Hello there, it has been awhile since I have been able to do some posts here. However, I have been quite busy with lots of things I would like to share with you.
I often find the autumn season a busy one as I prepare our vegetable gardens for winter and preserve the fruit from our trees.
It takes me awhile to do the gardening these days as I find I get a sore back after just one hour in the garden and then it takes a few days to recover. I suspect it is something to do with the low bone density that I have. It is quite a pain in more ways than one. I would like to just get all the gardening done but I have to pace myself.
It is school holidays at the moment and even though we homeschool we do follow the term holidays due to activities so we currently have a 2 week break and sadly the first week has already whizzed by too quickly.
I am trying to catch up on inside cleaning jobs as well as the gardening and preserving. I have managed a couple of sleep ins and this afternoon I sat and watched some episodes of "Victoria" while doing some mending and fixing a cross-stitch mistake.
So here are some photos updating what I have been doing and the provisions from our garden.
My greenhouse before I got stuck in and weeded. I only weeded what feels like a couple of weeks ago and they're all back again! The cardboard and bags are to keep the weeds down which does work. I harvested the remaining cherry tomatoes and then pulled the plants out. I weeded that area and laid down cardboard. When I have done the whole greenhouse I want to cover over with hay to keep the weeds down over winter.
Here are some winter greens that I planted awhile back that we will be able to eat soon. Two kinds of lettuce and pak choi. There is a little bit of silverbeet hanging on too.
I have bottled some feijoas and pears from our own trees. There is plenty more to be done as well. I prefer to do small amounts at a time so it isn't overwhelming. I have a big bowl of feijoas and dozens of pears to preserve. We are eating them fresh too but there is too many to eat in the time they need attention. Due to high winds and birds we needed to harvest all our pears at once so it is a big job.
Quince! I ordered some with our weekly vegetable box that gets delivered over the late autumn and winter months. I have never done quince before but I wanted to try it. I found a recipe online which I will share in another post coming soon.
Some late autumn strawberries and one green capsicum. The only one we got.
Still plenty of eggs although the daily production is slowing down. The daily feijoa fall that we collect every morning.
Rhubarb from our garden that my husband harvested and prepared. We always add frozen raspberries instead of sugar and then keep some in the fridge and freeze the rest.
On a different note, the other day I went over to visit our neighbours as the day before I was talking to them on the footpath and they told me that they had recently lost two family members to Covid-19. One in India and one in the United States. It was very sad news and I said I would be praying for them and for all their family members.
When I came home I thought to myself that I want to do more but taking food over is hard as they are diabetic vegetarians and their meals are all mostly Indian cooking. There is no way I can compete with my neighbour's Indian cooking, she is fantastic.
So I brought a lovely flowering pot plant and when I went over to give it to them they invited me in and we sat and talked for ages. It was really nice. We have been doing more of this over the last year.
The next day we were totally surprised when our neighbour knocked on our door and she had made us an entire Indian meal. I was absolutely blown away. It was so kind of her and very thoughtful. The meal was so delicious, we devoured it!
Why do I share this? I have been thinking a lot in recent months how our neighbourhoods can be great places to reach out to people. We aren't all given the opportunity in life to travel overseas to be missionaries or to help charities but right in our own neighbourhoods are people that need someone to care. To help in a practical way or to reach out with a listening ear.
It doesn't always have to be in big ways. Sometimes we simply take some surplus eggs or vegetables to our neighbours. Recently my husband and I said to each other that we haven't seen our other neighbours for ages so we popped next door one evening after tea just to say hello and check that all is well with them. They were so blown away that we just wanted to check on them that after talking on the doorstep for awhile they invited us in. It was so lovely. Out came some Chinese jasmine tea with traditional little cups to drink out of. We had a really lovely time visiting with them.
A little gesture goes a long way. All it takes is looking out a bit more, stopping to say hello and see how your neighbours are going. See if there is a need you might be able to meet. It might just be as simple as inviting them over for a cup of tea to chat.
Anyway, thanks for stopping by and visiting. I hope you have a blessed weekend.
Blessings,
Love Fiona
"Jesus said unto him, Thou shall love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." Matthew 22:37-39
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