Veggie Gardening in Raised Garden Beds

Backyard Makeover

After 20 years it was time for our backyard to have a makeover. Weeds had grown wild - we do have a bit of a wild garden. A few years of ill health also attributed to the growth of the weeds. 

Mr F got his digging shoes on and dug out all the weeds. He was pretty ruthless. 

Mr F hard at work. Me having fun with the camera

Next he built some garden beds. I have never seen raised beds so artistically angled and designed to fit the space perfectly. They are so well made, they will not break down.

Building archetecturally designed raised garden beds

Next it was time to fill the beds. We had over two cubic metres of soil that we screened to get out all the weeds and stones. I could not believe we had so many stones. The veggies certainly would not have gained any nutrients from them. 

Pea straw as a base for the soil in a raised garden bed

First, in goes a layer of pea straw. This will rot down and give nutrients to the soil and attract beneficial critters to it. On top of that went the soil, manures, coir and mushroom compost. Within days, the bed was ready to plant. I had some old potato pieces that had grown shoots. I kept them with just this situation in mind. So in they went as out first planting. Here they are coming up a couple of weeks later. They look small now, but believe me, they grew to be over 60cm tall (2ft).

Our first potatoes

Mr F had to take out a tree that was causing problems and sending out shoots everywhere. He had to dig down 1 metre (3ft) to get rid of the root. he filled the hole with lots of stones we had screened from the soil for the garden bed. It was heavy and hard work. Note the resting chair and some of the roots.

The all-important resting chair

It didn't take long for this to happen. We collected a lot of zucchinis from here. 

Zucchini is all pervasive. It covered everything else in the bed. 

While in the garden nursery, I found a sweet potato plant. It went into the largest pot I could find.

Sweet potato growing in a large pot

 Here's a little bit of the produce we have been reaping, - zucchinis, potatoes, tomatoes, and beans.

Produce from the garden in less than three months

And the broccoli is growing really well. 

Broccoli with its blue green colour

Emu BBQ Recipe

We have just celebrated Australia Day here in Australia. 

The animal and bird on our Australian emblem is a kangaroo and an emu. 



These are considered a delicacy here and Bevan Vahland shows you how to slow cook emu meat, covered in spices, on his outdoor barbie.

Bevan's sister Vanessa,  runs GrumbleTumms, a widely acclaimed food van, travelling to markets and fairs selling products containing Australian tucker - pies made from kangaroo, emu and crocodile, croc bites and emu burgers. Grab one to try next time you see her.

TANDOORI ROO

Come and share a barbeque meal.

What are we serving?

Kangaroo Tandoori steak with almond and chia spread.

This is cooked on hot coals out on a farm along with some hot bread. Scrumptious!

(Did I say that this video was made by my son?)

The Power of Red

Red Energy

Red is a very powerful colour. It has the lowest vibration in the visible colour spectrum of light. When you look at a coloured picture or painting, the first colour our eyes pick up is the colour red. 

Artist's Red

There are three primary colours from which all other colours can be made from. These are 

• red
• blue
• yellow

Secondary colours which are made from a mixture of these colours are

• red + blue = purple
  blue + yellow = green
  yellow + red = orange

Complementary colours are opposites on the colour wheel. The opposite of red is green. So when you put red and green together, they sparkle and they make each other stand out. 
  

Advertising

Red is used as an advertising colour to make things jump out at you. Think McDonald's fast food chain. Red gets you moving through quickly. 

Red attracts, but you don't want to hang around it very long.

GrumbleTumms food van

 Energy

If you are feeling down and tired, put on some red clothes. This will cheer you up and get you energized. 

When little children get agitated and irritable, if they have red clothing on, change it to blue and it will help them to calm down. 

Red in the Garden

Red flowers are very strong. Red hibiscus and red roses will grow very well in hot sunshine. Other red flowers are nasturtiums, dahlias and poppies, tulips and salvias. They bring strong colour into a garden. Generally, bees are not as attracted to red flowers. So, it you are allergic to bee stings, add some red flowers into your garden. 

Chakras

Chakras are energy centres of the body. There are 7 main energy centres and numerous minor centres. Each of these main energy centres are assigned one of the seven colours of the rainbow. The Base chakra is located at the base of the spine inside the body. The colour associated with this is red. 

Red Crystals

Red crystals are used on the red Base chakra for healing. These red crystals are a reddish brown to black colour. They are red jasper, red calcite, garnet and ruby. They balance the energy of the ares and help the blood inside our body.

Red Food

Red food is important for our body. The bright red colour has special nutrients which help us to stay healthy. Some of these foods are tomatoes, red peppers, red capsicum, beetroot, strawberries, raspberries, apples, rhubarb and cherries. 

 Graphics and designs by Therese Vahland

Pigs and a Cooking Show

Pigs on the Farm

Pigs are one of the animals I have never had. My husband flatly refused to have them. 

A pig called Stephanie

I have always loved animals and had many varieties over the years. We lived on an eighty acre farm. That's about thirty two hectares in size.

Animals on the Farm

We have had

• goats - angora, dairy (a few varieties) and cashmere
• sheep - carpet wool and a few other varieties along the way
• donkeys 
• mule
• horses
• cows
• chickens - lots of breeds
• ducks - 120 ducklings one year
• geese
• rabbits
• cats
• dogs
• birds - a variety

But we never had pigs.

Stephanie, the pig, features in one of his latest videos.

Cooking Shows on You Tube

One of our sons, Bevan, is a chef and makes videos with great recipes and scrumptious food. 

Why don't you check you his You Tube channel, subscribe and share? He'd love to have you visit.

A Nutritious Breakfast - BAKED MUSHROOM AND RICOTTA CHEESE

Bevan shows us here how to cook a quick and nutritious breakfast. 

 No excuses that you don't know what to cook. 

Please subscribe to his food channel.

I must tell you that I am biased about this chef. 

He's my son and has been cooking daily since he was three years old. 

Before that he played with the pots and pans.

Frogs in the Backyard

I was heading out the back door to lock the chickens up for the night. It was already dark. 

Just as I was about to take a step off the step I noticed something on the doormat. Sitting there quite calmly was a brown frog. He sat still while I went to get my camera, waited kindly until I had taken some photos, and in a flash, quicker than a blink, he was gone. He was so quick, I did not see him go, only heard the rustle of a sound as he jumped into the plants. 

Little Aussie brown garden frog come for an evening visit

Frogs in the garden

I always like to see frogs in my garden because I know that the garden is healthy when this happens. The absence of frogs is one of the first signs to let us know when the land is sick. 

Froggy Restaurant

Many years ago when we lived in another house we had frogs climb up on the windows in the evening. The bottom of the windows were about 120cm (4 feet) off the ground. When the lights were on in the evening, the insects were attracted to it. The frog thought this was a free for all and enjoyed climbing up the windows and having their fill.  

When we were in China we were served a plate piled high with small mountain frogs. Not for me thank you!

The Crafty Frog

I was given this lovely frog that has had mosaics lovingly applied to it. He doesn't get outside much though. I'm afraid he might hop away.

China frog with beautiful mosaics on his back

Frogs in Literature

Frogs have featured in literature for hundreds of years. We have the famous story of The Frog Prince by Brothers Grimm and the Chinese story of The Frog in the Well. Aesop, who was a great Greek teller of fables from long ago told of The Scorpion and the Frog. The Wind in the Willows is another famous English story by Kenneth Grahame that has become famous with Toad and other characters living at Toad Hall. A toad is a variety of frog. 

In the Australian aboriginal history, the Dreamtime story of Tiddalick The Frog is an important and famous story.

Frogs are also remembered in music

A Frog went Walking

A frog went walking on a summers day

A hum, a hum

A frog went walking on a summers day

He met Miss Mousey on the way

A hum, a hum, a hum, a hum, a hum.  etc

See if you can find some frogs today.

Drawing your Meal

Here's a great video by a talented guy.

• He's a chef and just loves cooking.
• He's a film maker and just loves making videos.
• He's an artist and just loves to draw.

• He loves to grow his own food.

See how he draws his ideas for your next plate of food. 

Real Aussie Food

GrumbleTumms

GrumbleTumms is a small business devoted to supplying REAL Australian food.

The good old pie is often thought of as being Aussie tucker. GrumbleTumms takes the humble pie one step further, no, two or three steps further. 

GrumbleTumms uses kangaroo, emu and crocodile meat in their pies. And not just a whiff of it. There are chunks of meat slow cooked in delicious sauces, enough to get the saliva dripping. 

They also have Flinder's Island Wallaby Kranskys, sausages made with wallaby meat and King Island cheese. Flinder's Island and King Island are out in the middle of Bass Strait. They are buffeted by the fresh Arctic winds and produce from there is known to be healthy and pure. 

Visit GrumbleTumms website to see all their produce and to find out where they will be next. 

The GrumbleTumms van is very popular at Aboriginal celebration days as these are some of the original meats eaten by the native people of our great land.  
 

Free Recipes

Free Video Cooking Class

I know this great chef, Bevan, that does most delicious cooking. 
He has his own website and makes great videos, showing you just how easy it is to make and present these great recipes. He has over 80, yes, 80 videos he has made just for you. Check out his you tube videos here.

Now he is a very good and creative chef but I must reveal my connection. Bevan is my son. We always look forward to a  meal at his home. 

Cooking is deeply embedded in him. Even as a tiny child his favourite playthings were the pots and pans. By Kindergarten age he had to cook something every day. And so it went on...

And here he is ...

Fresh Australian Food

Australian Food

Here in Australia we are very lucky. We have a plentiful supply of fresh wholesome food. 

Food is what we all need. We cannot exist without food. 
Food gives us the energy we need to do everything we do in our lives - walk, work, laugh and think. Yes, it gives us the nutrients our body needs. Our body then gets to and converts the food into energy. It uses the minerals, water, vitamins and protein to fuel our body. 

Eat Only Good Food

If we fill our body with sugar and empty calories then we get no benefit out of it. Eating the wrong foods for our body can make us ill.

Fruit and Vegetables

We all know about fruit and vegetables and how they are so good for us. The next time you are putting sweets, chips, bars and other manufactured products into your mouth, think what else you could be eating.

It could be food like this. Watch the video and be inspired to eat good food. Your body will thank you with more energy.

Here