MIdwinter

This year our midwinter bonfire is a little late.

Yesterday was spent clearing out the brickyard and getting ready for a fun weekend.

It is exciting to see the 'flaps up' ready to welcome people.

On the lay again.

Yay!!!

Chickens are on the lay again.
This time of the year they are tractoring over Asparagus -weeding and fertilizing.

We swap a bucket of scraps for eggs and the Asparagus is right next to the citrus so is usually topped up with Grapefruit and Oranges.

Upcoming workshops

Composting with CReW

Tutor: Louise Shaw

Cost: FREE

Time: 6pm

Date: Tuesday, November 17, 2020

Location: 20 minutes from Whakatane -to be advised on booking.

Bookings:please contact David at CReW. Phone 07 308 5963 OR,  email David@crewonline.org.nz

Hosted by CReW Whakatane. 

Compost is a key that makes the world grow!

We will kick-start the evening by looking at the basic principles of composting; What can be composted? How compost happens? And what finished compost is and does?

We will then take a stroll around the garden to check out various compost heaps to see what composting
looks like in practice and look at some of the different ways you can use compost.

If we have time we will get our hands dirty and construct our own hot compost.

Each participant will go home with; an understanding of the basic principles behind composting so they can improve on or start an effective composting system in their backyard.

BOOKINGS ARE ESSENTIAL
To book a spot please contact David at CREW. Phone 07 308 5963 OR, email david@crewonline.org.nz For more information visit: facebook.com/crewonlinenz.

Worm farming with CReW

Tutor: Louise Shaw

Cost: FREE

Time: 6pm

Date: Tuesday, November 24, 2020

Location: 20 minutes from Whakatane -to be advised on booking.

Bookings:please contact David at CReW. Phone 07 308 5963 OR,  email David@crewonline.org.nz

Hosted by CReW Whakatane.
Worms are the intestines of our earth.

In this workshop we will learn all about these amazing creatures, what they need to be happy and how we can create a variety of ‘farms’ to make them work for us.

We will wander through my garden and have a look at some working worm farms and set up a home-made worm farm from scratch.

We will then look at some of the different ways we can use vermi-cast to supercharge our garden; seed coatings, foliar sprays, biochar,...

Each participant will go home with; some amazing new knowledge on these powerful workers and the knowledge to set up their own vermi-composting system for their backyard.

BOOKINGS ARE ESSENTIAL
To book a spot, please contact David at CReW. Phone 07 308 5963 OR, email david@crewonline.org.nz For more information visit: facebook.com/crewonlinenz

Companion Planting

Tutor: Louise Shaw

Cost: $20

Time: 5.30-8pm

Date: Tuesday 1st of December

Location: 20 minutes from Whakatane -to be advised on booking.

Bookings: please email louise.shaw@blueduckdesign.co.nz.

This garden based workshop will start by delving into companion planting techniques and how they create thriving gardens. We will then walk around the garden and orchard to see first hand what companion planting looks like in practice.

We will cover the basics of; succession planting, guilds, cover cropping, crop rotation, beneficial insect plantings, mychrozial connections,…..and you will come away with your own guild of seeds/seedlings to take home. 

Please remember this is an outside workshop. Bring a small container to put your seeds/seedlings in and be prepared to get your hands dirty.

For bookings please email louise.shaw@blueduckdesign.co.nz.

Pottery

Second firing of the year.

Winter sun

Low winter sun angles mean it is time to change the angle of our solar pannels.

I love the wild plants growing around this suntrap. Avacado, Bamboo, Banana, Fejoa, Yacon, Cerimoya, Pineapple, Pawpaw, Tea.......

I'm especially in love with my clumping Bamboo which has new culms coming up at the moment. I cannot get two of my hands  around the culms. Cannot wait for three years when they have strengthened so we can build with them.

Mid-winter

What a way to spend an afternoon. The harbor was beautiful -if very cold.

We caught enough flounder for lunch the next day and then went to the beach to warm our feet around a mid-winter, full moon, musical fire, with friends.

Warmth for the soul as well.

Crop Swap

Yay!!!
What a celebration. The first ever Crop Swap in Whakatane. Over 20 gardeners showed up and shared herbs, plants, seeds, fruit and veg.

It is slowly evolving to meet the needs of our town. Today it changed to incorperate Timebank trading. It is going to be fun seeing how this event grows and changes over time.

Cannot wait to see what shows up in a couple of weeks time.

Builders

Lucky we had Toby and Finn around to lift the bathroom beam into place.

Things are getting exciting.

This weekend we got both beams up and most of the rafters.

All that thanks to a steady stream of visitors, WOOFers, music and great food.

Harakeke

The colours in our old flax leaves are beautiful. These guys are growing beside the drive so we get to see them every day.

This plant is my one soft weaving flax. The others have a much higher muka content and the bushes are a lot more upright.

Abundance

A quick gathering session around the farm to show off some of the abundance.

This is the photo used for our first Crop Swap advertising. Thought I would make it authentic by using crops grown in this bio-region in this season.

Kumara harvest

During the growing season Kumara vines should be lifted or they put down roots where they touch the soil. These roots turn into small Kumara and stop the main Kumara from fattening up. The more roots the smaller the Kumara.

I did not do a good job of lifting the vines that were on the beds. I think next year I will put down a thick layer of newspaper in the middle of the beds to discourage these small roots and save the time untangling and lifting vines.

They were put to good use and have made a great addition to our meals.





This year I used a small Broadfork from Crafty Gatherer to dig my Kumara. It made a beautiful job and the beds were then scattered with green manure seeds raked and DONE for winter.

The Kumara were placed in a nest of Kumara vines, covered and left to cure for three days before being individually wrapped and stored in my cob food shed.

Weekend away means music

Packing for a weekend away means making sure the Cajon's, Ukulalie's, guitar's, flutes and of course poi are all packed.

Sausage time

This year we all we made were fresh sausages and bacon.

My favorite flavoring was Kaffir lime leaves, Lemon grass, garlic toasted coconut thread and coconut milk.

Avocado

Avocados.

We have been getting more and more from this tree.
It is Verde. I only brought three named cultivars.

The named cultivars will give us known fruit, an extended season and fruit quickly. The seedlings will give us more variety in time and are much cheaper.

Flood

Wow!!! The water came down and down and down.
Over the last few days I have seen water where I have never seen water before. It was surreal. We paddled our canoes five kilometers down the road. Over fences past sheds and houses all full of floating furniture, tools and the remnants of peoples lives. In some places it was over 3 meters deep.  Neighbors said it took 2 hours for the estimated 1 million cubic meters of water to overtop the stopbanks.
When the water level dropped everything was coated in a layer of silt. We have spent the last week washing, waterblasting and filling skip bins of ruined belongings.

So grateful for clean water, laughter, friends, music, good food and a lifestyle where we can be there for others when needed.

People flow

The bus flat is a people place but also a private place.

Some people come for a short stay and others stay a while. We have been designing this space for a while and playing around with these public/private tensions.

This new woven bamboo fence guides people to park away from the people areas and moves them into a main entrance area.

We are designing the space by gradually adding levels of permanence so we can change things as we feel our way into the space.

Living design, gradual stiffening.

Brick yard

An impromptu design session at the brickyard.

I have been using pallets, hay bales and bamboo to mock up a corner cob seat with drying shelves and a mini rocket stove/kai table.

They were making pots and chatting. I was watching they way they moved in the space and then getting some great feedback.

Shelves moved higher, seat backs turned into a leaning wall and cob seats became wooden storage boxes for clay tools, tea making basics and kindling.

 I will not start this project until spring but it is great to be able to consider the design and see it being used before it becomes final.

Rendered beeswax

The house still smells of honey.
This is the wax harvest for the year.

We have enough hand cream and candles so this will probably be turned into furniture polish, floor wax and I would like to make a set of natural crayons with the colored clay and earthen pigments I have been collecting.

Soup again

Soup again. I love the routine. Light the fire. Everything in the pot. Mornings work then jars in the oven and bottle just before tea time.

Note the cool wooden spoon from Crafty Gatherers. Thanks Marco and Tess -so good not to loose your spoon at the bottom of your soup pot.

Last of the summer peaches

We have peaches from January through to the end of March from local trees where we have collected the seed.

This is the lucky last. Beautiful and juicy.

These ones are on one of our higher paddocks where they get a lot of breeze so miss the fungal diseases some peaches are susceptible to.

Summer harvest

Thanks Crafty Gatherer.

This tray of yours was given as a koha when
Catherine and Neville from Plenty Permaculture visited with their latest Permaculture class.

It is very beautiful. I could not use it as a seed tray. I oiled it and am using it to ripen tomatoes.

Brickyard

A good mornings work. 155 bricks.
Total stacked is now 1929.

Enough for our new bathroom, lounge extension and maybe enough left over for a pizza oven/rocket stove.

So grateful to all of the wonderful people who spent time mixing mud with me.

Garlic fiber

Garlic pulp made from cutting one of my garlic plaits up, putting it in a pot of water and leaving on the wood range for a day.

I think I might try paper or maybe add it to some plaster. What an easy way to get fiber.

Carding

Carding our wool.

It is a little harder to felt than some but we have been learning.

This basket full will be a pair of slippers or boots.

Summer garden

Lettuce

Lettuces growing after potato harvest.

Friction fire

Fire by friction - Thank you Caleb.

It is addictive.

Our front porch is now covered in tinder and our wood range has only been lit once since we started with matches.

Honey

Our stash for the year.

Liquid gold. It is a currency we trade with regularly with all of our friends and family.

Think I am going to print small please return jar labels this year as we have left jars all over the country.

Harvest bowl

My new harvest bowl. Thanks Mike O'Donnell.

To honor the bowl with garden harvest or was that to honor the harvest with a beautiful woodfired clay vessel built with that in mind.

It graces our table at most meals with harvest.

I have just used it to sort my broad seeds.

Guava

Chillean Guava are a great in between fruit.

These ones are in between my citrus and are fruiting heavily in their first season.

They are growing with an annual understory of
Kamo kamo. The Kamo kamo act as a screen so that there are some Guava left when I go foraging.