riveting

The night after I wrote my last blog post I dreamt that I died.

I was haunted by the visions of my death-bed scene all that weekend. I couldn't shake the feelings and conversations and finality.

Eventually, when I just couldn't let it go, I called my mum for an explanation and some reassurance, and hopefully no ridicule. You see I am the parent who finds the long, painfully detailed descriptions of my kids' dreams terribly tedious. More than once I have uttered the word riveting in a sarcastic tone when they have caught me somewhere and begun to share a minute by minute play-back of their last 10 hours in slumberland. Nine times out of ten it doesn't deter them and I am treated to every single gory detail and held captive until they are done; elephants and nakedness and school-yards and teeth and everything else their precious subconscious selves have thrown at them while they were slumbering.

So as you can imagine I didn't take my decision to call my mum, our family's chief dream interpreter, lightly.

But eventually I did.

Once we got over the riveting bit and I filled her in on all the death-bed details, she got down to business. 'A dream about a death is really about the end of something and the rebirth of something else' she told me. In this case she thought it was most probably my blog. And although this feels obvious now, it felt like such a relief at the time not to have to worry that it was any sort of premonition.

The end of something tho - was it really the end?

When I had sat down on that last Friday to write my blog I had had no idea that I was about to take a break from it. I knew that there were problems, I knew that it had started to feel like more of a responsibility than a joy, and I knew that that one woman's demand of my content had rattled me, but still I had expected to post some photos, write some words and press publish. I certainly had not anticipated the death.

But my blog knew what I needed better than I.

10 years had been a great run but the time had come to take a break to ask myself some questions. I felt relief as soon as I admitted it to myself.

In the past month I have not missed my blog at all. I have not missed the pressure to find things to write about, the guilt to read and respond to other people's blogs, the small but growing fear that my words could and might be judged and used against me, and I have not missed the time it takes to put it all together - the words and the photos.

Those precious blogging hours.

As a work from home/on the farm mother, there was so often a measure of guilt involved as I sat at my computer writing my blog on a Friday while the to-do list exploded around me. But it was a decision we had made, and although sometimes I did have to do battle with the lists in my head, I guarded those hours carefully and refused to allow them to be compromised.

After I published my last blog, my friend Penelope wrote to me suggesting that I spend my usual blogging hours on some other creative project. At the time I loved that idea, but I soon saw how useful those hours were at the end of the week on the farm or in the house, and then they were quickly gobbled up.

But then as my missed month of May became June I decided that I would blog again on the first Friday. Even if it was just to say goodbye. And then leading up to the Friday I began to notice all the things that I have missed: the community, the creativity, the precious few hours put aside for myself, the record, the writing itself and weirdly - the typing on the computer keys. All the nos I'd been feeling became maybes.

I had hoped to come back here today with some answers about my blogging future. I had hoped to have done some research about a new platform. I had hoped that once I sat down here this morning that the words would flow out of me and decide for me, like they did last time. But unfortunately I've had too many interruptions to give them a chance to make themselves heard.

So my plan is to keep blogging for as long as it brings me joy and as often as I feel like it. I suspect that I won't be here every single week, but I hope that I'll be here at least once a month. Ideally I'd love for it to be more often, but realistically I know that I need to give myself space to only blog when I have a story I want to share.

And I guess it needs to be said that as much as I value your thoughts and opinions, this is my personal blog and I will blog about what I want to blog about when I want to blog about it. If you have a problem with what I choose to write about please unfollow me, if you have strong opinions and thoughts about content please feel free to share them on your own blog.

And finally, I'd like to thank you all from the bottom of my heart for being my community. For reading along over the years, for caring about our family and our way of life, for writing comments and messages, for not scrolling past, and for reading my long posts in a world that favours the quick snippets. You guys are the best!

I don't know when I'll be back here again, but it might be sooner than later as I just bought a new camera and I suspect I'll take lots of photos as I learn to use it. And then we're going to visit Indi soon and travel blogs are always fun to write...

Big thanks also to Miss Jarrah who braved arctic conditions to model for me in my latest knit-in-progress The Sólbein cardigan , hopefully I'll have the sleeves finished and be ready to steek it (cut it down the middle) by the end of the weekend.

And with that I'm outta here! No longer dead but not quite yet reborn.

I hope you have a beautiful weekend my Foxslane friends.


Love,

Kate x

some answers

Hello friends,

Another week has flown right on by. So many times I thought of these photos and that I should post them along with the answers to the questions in the comments at the bottom of my last post, but it never came to be.

This past week was warm and dry and I feel like we made use of every minute; planting veggies and flowers, weeding, mulching, pulling the garlic, watering and mowing. From first thing in the morning til last light at night. Summer craziness on the farm has begun.

And it's exciting to watch as the scarlet runner bean fronds grab hold and wind their way up and around the trellises, flowers on the tomatoes begin to emerge, broad beans fatten up and await their picking, dahlia shoots emerge out of the soil, lettuces grow and plump up, strawberries and peas wait for you to walk by and snap them off and each day new flowers open and show their pretty faces to the world.

So here are the photos now. My Lanes cardigan still buttonless (Ravelry details here). Indi and Jazzy, the foxgloves, delphiniums and the warm summer's eve.

And now for the question and answer bit.

Hi Carly. Now that Indi has finished school she's trying to get her hours of learner driving up to 120 so she can get her driver's license (she's currently sitting at about 94), she's relaxing and socialising and she's working for me on the farm. I can't actually remember any stand out signs from the climate rally but at one stage Bren turned to me and said we should have made one that said 'Organic Farming is the answer!' I love that imagined one too. My advice for a new gardener would be to only grow the things you love to eat and look at. And to grow rocket and radishes because they are quick and easy. And I'm okay. Not great. I had a fight with one of my kids this week that really rocked me (we're good again now) and yesterday I finally went to the doctor about my elbow and ankle and now I'm all strapped up in purple tape with exercises to do and a list of things I'm not allowed to do. And I'm not allowed to knit for a week which I am stressing about. Or spin. Ugh, what's a girl to do?! A week feels like such a very long time. x

Hi Small Catalogue, has my brain returned now that my youngest is 10 and if so did it come back gradually or in a rush? Hmmmm definitely not in a rush. Actually I feel like for me it's been less about getting my brain back and more about carving out a space of my own. And I don't just mean a physical space, although the construction of my studio definitely helped with that. Over the past year I've come out from behind my girls and really felt a push to rediscover who I am, what I need and want, and to create some projects for myself. It's ongoing obviously, and it often gets squashed by things like VCE and other demanding family issues, but I feel like this past year I have felt more true to myself than I ever remember feeling before. Do you? x

Hi Kate, ooooooh I love your question about the other senses and what they add to my stories. So often when I'm in the garden wandering around or working, with the soundtrack of the calling of the birds, the singing of the frogs, the rustling of the wind through the trees, the fountain of the water as it comes out of the ground and pours into the house dam, I'll grab my phone and try to record the visual together with the audio to try to capture the scene as a whole. It's a shame I can't do that here now. I think that when I took these photos of the girls it was early evening and the birds must have all been calling out to each other but my focus would have been on Indi and Jazzy, laughing, breaking into song, telling each other stories, finishing each other's sentences and being silly. And as for the smell, I've been finding the sweet peas quite overpowering. There would have been that just freshly watered smell and the dry forest smell is just starting to be noticeable. I'm writing all of this from inside my studio where I can't really smell anything except for the wood of the walls, but I'm sure I'll be much more aware of everything later on when I go back to work. x

And that's me today.

Where are you? What are you up to? What can you hear and smell? And how do you feel?

See you next week friends.

Love,

Kate x

until then

Hello friends.

Just a quick one today because we're taking our girls into Melbourne for the school students' strike for climate action to protect our future. We're catching the train into the city early and probably won't be home until late.

Hopefully I'll be back sometime over the weekend with more photos of my finished Lanes cardigan and the girls in the foxgloves. Hopefully I'll think of some stories to tell. Or maybe you could ask me a question and I'll try to answer it. Does that sound like a fun idea? Let's see what happens.

Until then, be kind to yourselves and each other.

Lots of love,

Kate xx

from my studio

Hello friends! I'm writing to you today from inside my studio!!!

Yesterday the boys did the last bits of work on her and then they packed up their tools and left. By the time I got home from having coffee with a friend in Macedon it was no longer theirs but mine. It's so funny how that happens: one minute the building site belongs to them and the next they knocked on the door to come and see what I was up to.

What I was up to was listening to Missy Higgins on my headphones, washing the place from top to bottom with a cloth and warm soapy water, and having a little cry at the enormity of it all. 

It feels HUGE! And to be honest I'm not even sure what I'll spend my time doing in here, other than being alone, and probably knitting, and drawing, and writing, and hopefully painting, and possibly embroidering, and reading, and drinking tea, and hiding from my family, and lying on the bed in the mezzanine watching the tops of the trees blowing in the wind, and not being distracted by the housework, and valuing my own creativity, and enjoying my own company; we'll see.

I can't begin to tell you how much I love it. I'm sitting here in my chair alternating between typing words and looking out the windows at the little yellow-breasted birds drinking the nectar from the banksia flowers and I'm making plans for all the things I want to do in here over the weekend. Starting with washing the windows and bringing some plants in.

Okay, so how's your week been?

Here's a bit of mine;

july 21

On Saturday Miss Pepper put the finishing touches on her skirt. It was a funny old sewing lesson considering I hadn't touched my machine for years and years and we probably made every single mistake there was to make, but we both learnt something from each of them and it all looked great and fitted well in the end and that's probably all that matters anyway. That and that she wants to have another go at it again soon.

july 22

On Sunday, just as the sun was setting, we walked into the forest to collect some kindling for the fire and to take some photos of the skirt she made and of the cardigan I knitted her.

Cardigan details here.

july 23

On Monday my mum and I attended the first of five introduction to floristry classes we signed up for at our local neighbourhood house. In the first class we talked a bit, learnt how to make a basic posy and made wreaths out of grape vines and wisteria. We both had such fun and are really looking forward to next week's class.

When I came home I pulled some tubs of stewed apple and plum I'd made last summer, pureed the fruit, poured the mixture onto sheets, popped it in the dehydrator and then cut it into strips and rolled them up for the girls' lunches.

Here's a blog post how-to I wrote a few years ago.

july 24

These mid winter days I find myself constantly hunting for signs of spring. The green tips of the jonquils gave me cause to squeal with delight one cold and frosty morning.

And while these are still not brilliant photos of farmer Bren's turned bowls, they give you an idea of how sweet they look sitting on the top shelf in the shed in their nest of wood shavings. I had to climb up a ladder and hang precariously off to one side to take those photos, hopefully I'll get some action shots of him making them for next week.

july 25

On Wednesday the boys sanded the floor and then built the little deck off the side of my studio. I can only imagine how beautiful it will look in a few weeks' time when the ornamental almond is in blossom, and then when the days warm up it'll be such a perfect spot to sit with a book.

july 26

And then yesterday the shelves went up around the window seat, the final shingles were nailed to the front and the studio was handed over.

Late last night I came in to make sure the heater was off. I climbed up to the mezzanine, laid down on the slats, watched the spot-lit tops of the trees in the forest and listened to the sounds of the night. I was there for quite a while before summoning up the energy to return to the chaos and the hormones and the craziness and the dramas of late Thursday night. When it gets warmer I think I might stay out there from time to time.

july 27

This morning we hung out in my studio for a while after the big girls had gone off to school with my mum. We climbed up and down the ladder, we lay on the mezzanine, we sat in the window box and we admired the light and where the shadows lay. 

There's still so much cleaning and wiping and dusting to do after the sanding settled a thick layer of dust on every surface, but I decided to put that aside for the weekend and to write my blog in here today instead. I'm well practised at looking past any urgent cleaning, so that part was easy.

Which brings me to now. To finish at the very same place that I started. Sitting on a chair, in my brand new studio, with my lap-top on my lap, typing words in between watching the world outside and the shadows dancing inside.

So far all that I've brought in here with me is the chair that I'm sitting on, my computer and charger, my card reader, the socks that I'm casting off and the swatch that I've just cast on.

It's 4pm and the winter sun has just disappeared behind the trees in front of me. It's my favourite time of the day to take photos mid-winter, but today I think I'll just sit here and watch.

I hope you have a beautiful weekend my friends.
I hope you've got a good book to cuddle up with, and a nice cozy spot to snuggle up in.
And something interesting to tell me. Go on?

Oh and she'll need to be named of course, any suggestions?

See you next week you guys.

Lots of love,

Kate
xx

deep dark winter

This is me right now. It's Friday afternoon, it's miserable and rainy outside, I'm wearing socks I knitted last year and although I have absolutely nothing to complain about, I'm feeling flat and a bit grumpy.

It's crazy what a hold winter has on me because despite the constant reminding myself of all the wonderful things going on in my life, I don't seem to have any control of my mood. It's deep winter, it's been days since we last saw any sunshine, and the arctic gale blasting outside is so icy as it pinches and whips.

It's tempting to make a list of my many blessings here in the hope that it will somehow tip my balance over into the happy, but the truth is that this blog is all about the seasons and the seasonal, and this it appears is my annual, seasonal reality.

So let's get on with the week shall we.

july 14

Last weekend we had some friends to stay on our farm and on Saturday they came up to our house with a bucket full of shakshuka and some Turkish bread and together we cooked and then sat around to eat. We knew these friends at school, we had our kids at the same time, and now here we are as families sharing stories and food all these years later. How wonderful that feels.

july 15

Bren has been turning bowls again. This latest batch are the size of salad bowls and they're incredibly beautiful. He makes the bowls from the wood while it's still green and he leaves the edges thick so that when they dry out he can put them back on the lathe and reshape them. I'll take some better photos for next week's blog so you can see the scale and the shapes.

july 16

On Monday I looked around my room at the piles of books and unfinished knitting projects and decided to make a bit of sense of it all before the big move into my studio in a few weeks time. I put books back up on the shelves, I folded up bits of material and I finished the last few rows of a few knitting projects, then I soaked them and blocked them.

It's crazy how I'm always in such a rush to cast on and knit a new project, but then I often leave them for dead so close to the finish line. 

Hopefully these two will be dry, photographed and worn before the weekend is through.

Merricks shawl details here.

Lily Pond cardigan details here.

july 17

There's nothing quite like the feeling of finishing a book you really didn't like the tone of and starting something new and fresh. So far The Dry is everything I need in a book right now; it's engaging, entertaining, suspenseful, and steady paced, thank you Jane Harper.

july 18

On Wednesday Bren and Jobbo made one of my life-long dreams come true when they built me a window-box for my studio. It's incredible how much of a difference it's made to the space by framing the window and the view and inviting you to stop and sit. I imagine many a future blog post will be written in that new spot.

july 19

The power was out for most of the day yesterday so I planted seeds and split wood and the boys nailed shingles onto the front of my studio.

There's a small chance that by this time next week it will no longer be a building site but a small studio instead. Imagine that?!

july 20

The package full of yarn that I ordered full of typos last week arrived this morning. I think I'm going to use the yarn in the top photo to knit a Telija. But first I must finish those wine coloured socks. I pulled them apart twice more during the week. Once because the pattern I was knitting was driving me crazy and not at all fun to knit, and then again when I found a few mistakes. Fourth time lucky I'm going to knit them plain the whole way up to the cuff where I might do something fancy. Watch this space.

Which brings me to now and a little bit of surprise and relief that I managed to string all of those words together considering the grumpiness and the PMS and the rain. As soon as I've published I'll put some wood on both fires, hang out the washing, water my seeds, help Bren with the dinner and hopefully sneak in an episode of The Crown before the girls get home from school.

Hooray for the weekend!

Do you have anything fun planned?
Does your mood sometimes defy justification?
Do you know how much of a difference watching Glow on the iPad while running on the treadmill has made to my endurance?
Do you love peanut butter on corn crackers?
Do you know why our cat spends the day sleeping outside in the cold when she could easily sleep inside by the fire?
What else?

See you next week lovelies.

Love, Kate x