Feather your Nest Friday, 12th June, 2026.

 It's another week that went by fast but it was great.  We didn't get much rain but just a little bit to keep us going along. 

Firewood and kindling are loaded up.   Someone ask me to show more of how I decorate... so I will attempt to as I go but to me a huge old bucket full of pinecones is beautiful.   

A basket of sticks is beautiful!  

Maybe I'm a bird at heart as I like sticks and love nests!  

This week I continued to work through produce, trying to do things in the order they needed dealing with.  My freeze drier ran every day.   I am not one for naming objects but when you get your freeze drier going the screen wants a name.  So I called mine Becky as it was Becky on Acre Homestead who taught me how to get going,  how to process food and deal with a lot.  I knew she was my kind of friend when she would push the whole wheel barrow into the kitchen and begin.  Right there I thought this woman means business.  So I followed along and I thought if my freeze drier (and me) have half her work ethic I would be most happy!   

So first I put a whole celery through the food processor.   For either dehydrating or freeze drying a food processor is so fast but the slices are even therefore there are not thin and thick... they will all be ready at the same time. This is a great advantage.   If you don't have a food processor ask around. I bet someone amongst your family or friends has one they don't use.

Celery leaves are the best part, put the whole thing through. 

I was at Mum's and she was making a pot of soup.  I noticed her go to the pantry and get a jar of my freezer dried celery and another of parsley and add them in.  So one of these is for her. 

Then I had half a red cabbage and some rhubarb.  These filled another four trays.

I love, a lot,  that freeze drying keeps the colour so vivid.

I also had had a regular cabbage.   I retained some of that fresh to cook in my meals too.

As my stainless steel table has so many jars missing I got some stainless steel cleaner.  Next week I am going to give it a big polish up then re stock it.   And this week three bags of lovely jars and bottles came to me!

Next...  I had capsicums...  I kept a couple of yellow ones out for a meal I was planning and processed the rest.   These I decided to freeze in batches.   

About now I was thinking.....  in the cabin there is everything ... fridge, freezer, washer, drier...   many things were from my Uncle.   BUT while the fridge is used regularly no one ever seems to use the freezer.   It is a medium upright and really not that old.   I asked my helpers if it could come up to the shed and sit next to the big tub freezer out there.    Now I have this to work on!   I think I will use it for vegetables and butter.    This is awesome. I don't have any idea why I didn't think of this before!

Tom came over.   He chopped up the yellow capsicum I retained and I cut up a huge onion.  These went into this baking pan.    Then he added in all the meatballs and then the cherry tomatoes (from freezer.) 

I added a jar of pasta sauce and he murdered it with a good layer of cheese.   So he took that home as he had made dinner for his family and I added an apple crumble.   

Later that evening I got a message and photo from my son in law saying how good that was!  It was huge so they did a pretty good job of demolishing it.   I made one for myself too and I am for sure using more apples next week and making some more.

I still had a whole cauliflower and three heads of broccoli.  I steamed them and make two trays like this...

Then I made a big jug of white sauce, added cheese and grated cheese topping and poured over them.  I baked them so they were golden. I forgot to take a photo but I think Chloe might have had two side dishes from one of them.

I cut out wool and made progress and I worked on my pantry.  Some days I did a lot and some times just a little job.   This is my whole room pantry that looks like Nanas kitchen.  I have two of these cupboards along one wall.  I labeled the baskets on top and they are full of foil trays and paper napkins,  paper towel etc.  The bottom cupboards are full of sugar, salt,  epsom salts and other things that don't need a climate controlled room.

Each time I move stuff into these cupboards and baskets I made more room in my kitchen pantry.

I have a flash new wood box outside that is water proof!

It is right next to the side door where I bring the wood in. This is such a great improvement!

With Tom here and the fact that it was a beautiful clear day we took all the boxes and stuff I save up to start a bonfire and we lit up three more big ones!

This is my eldest Grandson Sidney picking dinner plate mushrooms!

So... did I come to the end of the produce?  No!   I have a harvest of broccoli almost ready in my garden.

Tomorrow it is meant to rain and much of next week.   I am going to leave them and consider picking after that.

And then.... yesterday I was given another big bag of red apples.  They are beautiful.   I will eat some fresh and I gave Chloe some as they all will eat them fresh too.  Fresh is still best.    

And I will have to show in next weeks photos but today I was given baby butternut pumpkins and passionfruit!    The pumpkins are just gorgeous. I am just going to cut them in half and roast them.    My parsley in the garden is so huge that is the next thing to harvest and preserve some.  I planted a lot of seeds from spent plants and now have a whole huge parsley bed.  The biggest ever!

While I was having my brainwave moment about the freezer I thought of all the lemons I still have to juice.   Some are soft and juicy and easy to squeeze but some are harder.  Either way after about a dozen I get a sore wrist, have a break and come back and do a few more, and so on.   I know I have more lemons coming and HOPEFULLY oranges.   Smarter people than me have electric citrus juicers.  So I ordered one!    It arrived today but I won't be trying it out until over the weekend.   I hope it might be revolutionary! 

With the sunny days the kids were all out soaking it up.  Lily has enough hair to have pigtails and her ribbons fly behind her as she rides her bike.

A storm is coming in.   Rain is meant to arrive early tomorrow morning.  I will be most happy to have an inside day.  Maybe I will get the parsley cut and some wool squares cut out.  Next week really looks like a soup, roast and roast vegetable kind of week.

I hope you had many ways to build your nest this week.  From adding one meal to the freezer, one can to the pantry,  one veggie to the garden...  it all adds up!  So many of you are my friends now this is my letter to you.xxx