The littlest biker of them all

Cam came home tonight with a bike seat for Ro! We all saddled up and rolled on down to the creek, the first time I've ridden a bike in aaaages, was such fun! Ro wasn't very keen on the helmet but he loved zooming along, and peeking at me on my bike from under Dad's arm.



Thank goodness for whoever it was that invented gears, coming back up our very steep and very long driveway!

An Irish native peace tree

We made up the garden for the Southern Cross Permaculture Institute by the river at the Sustainable Living Festival last month, with natives and fruit trees and herbs, a lovely grapefruit tree in its pot bowling over regularly in the wind! Ro was very happy sitting under the tree in the dirt on his Bolivian blanket from Mel and Tobes, laughing with everyone who came to have a rest in the garden, having his naps in his pram in the tent at the back.

A woman from Ireland and her husband came by and bought some of the beautiful natives and donated them to us to plant; they had planned to come to Australia to live but her mother was dying so they were going back to Ireland.

Cam and Ro planted them along the path to the chookhouse, where they’ll become part of the support for the future edible forest garden (fixing nitrogen in the soil, protection from wind etc), and meanwhile just be beautiful in themselves as well.

May our Irish woman and her mother have much peace.

First weekend of PDCs 1 & 2

We began our two parallel Permaculture Design Certificate's from here this weekend - woohoo! Two lovely groups of people, one lot doing the course on Saturdays, and the other on Sundays, over 12 weeks. Here they are all penned in the chookhouse, inspecting the deep litter compost system the ladies have going on for us:

Here are some remains of afternoon tea, a lovely sort of composition of pips and peel and tea bags that took my fancy as I went to clean them up:

Funny potato creature

Look at this funny little fellow:

He looks like a Bert to me!

Have pillow, will travel

A nomad mother necessarily has a nomad baby: little Ro is seven months old, yes, and has finally gotten a bed! He’s been sleeping on the floor beside us in tent and boat and bedrooms so far, and thanks to ebay and the delights of settling down for a year is the now the proud owner of his very own white cot: 

NB: In Samoa, Cam built this ingenious bed on the side of ours for easy feeding in the night, mainly so we didn’t have to blunder in and out of several mozzie nets all night long! I sewed an annexe into ours to fit over and tuck into his little sidecar bed. 

Just the other day I saw the same sort of thing for sale in the ABA catalogue for more than $400!! It’s definitely a lovely way to keep your snuggling space as a couple but have baby with you too.

A gratuitous shot of Ro on his first day, just because he's beautiful:

Produce report

Here is some kale, now in the headlights of the bulldozers, down the middle of what will be a path for the new beds. I had to take a photo – in my fancy they look like Egyptian fans for slave girls to wave over Cleopatra on a languid day…

…while feeding her grapes! They are delicious, sweet and slightly tart and taste like the deep colour purple, even if they are small and taken up by a lot of seed!