For the joy of it

Apologies for my absence last week. You know those weeks when everything goes wrong? Last week was one of those. It was one thing after another with a couple of particularly low points. The lowest point was having to put Hagrid our livestock guardian dog down. A few days later a nasty case of gastro went through our family, then my favourite goat got really sick. 

She was touch and go for a couple of days but seems to be rallying with 5 days of special care, oral iron, copper, vitamin C, electrolytes and extra feed. She had been looking a little on the thin side, which isn't unusual for a goat feeding twins, but she spiralled rapidly when we were sick and hadn't been watching them so closely. We think she might have been feeding all 5 of the youngest kids in the end as they were all following her around. As a result, her nutrition became badly depleted. She is now being kept separate from them and thankfully she seems to be on the mend and looks to be getting stronger every day. She will remain on iron and continue to get additional feeding until her gums and eyelids are nice and pink again and her weight has improved. We are also monitoring her for signs of mastitis after sudden weaning. So far so good and her udder has remained soft. I suspect her milk supply had dropped right when she became sick.

Since moving here we have too-ed and fro-ed about what to do regarding housing and the garden. I have hesitated to commit to a big garden around the yurt due to energy with having a baby/toddler and ongoing uncertainty about if we should put a home on the hill and rent out the yurt. I wanted to avoid committing time and energy to a big garden knowing it would be mostly let go if we moved to the hill in the future. 

Initially, when we bought the farm, we planned the yurt as short-term accommodation and intended to turn it into a farm-stay, while building a more conventional house on the hill. But with the last three years of financial uncertainty, rising interest rates, rising inflation and a shaky global economy/relations it seems wiser to make do with what we have. Unless something drastic changes financially, (Like winning the lotto, which is unlikely as we don't buy tickets...) we plan on staying in the yurt. We have agreed on a plan about how we will build the deck, the extra rooms we want to add and how to design the garden around it all.   

With Grant's new job with the forestry department, we finally have financial stability again and can begin to look forward. More importantly, he is in a job he enjoys and can envisage building a good career at. 

Next year we will start on a big undercover deck with a master bedroom/small ensuite and another small bedroom which will probably serve as a spare room/office/sewing room. How far we get on it will depend entirely on finances. Over time we can eventually retrofit the yurt with permanent cladding/insulation and extend the kitchen along the outer wall where the Aga is, which is what many people do. The deck will have an outdoor wood-fired oven on it for summer cooking, an outdoor lounge area and a dining area and laundry space. It will hopefully be a generous size as much of our living can be done outside year-round in this climate, though we would like to be able to enclose it with outdoor blinds for the cooler months.  

When it comes to the yard we plan on breaking it into sections to have a small dog yard and then convert what is currently a blank slate into perennial beds, filled with flowers, roses and lots of herbs for cooking and medicinal purposes. The dogs have the whole farm to run around on, so they don't need a big yard as such, just a place to secure them when necessary. I'll think I'll add a few more silver birch and other pretty trees to help create a shady oasis. The sub-tropical heat can be brutal. The boys are going to build me an arbour with wisteria growing over it for a shady sitting area and of course, we will put in the pond we picked up for free a while back. The round garden will be opened up into the main garden area and I plan on packing that full of leafy greens and veggies. The panels of fencing that we remove will be used in the yard division. Nothing will be wasted and we will utilize materials like rocks and timber from our property as much as possible. 

Although we have lots of beautiful forests here, I miss flowers. I miss having a pretty outdoor area to relax in and hang out in as a family. We still have plans for a big veggie patch and orchard, which we will start next year once we have the fencing sorted. But the truth is perennials are more forgiving and frankly I need a gardening win. I have found gardening here a steep learning curve. The weeds are incredibly vigorous, our soils are heavy and the pests and bugs are never-ending. This would be easily resolved if I used pesticides, but I am trying to grow organically which makes it all a little trickier. 

The reality is that I am not an amazing gardener. I mean I'm not terrible, I enjoy it and I love to be outdoors, but it's time to spend some time gardening again purely for fun. All of my leafy greens which were doing really well have been decimated by cabbage moths and pests over the last couple of weeks, to the point I have had to clear them out entirely. Such big setbacks are disheartening. Perhaps focussing on perennials and flowers for a while and soil-improving health will help grow stronger plants and bring in more natural predators. I still have all the herbs I need here growing strong so there is at least that and I'll be sure to tuck some leafy greens in the ground before too much longer. Once the clouds of cabbage moths have dispersed.....

I'm hoping that developing the garden will be a good family project with all my strong boys at home for the school holidays. There are rocks to gather, garden beds to build and manure to turn into the soil. Grant seems happy to work on making a nice house garden too and all of the structural things can be done with very little money by using what resources we have on hand. Plants add up of course, but that can be done a little at a time. It will take time to build up the soil anyway.    

We have put a lot of emphasis on "big" projects since moving here, which were absolutely necessary. The land needs animals grazing it who in turn need fencing, the shed needed to be built (and still needs finishing), and we needed water, solar and a home for our family. But I'm looking forward to a project for fun, something that will bring beauty and joy to our life here. 

Perhaps what I'm looking for is a little softness. 

The reality is that moving to a farm with no money, no infrastructure and starting it entirely from scratch has been incredibly difficult. (It was always going to be) But throw in a  new baby and pandemic resulting in unforeseen job insecurity....well I'm feeling a little battered about by life. I know many people feel the same way after a strange and difficult few years, and no one has escaped unscathed. Many have had it a whole lot worse than us. We are incredibly blessed that our finances are slowly firming up with good secure work. The relief that brings is beyond describable. 

But despite that, if I am being entirely honest, my resilience is currently a bit low. All gardeners know that gardening is beneficial for the mind, body and soul. It is well-researched for being an excellent aid to mental health, and  I think creating a garden for the purpose of pleasure and spending time as a family might be just the tonic I need. 

What's happening in your garden?

Much love,
Emma
xx