by Krista | Nov 2, 2016 | Spring
The sun is sinking low over the fields and I’m parked in front of a fan, cold spiced tea beside me as I edit photos and watch Psych reruns. It’s been an exquisite day of just home-ness.
After weeks of dashing hither and thither for various jobs, meetings, and commitments, today was just for me. Bear was out and about running errands and I had the whole house and farm to myself to potter at all the little things that get lost and neglected when life has those inevitable busy spells.
I finished work and we had a good breakfast and then he was off and I headed outside.
How I’ve missed being outside in the sun and the wind, digging and watering and planting, hauling and organizing and tidying. I covered up well to protect from the sun – yes, dear Aussies, lest you worry, I wear a long sleeve, collared shirt and broad-brimmed hat when I’m working outside – then set to work, chatting to goats and dogs as they wandered over to see what I was up to.
I got my gardens watered and tidied up the farm yard. Our goats are wizards at getting their horns and hooves hooked into things and dragging them all over the place. I found once tidily rolled up hoses stretched willy-nilly down by the goose pen, my potting table toppled over from where they tried scrambling up to reach pea vines growing through the fence, and once neatly stacked flower pots tumbling every which way. I know they’ll probably end up helter-skelter again in the near future, but for today, everything’s where it ought to be.
When the sun got too hot I made a pear strawberry smoothie and sat in the shade on the back veranda watching the goats snooze in dappled light under the gum trees. After you’ve been running ragged, isn’t it wonderful to simply sit and bask in quietness?
After a while I went back inside and started pottering in the kitchen. It never fails to astound me how quickly one room can go from clean to utter mayhem. While I worked I listened to “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone” – it’s that happy time for my yearly read through of all the Harry Potter books – and got my little pantry organized, my fridge sorted, dining room table cleared, floor swept, and dishes done. I can’t help but smile when I walk out there now.
Bear brought home fish and chips – he always seems to know the right day to do that – and now it’s time for a glass of homemade apple wine, a chat about the day, and an early night. xo
by Krista | Oct 20, 2016 | Spring
I’m sitting in a blissfully quiet house, comfy on my bed with the windows flung open to catch even a hint of a breeze on this hot-as-blazes-still-before-the-storm afternoon.
Bear and I went out earlier to make sure everyone was fed and watered, and now he’s off running errands, the animals are all snoozing or ambling lazily, and all I hear are gentle little songs from the wild birds that thrive here – fairy wrens, woolly wagtails, grass parrots, rainbow lorikeets, and more.
It’s wonderful to be home again after a treasured little jaunt to Brisbane with two grandmas I adopted for the night. We went to an Andre Rieu concert and had an absolute ball. They’re both disabled at the moment, so I had one on each arm as we inched our way slooooowly across parking lots and lobbies and hotel rooms and loading ramps and finally into our seats. I haven’t laughed so hard in ages as the two of them teased each other mercilessly and threatened to “show a shapely leg” and bust out into the can-can. I saw the young women they once were as they laughed and cried and swooned through the music, hands clasped to their chests in raptures as they sang along, clapped, and held hands with strangers, turning the disabled section into a jubilant party. It makes me tear up even now as I think of them, revisiting the music of their youth, regaling me with stories of long ago dances and concerts and beautiful dresses. Such a magical night.
Now I’m home again, heart full of memories of wondrous music and epic performances, so thankful for these moments that make life so marvellous.
I love going on adventures and love coming home again to my gardens and animals and very own bed, and Bear – who listens with a big smile to my exuberant stories.
I wandered through my gardens after work this morning, so excited to see artichokes blooming!!! I’m a huge artichoke fan and can’t wait to cook up these beauties. Some will be steamed then dipped, petal by petal, into creamy, garlicky mayonnaise, others will be roasted, Roman-style, with lemon, garlic, mint, and white wine.
The asparagus is flourishing too – a new crop of spears every morning.
I picked a lovely big bundle and will roast some of them with green beans for a cold salad tossed with a fresh tarragon vinaigrette and shredded roast chicken, and others with plenty of Parmesan cheese that will crisp up marvellously in the oven.
And now I must get back to my kitchen. I’m cleaning out the pantry – making room for homemade pasta, bottles of black raspberry liqueur, absinthe, and Sambuca, and jars of preserves – and the fridge so I have somewhere to store all the good things coming out of my gardens. And laundry. Yes, mustn’t forget the laundry.
What’s the best soul-stirring music you’ve listened to lately? xo
by Krista | Oct 18, 2016 | Spring
It’s a gorgeous morning on our farm, the wild winds and pelting rains of yesterday forgotten in a wash of sunlight and stillness. The world looks clean and bright and all is peaceful.
Recently a retired friend of mine told me that she’d spent the 50 best years of her life working non-stop, trying to build something good to pass on to her descendants. She doesn’t regret the investment, but wonders now why she thought she had to only work, work, work and rarely, if ever, take time to play. She urged me not to spend my life working, but to make time for the inspiring, the beautiful, the things that delight.
I love friends like that. Friends who remind me of what’s important. And that it’s never too late to start fresh.
She’s part of my “in cahoots” tribe, and with her and others we’re redeeming the lost moments, making time for the things that make our souls sing.
Like finding a café in Toowoomba that looks like it was plucked out of Greece or Italy or France – or some splendid hodgepodge of the three.
Café Valetta has become a favourite spot to meet with dear friends when we’re adventuring in Toowoomba. Such a wonderful escape from the ordinary, a charming oasis that begs for leisurely visits and solitary reveries.
Recently I met my friend Bernie there, and we had the best talks and laughs over mammoth pieces of cake – carrot for her, red velvet for me – basking in dappled sunshine and fragrant breezes and beautiful views of the park across the road.
I enjoyed a solitary cuppa there when I arrived early for a meeting, letting the cool morning air whisk my imagination back to beloved trips overseas and finding hidden cafes in Paris, Malta, and atop a cliff in Greece. You know you’ve found a good spot when it reminds you of places that hold beautiful memories.
I’ve thought a lot about what my friend told me. Since that chat we’ve saved up money to go to an Andre Rieu concert and to see the Russian Ballet perform “The Nutcracker” over the holidays. Things that may not delight others but fill our souls up to overflowing.
We will always have work to do, always, and work is a good and necessary thing, but our souls need nourishing every bit as much as our bank accounts need filling. Sometimes I’m really good at remembering that, other days I need a nudge.
What good thing will you make time for this week? xo
by Krista | Oct 12, 2016 | Spring
It’s a gorgeous afternoon, soft and golden, cool and green, our goats and sheep nibbling contentedly among the shifting shadows of the gum trees.
A lime yogurt cake is baking in the house, and Bear and I just finished a break on the veranda, watching our little world as we chatted and sipped cold drinks. It’s so good to be home.
Monday was a lovely but busy run-around day. We got up early and drove out to the Pilton hills to pick mulberries at our friend Carolyn’s property. She is an incredible gardener, generous with her produce and her time, happily trading and sharing whatever bounty she has whether it’s a basket of limes, a bundle of asparagus, or, at this time of year, a few kg of mulberries.
I always love visiting her and meandering through her gardens and orchards to see what amazing things she’s built, planted, or harvested. We had a fun time crawling about under and among the mulberry branches, filling baskets and bins with gorgeous, ripe berries. Carolyn and I kept getting our long, blond hair tangled in tree limbs and emerged looking like wild women with berry stains everywhere and hair stuck up with leaves and rogue mulberries. Bear, on the other hand, appeared utterly unscathed. Even his hat remained on his head!
Laden down with mulberries we bid farewell to Carolyn with promises to drop by bottles of homemade mulberry liqueur and cordial.
Then I was off to Oma’s to process all the berry beauties. We pushed them through a hand-cranked sieve that retained the seeds and left us with gorgeous mulberry juice. Then we made sugar syrup and blended it with the juice before bottling. Oma processed hers in a hot water bath and I put mine in the freezer. I just love that gorgeous color.
Next up was making pasta. Oma’s recipe is simply 1 egg per cup of flour. We made a 5 cup batch using Oma’s free range duck and chook eggs that turned the dough a rich yellow. We floured it well and cut it into workable pieces.
With mulberry stained fingers we pushed the dough through the pasta machine into long, wide ribbons, then again into thin sheets, and once more as we cut them into fettucine and vermicelli. The weather was so warm that the pasta was dry before I got home and I didn’t have to hang it to dry.
It felt so good to come home with glistening bottles of jewel-tone mulberry syrup, stacks of homemade pasta, and plans for how to use both.
With the warmer weather we’ve had, I’ve been making all sorts of cold drinks with the mulberry syrup. After the long day of berry-picking and pasta-making, I made us Mulberry Gin cocktails. Yesterday afternoon I raided my garden for fresh herbs, then sat on the veranda with Mulberry Lemongrass Iced Tea, while bottles of Mulberry Mint Iced Tea chilled in the fridge.
Tonight we’re having my homemade vermicelli tossed with roasted tomatoes and garlic. I’m really looking forward to it.
What is your favorite cool down beverage? xo
by Krista | Oct 6, 2016 | Spring
Recently someone from my past communicated with my husband, telling him I have no mind of my own, no will of my own, that any thoughts, beliefs, or choices I have formed, expressed, or made are not mine but those forced upon me by him and others.
It’s an old trick of Patriarchy. A tried and true method to control and suppress women, smother their doubts and questions, and undermine any attempts they make to break free.
In the past, such words were lethal to my very sensitive heart and mind. I believed them. I accepted that I did not matter, that any questions or doubts I had were the work of the Devil, that any dreams and hopes I had for change were merely the reflections of a rebellious heart and needed to be confessed, abandoned, and replaced with whatever my authorities decided was best for me.
I picture those words like those heavy, leaden blankets you wear during x-rays, hurled over to smother me, obliterate my voice, douse my light, keep me under control.
For most of my life I lived under that blanket, quietly accepting my lot, trying to find ways to shimmer a little in the darkness, keeping Me safely hidden.
I’m not part of that world anymore. I left it with three suitcases, a one-way plane ticket, $1000 in my bank account and a passionate, desperate hope that things would turn out OK.
They did.
Bit by bit I got out from under that strangling blanket. I’ve learned to think, to speak, to be without shame, to link arms with fear and courage and tackle grief and rejection and loneliness and illness, and slowly but surely stand on my own two feet with a mind of my own and a worldview and faith shaped by my own experiences. I have friends, true friends, who love me for me and don’t care two pins about the all the external stuff. They see me, with all my foibles, and love me anyway.
The Blanket People hate that.
So every couple of months they send someone along to contact us to try to get me back and return me to the girl living in darkness and oppression and abuse. They tell me I’m going to hell and am a shame to God and all of them. They accuse him of hiding me in a dark medieval cult. There have been death threats and desperate attempts at manipulation. They’ve tried to turn him against me with private messages telling him I traveled the world sleeping with men in exchange for money, that I was never abused or in a cult, and that I only married him for his money. They go through Robbie because in that world, it’s the Men who decide what’s to be done about the Women. My decisions and choices and thoughts have no weight simply because I’m female.
In the beginning such communications were so traumatic for me I’d be vomiting, get migraines, and have nightmares for weeks afterwards. As I healed and got stronger those symptoms eased and eventually I could see that although I’d stepped out from under the blanket, the blanket was still being used to harm me. The blanket needed to be burned.
I’ve learned that the only way to burn blankets is to find out what gave the blanket its power in the first place. To go back in time to when the lies and false beliefs took root in my heart and mind, and replace them with truth. It’s been an arduous task, but a precious one. With each journey another chain is broken, another blanket burned, and the peace I’m experiencing is beyond description.
I’m so thankful for Bear and our dear friends who have stood by me through all this, who helped me unpack the lies and remind me of truth whenever I got wobbly. Because I do get wobbly. Sometimes the pain overwhelms the truth and I can’t see it anymore. That’s why we need each other, to help us get out from under the blanket when it starts smothering us again.
Today, as the sun shines so brilliantly, I’m celebrating that this latest blanket toss didn’t smother me. I was able to see it for what it was – lies, fear, control – and reject it outright, burn that sucker, then remind myself of all the loving, non-smothery people in my life who make this world a beautiful place. xo
