Home sweet home

                    Home sweet Home

Finally we arrived home this evening, what an awesome week we have had but I must say its good to be home, we arrived a bit to late to go outside and check on the menagerie but were greeted by a few.
The house is in one piece, I was a bit concerned about my 26 year old daughter looking after everything but she did a pretty good job although she slept in every bed, she did make them but didn't make them like me so it was noticeable as soon as I walked in the bedroom lol.
I was going to blog while I was away but was to tired by the end of the day.
I did manage to read Rhonda`s blog
http://down---to---earth.blogspot.com.au/
this is the blog that started it all for me.
I have included a couple of photos from my holiday from my favourite place of the trip which was crystal castle at Mullumbimby this place is just beautiful.

Now its back into the swing of things posting parcels from a back log of ebay sales, then back to decluttering the house and work boo hoo.
Oh there is one thing I didn't do while I was away is I didn't go to an opp shop , not one single one I seen them but I didn't go in,

Not much time to blog

I must say I did plan to blog each day while away but time has got away and by the end of the jam packed days I've been to tired and I'm only blogging from my phone so I only have a few photos to work with.

I've been checking in with my daughter at home each day she is 26 but not used to looking after all my pets , that's been amusing . Thirty minutes after leaving home she rang me and asked me why the cat was miowing I thought to myself oh no this will be a nightmare. 

The second day a chicken escaped and she had to chase it around the backyard to catch it , oh how I would of loved to see that. She also informed me she felt like their slave opening and closing the door for them lol. 

In the mean time we are having a lovely time on the Gold Coast yesterday I drove down to Byron bay and crystal castle that's truly amazing I took many photos but have to post when I get back this is only photo I have

There were crystals everywhere truly beautiful. Very scenic and winding drive.

Everyday we have been swimming and in the sauna at the resort then embarking on an adventure for the day .

Vacation

Day 1

Bacon and mushroom risotto

This recipe is quick and easy and tastes delish

2 tbl olive oil

15 g butter

1/2 diced onion

2 rashers bacon chopped

1 cup arborio rice

2 cups chicken stock

1 cup sliced mushrooms

2 tbls grated Parmesan 

Chopped parsley 

Ground pepper

1 heat oil and butter add onion and bacon

2. Stir in rice until rice slightly colors keep stirring.

3. Begin adding stock 1/2 cup at a time

4. After second edition of stock add mushrooms

5 if rice still not soft cook further adding hot water. 

6. Remove from hear add Parmesan and pepper and parsley 

So many things to think about

I havnt blogged for a while as I've been so busy with things happening around the home. I'm actually having a go blogging this from my phone so hope it all works ok. 

Changes around my home my eldest daughter has moved back in and it's very different and challenging as we all have a routine and kids have jobs and help out  which I think is fair . You can't expect one person to do everything ,so without sounding like a nagging pain in the rear ( actually no I have been a pain in the rear ) but slowly getting her to be part of job circle and trying to explain why. Some days I have felt like exploding I can assure you living here is no holiday. 

Speaking of holidays I'm taking one and I'm sooooo excited.

The other news is I'm thinking about selling my house and building so the next few weeks I will be doing a lot of thinking. I love this house I have planted everything here. The rooms are huge the soil is awesome I love my vege gardens and pets making jams from my berries and fruit and cooking sauce from my tomatoes . I don't like the stairs and would like to have single story house but have to think about starting from scratch and planting all over again. Also the size of rooms in newer houses are so much smaller than my rooms . So after my holiday there will be major clean out and garage sale. Then decide sell or stay . 

Chooks

                            Chook pen

 The weather is getting wetter and the pen is getting quite slippery, the girls appreciated the refurbish today. I raked out the old mulch and put down some woodshavings and straw for the girls to scratch up also pulled a few weeds from the garden and trimmed some rose bushes and put them in the pen for them to kick around.

 They rush out of their house to check out anything new

 They scramble quickly for the morning scraps

 This is the old mulch from the pen its beautiful and rich and went straight onto a new garden Im building , I wont plant anything in it for a while it will get built up over winter, the chickens do a fantastic job of composting

I keep my worm farm in the chook pen and a few months back my son knocked it over and I thought I had lost all the worms as I had checked several times and there was nothing, but today there were quite a few but I couldn't get a decent photo as they buried into the mulch, so I will have to start feeding some scraps to them again, this will be going onto the new garden as well.
My girls have done a great job with the mulch pile in their pen, Its just plant prunings and weeds and leaves and old hay , they get in there and kick around and scratch it up and poop through it.
Now they have turned it into beautiful rich compost for the garden.
Chooks have to be the most useful and entertaining pets, I just love them

                     Not what I had planned

I had a nice long list of jobs I had been planning to do today, but unfortunately the list got cut right back.
Yesterday I fell down the stairs again ugh, this time I hurt my back oh what pain it was, so yesterday I did nothing at all but rest {which I hate to do}
Today I did some stretches to strengthen my back but Im being careful.
I was going to refurbish the chook pen but shoveling may be a bit much so that can wait for another week.

 I did manage to clean a guinea pig hutch  and 2 girls had given birth to these little cuties in this picture they are about 15 minutes old, its hard to tell but there are actually 6 piggies here they are all purebred sheba yaks. The 2 white ones are 2 one girl and the 4 others are 2 another, with my piggies they all seem to look after each others babies they have quite a community happening.

 This is Kat keeping careful watch over the pigs

 I was going to bath these girls today but that will have to wait as well, they are looking pretty scruffy at the moment

 Im a bit excited about this , every lemon tree I have planted has died  but I have three lemons and that's a lot for me

 My favorite shoe wardrobe

 Another exciting achievement today, I have never ever made pies, I always make sausage rolls and pasties but never pies and yesterday while I was resting I was busy reading other peoples blogs and I seen some lovely pies, so today I made pies and they were absolutely delicious.

 As usual I have no recipe but I made my own shortcrust for the base and the filling is mince steak I divided it in 3 and made Bolognese , curry and just plain beef, for the top I used puff pastry sheets.
The Bolognese I also placed cheese in as well. I was extremely happy the way they turned out and everybody loved them.

Now I want to make more, I really enjoy making the different varieties.
Think there will be quite a few experiments in my kitchen now