Feather your Nest Friday. 11th April, 2025.

We are right in the middle of Autumn but the weather is Summer.  It is so dry and now it is hot when it should be cool.  So many farmers are just hanging on.

I have tried to just focus on what good I can do.   

I will start with left over pastry.  I made a big batch of Pasties over two days.  At the end I ran out of filling before I ran out of pastry... so I made jam "pastries" and considering how simple they are  they look pretty fancy.

I used to just do little rounds in muffin trays.  Chloe showed me how to make pinwheels which look much more professional!  😊

The Pasties....  I made a big batch of filling.  This is a big meat stretcher.   I use my slicer dicer to cube a heap of potatoes...

In my big, deep frying pan I cook up some chopped onion and mince.  (Ground beef.) I have no measurements!    Then I add the potato,  a beef stock cube and a big splodge of tomato sauce.

Then when the meat is cooked and the potato has softened a bit I turn off the heat and add a couple of bags of frozen chopped veggies.   The frozen factor helps cool this mix right down... as you want it cool or your pastry goes soggy and hard to handle.

I began to make up regular and also gluten free pockets.

The rectangle ones are gluten free.  

I don't know how many I made!  I had one for dinner two nights.  I gave one to one of my farm helpers.

I gave Mum three.   Chloe got a tray which included kid sized ones...

I froze some for emergency meals.  I gave three to my  niece.   The first day I was still cooking late evening and got sick of it so I refrigerated everything and kept going the next morning!

  

My other cook up was I decided to roast one of my on special after Christmas turkeys!  I just felt like a roast.   I had a roast dinner twice and make up a huge baking dish of roast everything for Chloe's family.

Her children will demolish roast meat and veggies and leave nothing.

I froze left over turkey meat and the bones which will become more meals and soup.

Some more apples were picked.  

These will become something next week.

I started a blanket for Lily.  This will be single bed size.  The colours are to go with her room.

It will probably take me all winter.   Also I bought two patterns but after being given patterns by two lovely friends I am set with so many things I can make for Lily.  

I wrote some happy mail.

My stock up item was bags of beans ie dry soup beans and dry Italian bean mix.

In the garden I planted up a bed of garlic and a bed of elephant garlic. I am really hoping these are successful. 

My seeds continue to come up and my seedlings are growing.   I had trellis set up (which I showed a few weeks ago)  but I still had one bed that will soon need some kind of trellis.   Mum said she had just the thing!   And she did!  So the back of my car was loaded up!

Tomorrow I am going to the hardware store to, hopefully, get stakes that will hold this up,  worms for the worm far,  silverbeet and chard seedlings and you never basically know once you're in a hardware store!

Mum made lunch and Chloe and the kids (and me) went over to her farm.  It is about a half hour drive over a four wheel drive track.   I took this photo as the boys were both wearing vests Mum makes them every year.

My Dad always wore a green vest.  So it's a tradition now.   Lily gets a pink version too.

A great time was had by all and this was the scene on the way home.

And this is pretty much how I feel now.  It is 10 30 pm after a long day, travelling, shopping and seeing Harper dance in a concert tonight.  Tomorrow heading home I will do an Aldi stock up and make the most of being near shops I don't normally get to go to. 

I hope it was a very good week for you.  How did you build up your home, pantry or garden?   xxx