Australian House and Garden. Keeping it Real.

We have a new bakery in our little town, dear reader.

It’s actually the old bakery rejigged.

They have revamped and stoked-up the ancient wood-fired oven and they’re making posh bread and fancy biscuits.

And they have a hole in the wall where they serve totally ACE coffee.

And it’s all VERY exciting.

Yesterday when I was getting a coffee, there was a little kid dancing around on the footpath, waiting impatiently with her grandmother.

The barista said to the kid, ‘Do you know who’s coming to visit soon?’

The kid cried, ‘My mummy!’

The barista shook her head, ‘Does mummy have a long white beard?’

The kid thought for a moment and said, ‘No. She just has a tiny beard.’

We all screamed laughing.

Kids. They love to get up close and personal, don’t they? (Strokes chin warily…)

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At home we have wrestled the backyard into submission.

We had BUCKETS of rain will we were overseas and returned to an absolute jungle. Honestly, walking into the backyard I felt like Joseph Conrad entering the heart of darkness. The horror! The horror!

In other news, I leapt for joy to find a bag of horse poo I’d forgotten all about! It was in the wood shed under some…stuff, and had turned into the most delicious compost. It was positively wiggling with wiggly worms!

With my trusty compost at hand, I got busy and planted cherry tomatoes, Jalapeno peppers and a couple of blueberry bushes.

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We are currently eating strawberries fresh off the vines. Yum, right?

Meantime, random Sweet Williams have popped up in the lettuce bed. #curious

I pulled a heap of purple garlic last week and have it on a drying rack in the shed.

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Speaking of the shed/collapsing garage, we have FINALLY spoken with our favourite builder and he has lots of cool ideas for how we can strip the shed back to its frame and foundations next year, and turn it into a lovely, airy studio.

An official, purpose built, girl&duck HQ, dear reader!

I cannot friggin wait!

I don’t love working in the house. In fact, I find it frustrating and claustrophobic and even though I LOVE what I do, I still crave some separation between me and my workspace. Preferably more than a flimsy old Ikea curtain.

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I cannot wait to shine my shoes, pack my satchel and ‘go to work’ next year!

I’ll share the reno as it unfolds, okay? It’s a few months away, yet. But the wheels are in motion and that’s enough to make me dance a happy jig.

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Remember how I mentioned chickens in a recent post and how I was scared to make the commitment?

Well, being scared is soooo boring, right?

So, we have mapped out where we’re going to put the chicken run and plan on buying THREE chickens in the new year. I’ll have to get Jackie French’s book. And the one by Fiona Scott-Norman, too. I’ve heard only good things!

See my Chicken Creative Visualisation below…

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The chickenrun and chicken coop will be between the oyster plant and that other prehistoric rain plant thingy. And Gandalf (our gum tree) will provide shade, too.

Of course, the chickens will be mostly free-range during the day, but they will be tucked away in the evenings.

I’m sorry to say I’ll have to farewell the Witchy Cottage next year. (In case you don’t know, it’s the little yellow building featured above for context). Once the garage is converted we will need the Witchy to be a garden shed again. Because lawn mower and tent and bar fridge and pogo sticks…

Round and round we go, yeah?

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Time to close my laptop, dear reader. Himself will be home from work soon and, might I add, he will come bearing fish ‘n chips. We have fish ‘n chips every Thursday night. For better or for worse…

Until tomorrow and the third instalment of my self imposed three-day blogging challenge

thank you for joining me.

I remain

Yours all tangled up in fish wrap

Jen xo

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PS Do you get my museletters? If not, you’re welcome sign up here! I write roughly once a fortnight with news from home, creativity tips, and personal reflections that I don’t put on the blog.

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PPS This Writing Life!

More advance copies of Truly Tan arrived today! That’s all eight books, done and dusted, set to hit the shops again in January 2023. Truly brilliant!