Well today is my 48th Birthday. I have had a nice relaxing day. Breakfast with my hubby, then a phone call from the boss to say happy birthday, and why don't you stay home today nice surprise.

The photo above is of the beans we planted on the 9th Jan. They are already popping their heads up out of the dirt, will be able to plant them out next week.

These lettuce are growing like weeds, they seem to grow taller every day. I think you can just about watch them grow.

Here is Ethel on top of the Box of weeds I bought them home yesterday. It is keeping them busy. In a few days they will have it all emptied out and all the good bits eaten.

Can you see the ginger rooster in the background behind the girls, Kirby spends hours in the chook pen with the girls, we think there may be a mouse catching his eye.

This is my Rosie girl. She doesn't like the hot weather. She hates it above about 25 degrees c. Here she is under the shade of a gum tree keeping cool.

Well this was just a quick catch up of around my place. Work keeps me really busy so not much time to catch up on blogging.

Tracie

"Christmas is coming the goose is getting fat etc etc......."

The new Job is going great. The best move I have made so far. It is very quite at the moment not many people buy beds pre christmas, but they tell me that after christmas we will be run of our feet.

Have today off. I don't start work tomorrow till 1.00pm - 9.00pm. Thats okay as I get to do a few more christmas things. We were having Christmas down here but with the change in job we are going to have Christmas at Pymble this year. When I have been in the job longer I may be able to organise Christmas eve off next year. I know it's a whole year away but I like to be organised.

Today I have made 2 Festive fruit and nut cakes to give as gifts. I like to give gifts that I have made. Made a huge batch of white christmas to give as gifts as well. YUM.

Well I have 3 fairy skirts still to make so I had better get to it.

Tracie

I can't believe I haven't written anything here for the past 3 months. Spring has passed by in a blur. Last time I wrote here, I wrote about starting a new job. Well this week I finish that job and move on to another more permanent job. Nannying has been great for the last 18 months, and I'm going to miss M J and A greatly. I hope I can still see them. I'm a bit sad that I can't watch them grow anymore, but it was my time to move on.

I'm going to be selling beds and mattresses for a large chain. I have retail experience but have never sold a bed. Suppose it won't be too difficult once I now all my product knowledge. Product knowledge is swimming around in my head right now as I had my first shift yesterday.

Now that I won't be working such long hours I will try and write more often.

I have been doing some baking, and our garden is looking fantastic.

The chookies are all laying, and we get 5 to 7 eggs per day. We are both enjoying our googs, they are sooooo nice.

Have a great day.

Tracie

SPRING

Today is the first day of spring, hurray, I love spring, the new life that is popping out of the ground is great.

Two of my pullets are laying... They lay the cutest little googs (eggs). I put a couple of them in rissoles last night and they were yum.

It has been awhile since my last post but my life is a bit hectic at the moment. I have started Nannying for another family. I had to give up my Funtime job. I finish there this Friday. It is a little sad because I loved it at Funtime. Hopefully I'll be able to work on the odd weekend to keep my hand in.

I'm now nannying 5 days per week. The new family is very nice, but I will need a bit of time to get used to their routine and what is expected of me.

HARVESTING

We harvested 3 kilos of spuds they were yum, and we have been eating broccoli for weeks now and it is yum as well. I especially love the purple broccoli. Last night all the veges we were eating for dinner we had grown, broccoli, kohl rabi, pumpkin, potatoes, snow peas. I steamed them all and had them with rissoles.

Better get ready for work...

Have a great day.

Tracie

Our garden is coming to life. We have tiny little peaches on the peach tree, I just hope they set. We got one Peach last year and it was yum.

Our lemon tree still has quite a bit of fruit on it, I have given it a prune and now there is new life on it too. Lovely new shoots and lots of little lemons.

This is one of my favourite flowers, I love it because it just pops up every year. No need to re plant it. The chooks also love to eat the lovely green leaves.

The broadbeans are flowering but not much else. There doesn't seem to be any little beans yet just lots of flowers.

This is the 3rd year I have had my blueberry bush. this year it is full of lovely little flowers, if all the flowers on my bush turn to berries I will be haveing a blueberry feast. I think it loves the drink of tea I give it every morning.

On the other side of our fruit salad tree we have a branch of apricots. this is the first year it has flowered so hopefully we will get fruit.

Thats all for today. Better get ready for work.

Tracie

Getting ready for Spring...

Here at Our Simple Green House we are getting ready for spring. You wouldn't know it by the weather but it is only a few weeks away.

Steve has built me some new gardens to use. As we have a very large and beautiful gum tree plus a useless pool in our back yard we have to do alternative planting. We bought 4 200lt drums for $30.00 and we cut them in half to create this...

.

We have planted under the little PET bottle green houses, peas, lettuce and rocket. The rest are in the green house getting a little bigger. In the green house we have,

Our chookies are all doing well. Rosie is back to giving us 1 egg a day.

The little girls are 18 weeks old now, they are very big eaters, I give them warm

porridge, grain and weeds every day they are growing well.

Here are our other hens, I have to say my favourites are Rosie and Harry, they both have lots of personality. Rosie is the boss of the 8 chooks but I think Harry is the boss of the five new hens. I also believe that Harry and Ava will be my first layers as their cones are bigger than the others.

Well this has been quite a long post.

I have more photos to come.

Tracie

Weekend Retreat

Last weekend I went away with a group of 7 girlfriends for a weekend away Scrapbooking and card making. This is a yearly event for me and we all had a fabulous time. I spent the whole weekend making 5 Christmas cards. The weekend is all about being social for me, I spend more time talking than scrapping, but I have a great time. We have all booked for next year.

Below is a picture of the whole group taken from the Memories That Last Facebook page.

Have a great day...

Tracie