Feather your Nest Friday, 6th of September, 2019.

This week was a bit of a slower week and I was out three days.  Somehow this seems like I was out 300 days as far as the house is concerned!   It is Spring now and I already did some veggie planting.  Just a bit of a start.  I hope to add each week and end up with a very full garden and a staggered harvest.  My first eight tomato plants are in plus five capsicums.
We also have rain!   This is the best thing we could have and the biggest help of anything. No work we can do equals rain.   Despite this I started Spring cleaning today!  
The last two days I was just catching up on housework from being out and about.   Today I am actually getting stuck into extra things and hope that between now and the end of the weekend I will have lots done and a few things sparkling.   It can be kind of hard to get going but once you get into the groove suddenly everything looks like it needs a wash or re arrange.  Then the momentum begins!

Some of the ways we got things done, got ahead, saved and added to the pantry this week were:

For Loui we had cleaned out the animal houses and all this mulched down hay went around the fruit trees to help them through summer.

By the way Loui is doing really well!   And he and Scout have made friends.  At first their relationship was one I had to watch.  Now they are buddies it seems.

Dad told me Loui can grow to be 900 kilos to one ton. That is 2204 pounds!  With what he drinks now I would say he is on track!

I didn't have much thrift store luck but I did stock up on bedding suitable for new born lambs.  When I needed it last I went though a lot drying cold and wet babies etc.  So this added to my animal pantry.

I was given lots of lemons.   I have been squeezing one into water each day and I also have loads of eggs so I will make up some lemon butter.  It means I can make butterfly cakes and tarts and many good things.

Another bargain I got was at the post office.  They often have amazing deals.  It is a CWA (Country Womens League) recipe book and they have amazing recipes.  Like all old fashioned cooks it is wonderful food with simple ingredients. It was $5 so I was pleased with this.

Before the rain came we had two big fires.  I lit up our biggest fire on the last day of winter.   It was a huge fire of many tree stumps and the its we could not handle and were heaped up by the tractor.   We are up to almost 40 fires for the season.   Future years won't be so many.  It is just that no one had maintained this area for many years and we are trying to be fire ready.

Our family had a special Fathers Day. Mum made a big afternoon tea and so many family members came and it was beautiful.

I had oranges and eggs.   So I made a heap of cakes.  I froze some, took some to the girls, used one as a little gift.  This is the recipe Winter Sunshine Cake.  As I was mainly making it for children I removed almost all of the orange peel.  For a more grown up taste I leave most of the peel on.  The colour is beautiful.

One lot I made as cup cakes with snowflakes on top.  This is because Frozen is the in thing with the girls.  Harper immediately understood my "artistic expression" of icing sugar being snow!  😊

Harper has officially changed her name to Elsa.  (she is 4)

I caught up with my friend Wendy and apart from a lovely time we did some trading (as usual) and I took her eggs, Bay Leaves and bits and pieces and she gave me satin fabric remnants that are divine thick satin.  I have big plans for these!  Wendy also collects interesting bottles for me as we always need those.

I had a big cook up of a spaghetti meat sauce.  It made so much and was delicious.  I took four containers to Lucy.  She sent me a photo of Scarlett eating it.  You should have seen her face!  But boy was she enjoying it!   I added two meals to the freezer and we had two spaghetti meals as well.

Now that I am catching up I hope to get my Nana series back on track.  Researching for it though I have been learning learning learning!

I hope you had a good week.  How did you save, get ahead, build up your pantry?  Did you learn something new?   There is much to learn.  And motivation to do it... this week I heard so much more about drought, farmers having to leave the land,  towns and farms with no water supplies at all.  To think this won't further affect food supplies and prices would be crazy.   My friends in other countries are experiencing the same.  So learning new ways to save, make meat go further and things we can make ourself is all very helpful.

Have a wonderful weekend! xxx