Feather your Nest Friday, 3rd June, 2022.

It has been a much better week!   We are into a new month and it is winter!   We have the fire going and it has been pretty cold at night.  I am loving it.  I think I am just ready for a quieter season.  

Lucy came home and I went to help for a few days.  This was really nice and made me a lot happier that she was safely home again with her family.   It also showed me how fast the ready meals in my freezer are used up in a crisis.  They were wonderful.  I was able to head off with a tray of Enchiladas, soups, pasties,  (I packed relish) and complete roast dinners.   It was a big help.   Now I need to build it back up.

Some of the ways I feathered our nest were:

I worked on coat hangers.  I am up to no 17. 

I found lids for some beautiful big jars my friend Wendy gave me.  Now I can put those into use.

I packed up my dehydrated celery into jars and vac sealed them.

Scarlett asked me to fix some leggings for her.  Then she added two toys with "injuries" so I have mended her monkey and bear.   😊

Lucy's garden has a giant patch of Dill.   I had trouble finding it this time because sheep had eaten it down.  But I think this actually helped it transplant well.   I dug up enough to plant three patches in my own garden and five pots for the swap table.  I will grow them up a bit first. 

I ordered a very good first aid kit for my car.   We kept my old car for a farm bomb.   So the first aid kit etc stayed in that car.   After ordering a good one I made up two car kits to add to that.  I have a pure wool blanket kept in the back and my kits include a torch (flashlight),  hand wipes, toile paper, cash, cutlery, gloves, water and so on.  

My chicks have really grown.  I have found this stage easy,  I think it was just a matter of getting a warming plate and setting it up.  They are noisy and nosey trying to see what I am doing.  

I am giving them greens and they love them.   I chop up some spinach or broccoli and they are very keen! 

I am really excited because we now have a little green house!  I got it from Aldi.  

We anchored it to the fence.   This is the area that I have my container garden.  Come Spring I think it will help me so much!

On the farm it is lambing.   I love it.  The whole district is lambing.   At Lucy and Kato's it is lambing as well.    Driving anywhere you see tiny newborn lambs.    

We saw quite a lot of twins and a few triplets. 

I did a big stock up grocery order.    

Tonight I cooked up two big pots of spaghetti sauce.  I bulked it out with grated zucchini.   In the end I had a huge pasta bake, four lasagnes and dinner which was the meat sauce with spaghetti.  It was delicious.

I cooked the lasagnes lightly as they will go into my ready meals freezer and when they are re heated I don't like them to end up too dark.   This way they end up just about right. 

I am happy to get some meals back into that freezer. 

It is only four weeks until Chloe is due to have her baby.  I will be helping with a lot of meals then! 

She is letting me share some photos.  This is Tom who is a little farmer like his Great Grandfather Tom.  My Dad would be so proud!   

Helping feed the chooks...

Helping feed the calf...

He is mad keen on tractors and animals.  

We had our first bon fire of the season.   It was just a little one but we have a series of big ones coming up.

We are working hard and trying to think hard.  It is now apparent to everyone that we face a major energy crisis.   We have headlines like. "Australia energy crisis: Gas and power outages to sweep Australia as cold snap deepens energy crisis."  Yep that is what happens when you know the power stations down.  They are talking that industry will need to shut down on cold days.  Think about that for a moment...

Food prices are just soaring.  Fuel prices also.   Trucking companies are on the brink.  So we are on the brink.   "Looming economic bloodbath..." was another headline.   We can see if you can't move goods due to the cost,  there are fertiliser shortages and harvester and part shortages...  there are going to be food shortages.   I have been saying for over a year... please if you live in a cold climate make sure you have alternative ways to keep your home warm.   Store fuel.  Make sure wherever you live that you can boil water and cook without electricity or gas.    In my index I have a series of preparedness posts that cover these subjects.  Do these things now.   We know from experience you are not able to buy what you need when this hits.  It is too late then.    Do what you have to do.   Don't let anyone discourage you from doing what you have to do.    

She looks well to the ways of her household!!  

We can feel daunted by things or we can feel that we were born for such a time as this!   I would like to recommend Patsy's Blog and her series on this subject... A Working Pantry.

Also Cath's series on You tube 7 Things Great Grandma did to save money...    This video reminded me of my Nan and Pa so much!  

How did you build up your home, pantry or garden this week?   I hope it was a week of opportunities!  xxx