Lately

It’s been four weeks since we moved back to our freshly renovated forever farmhouse, and we are starting to settle. Starting to remember where things are kept, and to develop little routines and habits in our new abode. We’ve found nooks for most things now (though not everything), and not a day goes by where I don’t just look around and pinch myself in awe and wonder. This is where I live! This is home! If you had told me before, just how profoundly a house can affect your life, I would not have believed you. The light that pours in, the warmth of the fire that permeates the house, the joy of having a kitchen that works, and makes life better. I’m sure that the novelty will eventually wear off (not too soon I hope!), but I just remember our old run down kitchen and draughty rooms, and I’m sooooooo grateful that we were able to do this.

Loving: Winter bonfires. Over the summer, CB and his father pile up all the debris from around the farm in a big heap at the bottom of the hill below our house. Old rotten fence posts, and fallen tree branches, and other such things. During the holidays we had some friends over and set the pile alight. Once the initial flames settled down, we got out hot dogs and marshmallows to roast on sticks and wrapped up garlic bread and bananas stuffed with chocolate chips to bake in the coals. A cheese platter rounded out the meal beautifully. Fires are just asking to be played with so there was lots of adjusting the wood and so forth. As the sun set we pulled out a few sparklers and the kids wrote their names in the air. Winter bonfires with friends are one of the best bits of country life!

Watching: Series 2 of Friday Night Lights. Absolutely loving it too! I’ve just got a new internet deal which will finally give us enough data for everything, so I’m thinking of giving Netflix a try. We’re not big TV people, but we do like an occasional series to binge watch or a family movie night, so Netflix sounds perfect.

Listening: to podcasts on the way to work. I’m loving What Trump Can Teach Us About Con Law which is both really interesting, and slightly alarming. Other faves are 99% Invisible, My Open Kitchen, This Glorious Mess, Invisibilia, Young House Love Has A Podcast, and The Chris Loves Julia Podcast.  I’m also enjoying a few acoustic playlists on Spotify. The Dixie Chicks are getting a bit of a play, as well.

Reading: I’m out of the habit of reading at the moment, and I really do need to get back into it. I recently purchased At Home In The World by Tsh Oxenreider and I’m going to start with that. Now that my books are all (finally) unpacked and on the bookshelf, I might ease myself in with an old favourite to get myself going.

Buying: furniture. A lot of our old furniture was hand-me-down stuff we were “making do with” for the last few years. Now that we are in our forever farmhouse, we are getting organised. We have bought big Ikea wardrobes for Hannah and our rooms. After having all my clothes crammed into a small wonky wardrobe, where the doors didn’t close, I’m loving having enough space to not have to jam everything in. We’ve also bought bookcases for the hall. I purposely got them with doors to hide the mess down the bottom, and to (hopefully) protect the books from some of the dust.

I also splurged on a Dyson stick vacuum cleaner which I already love. It makes cleaning the floor so easy, and Toby loves to vacuum as much as I do!

Looking: At my family’s WhatsApp chat stream. I have one sibling who lives in Asia, another in Adelaide, as well as my parents and another sibling in the mountains, so we don’t get to spend a lot of time together. WhatsApp has changed the way we get to interact and share our lives. If the kids are doing something funny, or there’s a nice sunset, or even if I just want to show them my organised bookshelf, it all goes on WhatsApp and everyone in the family from Hannah up gets to see it. Once we clued my mum into what LOL meant (not lots of love!) she was in as well. Over the school holidays, we got to share the excitement of my sister visiting New York for a few weeks, as well as us settling into our farm house, and all the other mundane bits and pieces of our lives. When we do get together, we can talk about the more interesting stuff.

Making: Birthday cakes for Meg and Toby. Their birthdays are four days (and three years) apart which is either very good or very bad planning (depending on your point of view!). Toby chose a “snake” birthday cake, which in reality is really just the cake from the book which appeared to have the most lollies, while Meg asked for a number 10 with chocolate icing – Done! It’s lovely to see them so excited and to reflect on how much they have grown and changed over the years.

Sorting: the last few boxes from our move. There is still about four boxes left for me to attack. Mostly they contain supplies for the study which we are yet to find the right cupboards for, but there is also a box of photo albums which are too big for the bookshelves, and a box of framed pictures which I need to pull out and decide where (and if) to hang.

Thinking: about our future plans. Now that the renovation is finished, we can move on to some other projects we would like to accomplish. I love a project, though I want my next one to be a little smaller than the last.

Enjoying: the school holidays. Beautiful weather (mostly) and time to settle and reacquaint myself with the farm… with camera in hand. Going out in the ute with CB to feed sheep, or spending an afternoon curled up on the couch with my crochet. A day in town with a trip to the movies for the whole family. Cousins coming to stay. Of course, it is never long enough, but it was good while it lasted.

That’s what I’ve been up to lately. What about you?? Do you have Netflix? Enjoy the school holidays? Can you recommend some podcasts?