greenhouse and plant the elderflower in my new garden bed where it can spread out into a beautiful hedge that will keep us supplied with flowers and elderberries for many years to come.
Campfires have been our comfort and delight this week. Especially after a big day of medieval projects.
Bear and I have been making, staining, and painting tent poles for our new medieval market stalls. For the past five years we’ve made due with what we had, but every year, without fail, I got sunburn and heatstroke. This year Bear made Sue and I our own shelters in the style of medieval Muslim market stalls we found in an old manuscript. They’re beautifully shady and cool with plenty of room for us to display our wares, do our demonstrations, and talk with people interested in learning about medieval folk medicine, medieval desert tribal food, linen-making, coffee-making, and cheese-making. We’re so excited to get them set up and decorated with the vivid colors favored in the 12th and 13th centuries.
After painting four coats on 28, 8-sided tent poles, dinner by the fire sounds like pure bliss.
Sometimes we just sit and stare quietly into the fire, getting lost in the play of light and heat. Others we visit amiably whilst eating cheeseburgers on homemade buns and watching the sun sink down through the trees.
And one night, when Bear had some writing work to do inside, I had the fire all to myself. I poured a glass of homemade cherry brandy, pulled my chair up close to the warmth of the flames, and let all the stresses of the day melt away.
Our first medieval event of the season is nearly upon us, and we’re so excited. This weekend our Blackwolf friends arrive to pack our trailer with tents and poles, pegs and ropes, rugs and tables, beds and shelves, pots and boxes, chairs and bedding. And plenty of firewood for as many cozy moments around the fire as we can muster. xo
