Hey there everyone, welcome back to another week of link ups at our Good Morning Mondays Link Party.

Wherever you are I hope that you have had a good week. We have had beautiful Autumn weather this week, some warm days but beautiful cool nights. It’s warm again this weekend but back to cool and damp next week.

We had a heap of rain earlier in the week which was just lovely and they are saying that it was our autumn break, which usually happens around mid March.

I managed to get some apple slices dried this week and I worked it out that I dried around 40 apples. That means that there is still a heap to go, but I’ve made a start.I’ve also been working on my sock knitting for our granddaughters for their birthdays in April and May. I did one to get the size right and then I found some more feminine wool and started on another. I’ll make sure that they get pairs of both.

I was also blessed with some bamboo/wool from a friend and I’ve started a special project, but I’ll show you when it’s gifted.

My wonderful husband and our no 2 son have been busy with work in the vegetable garden area this week and have almost finished one of the raised garden beds. The wet weather stopped him digging out the front for a little bit so he transferred his attention to the beds. We are already thinking about our winter crops and I’ll plant some broccoli, cauliflower and cabbages as soon as the first bed is finished.

I really enjoy the change in seasons, we’ve had a very mild summer but I’m still pleased to see autumn and winter coming. At the moment the season has us busy preserving our harvest and then it eases and we turn to inside work. More school and sewing and hopefully knitting.

We got a busy month coming up with April. We are needing to do a butchery session and it is planned for earlier in the month. Our freezers are almost empty. Then we have a niece getting married in Melbourne and shortly our no 1 son will head off again.

The school holidays are almost upon us so we get a break from early Saturday mornings but I think with the butchery they will be busy anyway.

This past weekend we spent with our son-in-law, daughter and their children. The men went to a tractor pull on the Saturday and us girls (and our youngest grandson) stayed together and had heaps of fun, talking, preserving, cooking and snoozing.

Actually it was more than a tractor pull, they had heaps of stuff and it went until Midnight. They had a great time together and it was one last bash before our no 1 son left again.

Okay, unfortunately due to our dodgy internet I’m not able to do the top three this week so I apologise, but it’ll be back next week.

Thanks everyone for stopping by and linking up each week.

This coming week will be more of the same, preserving, gardening, school and music practice oh and knitting. You can see I’m enjoying my knitting !!!

I also need to get into my sewing room and mend some work clothes and start on some new projects. I would like to make our granddaughters a rag quilt each for their birthdays and the first one is at the end of April so I need to get moving.

I’ve been almost keeping up with my scripture writing and I do enjoy it. It’s so busy at the moment but it’s so important to read God’s word otherwise I know for me I start to feel parched and distant from God. He never leaves us, but I’m sure he spends heaps of time waiting for us to come to Him.

Well I hope you are all going good and I just wanted to remind you all that I won’t be doing a Wednesday Wisdom Searching for a little bit while I am posting on my marriage series.

The first one came out this week and I hope to get the next one done in the next week or so.

Numbers 6:24-26 “The Lord bless you and keep you; The Lord make His face shine upon you, And be gracious to you; The Lord lift up His countenance upon you, And give you peace.”

Blessings my friends xxxx

 

You will find me linked up at some of these great blogs.

Hi all, welcome back to our Good Morning Mondays Link Up. Another week has passed and it’s mid March, the year sure is flying by.

We are in Autumn now and the days are warmer than summer, but the evenings are beautiful and cool and we have only had a couple warm nights all year.

Our tomatoes are now in full ripening mode and so we are in full picking, bagging and selling mode. We’ve opened our road side stall again and are selling our fresh tomatoes and eggs.

Mid March is also when we pick apples from the road side trees and we picked over 100 kg the other day. The apples are really big this year which is great for drying and preserving. They are still a bit sour but once you process them they sweeten up nicely.

We’ve been blessed to be able to borrow a tractor with a front end loader to do some heavy work around the farm. We are putting in raised garden beds for our “kitchen garden” crops and also re-doing some of the garden around our house.

When we moved here there was a huge garden and there just isn’t the time for it and we like an easy garden. So we’ve been digging out beds and moving stones.

Our raised beds are going to be 1.5 metres wide and 20 metres long. At the moment we are definitely making 2 of them maybe more. We will have a separate bed for potatoes and for this we are using an old tank that has been cut into rings.Our chickens are laying well and are fit and healthy. We have put our Australorp rooster in there with them to keep them company and hopefully we will be able to incubate some eggs over the winter months.

So it’s been a busy week with the tractor work going on and the children have had a great time helping their dad do things around here. Later in the week though it was back to school work and music practice.

I’ve been experimenting with my cream cheese and have decided not to let it drain quite as much. It’s normally a bit crumbly but this week I made some and ceased draining after a few hours and it was smoother and creamier. I turned it into some dips using the onion power I made and some corn relish from our no 1 daughter. These dips and bikkies went down very well.

Saturday my husband and I went to Ballarat to get some more Rainbow Trout fingerlings for our aquaponics system and our no 1 son took the two younger children to music. It was nice to have a couple hours alone but even better to get home together again.

Our no 1 son is only home for a few more weeks and then he’s off working up north again. It’s been such a blessing to have him around and we will miss him once he is gone again.

Let’s talk link up…

Our top three posts this week were…Start Where I am. Use What I Have from Living Our Days
What Shall We Have For Dinner from My little old worldThe Art Of Home Making Mondays Link Up from Strangers & Pilgrims on Earth

Thanks all for stopping by and linking up, what a great range of links we have each week.

This coming week is more of the same…. garden work, tomato work and starting on apples, oh and of course school work.

I’ve managed to get back on track with my scripture writing and I’m enjoying that again. I have a few days to catch up on but doing an extra couple each day works well.

I like to talk about what God has been challenging us with each week and I guess this week it’s just about life, and dwelling in His presence daily. This is so challenging when there is so much going on but life is futile if we don’t put God first and take the time to listen to Him through His Word.

Well I hope you are all going good and I just wanted to remind you all that I won’t be doing a Wednesday Wisdom Searching for a little bit while I am posting on my marriage series.

The first one was suppose to be out last week but I didn’t get to it so this is the week.  I’m looking forward to hearing from you all in the comments section.

Numbers 6:24-26 “The Lord bless you and keep you; The Lord make His face shine upon you, And be gracious to you; The Lord lift up His countenance upon you, And give you peace.”

Blessings my friends xxxx

 

You will find me linked up at some of these great blogs.

Hi everyone, welcome back to Darling Downs Diaries and our weekly Good Morning Mondays Link Up.

How has your week been???  Mine was generally good, but we had a busy weekend, so I’m a bit tired now.

We spent Saturday at the Lost Trades Fair near Kyneton (about 3 hours drive). This fair showcases all the lost trades like, blacksmithing, leather work, rope making etc. We had a fantastic time and came home with lots of ideas of things we want to try.

If you want to see some photos, pop over to my Instagram account @country_homeschooling_grandma.

Sunday we went to the annual Port Fairy Folk Festival where we met our son-in-law and daughter. They were sharing the gospel through song and we went so my husband could play along with them. He also enjoys joining with the accordian group that plays every year. It’s a great time of fun and musical entertainment.

Apart from the weekend we had a rather normal week with music lessons on Wednesday afternoon instead of Saturday. The children’s piano is coming along really well and we are only 3 weeks away from school holidays and then it’s only 6 or so weeks until their first Eisteddfod.

The Eisteddfod is a great way to learn how to play in front of people and get a critique on their pieces so they can perfect them for their exam which is usually in August, plus it’s good fun too.

I managed to get some preserving done too this week and dehydrated some onions that our no 1 daughter grew. Then someone on Instagram suggested turning it into onion powder and so I did. It’s great and has a fantastic smell (like French Onion Soup) but I’ve got to remember to not be too heavy handed.We were also blessed with some nectarines so I dehydrated them as well. They are a great snack to have when the children are feeling a little peckish.We bought some saddleback piglets a month or so ago and they have settled in really well. I went to see them the other day and they were all nice and cosy in their hut, they didn’t even bother to get up when I came.

We intend to breed them once they are bigger so it’s good they get along nicely.

Well that’s about all from me, let’s get onto our link up…

Our top three this week were…When You Feel Abandoned by God, 10th Update on Kristen, & LOTS of FREE STUFF!! from Homespun Devotions
Slow Cooker Sausage and Potatoes With A Twist from The (mis) Adventures of a Born Again Farm GirlThe Old Paths from Rejoicing in Christ Daily

Thank you everyone for linking up, I hope you were blessed by your visit here.

This coming week is a home one again, the best of all. I think Monday may be a catch up day, but with our Daily Home Blessing Hour the house is nice and tidy, so we will do some school and piano and maybe have a rest.

Our no 2 son has been going with Dad and helping some friends with their shearing. It is a great experience for him and it’s nice for him to spend time with Godly men working hard to make a living. He was so excited to go the first day that he got up at 4:30 am and did his school and piano before daily devotions. He was a bit tired that night but it was good for him.

I have really struggled this week with my daily scripture writing plan, and I want to really focus on it this coming week. Our morning devotions are good and we focus only on a couple of scriptures but boy they make you think. That’s what we need to be doing though – thinking, not conforming to the way of the world because we don’t think. Challenging stuff.

Well I hope you are all going good and I just wanted to remind you all that I won’t be doing a Wednesday Wisdom Searching for a little bit while I am posting on my marriage series.

The first one will be out this week and I’m looking forward to hearing from you all in the comments section.

I hope you are all going good and I’m looking forward to hearing from you this week.

Numbers 6:24-26 “The Lord bless you and keep you; The Lord make His face shine upon you, And be gracious to you; The Lord lift up His countenance upon you, And give you peace.”

Blessings my friends xxxx

 

Hi everyone, welcome back to Darling Downs Diaries.

We are now up to week #114 in our Good Morning Mondays Link Up and I feel blessed each week when you stop by and share what you are doing and what God is teaching you.

We had a good week at home and it was even better because my husband was home for some of it too. Unfortunately he had a small accident and had to get six stitches above his ankle. It’s going okay now and it wasn’t really a big cut it was just deep. So that was a bit of excitement to keep us on our toes!!!

The cream separating has been going well and I managed to get some butter made.  I got this one and one in the freezer so that will keep us going for a little bit.

I also made some vanilla ice cream and that was pretty good too. One batch only makes just enough to feed our family of 5 so if we were having visitors I would need to make a couple batches in advance.  I bought some nice chocolate biscuits today to make put in some chocolate ice cream next week.

I managed to get started on our son-in-law’s jumper and I think it’s going to knit up really quickly seeing as it’s 12 ply. The wool has a lovely texture so I’m looking forward to seeing it completed and him wearing it this winter. I get such joy out of making and giving, what do you enjoy making???I’ve also started on some socks for the granddaughters birthdays which are coming up in April and May. I’m giving myself plenty of time so I don’t need to rush with them. Swapping around keeps me interested.

We sold some pigs last weekend and had to deliver them and we were able to stop and have some pizza for tea on the way home. The children really enjoyed themselves and I must admit that the soft serve and chocolate mousse for dessert was pretty good too.
Our daily “home blessing hour” is still going well and it’s becoming a good routine now, and definitely something I am going to keep up. We have slacked off a bit in the bedrooms but my aim is to get on top of them this coming week. It is so nice to have the house clean more often and not such a chore on a Friday.  What system do you use to keep your house clean and tidy??

On Saturday night we had our no 1 daughter’s father-in-law’s 70th birthday. It was a great evening and lovely to catch up with them.

Okay, I would love to hear what you all have been up to???

Onto our link up…

Our top three this week were… Happy Home Maker Monday – February 27, 2017 by Harvest Moon by Hand God is not Trying, He is Doing! by Blessed TransgressionsEvening Song – I Am not Ashamed by The Cotton Apron

Thank you for linking up each week, as I said before it is such a blessing and you make this link up a lovely place to visit.

This week we have music lessons mid week because we may be going to the Lost Trades Fair. This is a Fair that showcases all the old arts, weaving, spinning, blacksmithing, leather making etc. Hopefully we can make it because it sounds so exciting.

Then on Sunday we will go to the Port Fairy Folk Festival to see our son-in-law, daughter and family. They join together with a Christian group to spread the Gospel in song and puppetry. My husband and the children will help with the singing and playing as well, it should be a good day.

Apart from all that it’s just the usual.  We’ve been having some quite warm, consistent weather this past week so our tomatoes are slowly ripening and hopefully they will be full on in a week or so. We hope to sell some again this year, but we’ll have to see how the season finishes up. We have lots of plans for our next season and it will take the months in between to get it all organised.

Also don’t forget our monthly link up…This months topic is…

WHEN YOU’VE BEEN LET DOWN

I would love to see you here if you get a chance, but…

This will be the last Wednesday Wisdom Searching for a little bit because I’m  starting a series of posts on Marriage, I’m not sure how many I will do or how often but I would like to just focus on them at the moment. I will come back to our WWS and I will keep you updated as things progress.

 

I hope you are all going good and I’m looking forward to hearing from you this week.

Numbers 6:24-26 “The Lord bless you and keep you; The Lord make His face shine upon you, And be gracious to you; The Lord lift up His countenance upon you, And give you peace.”

Blessings my friends xxxx

You will find me linked up at some of these great blogs.