baskets filled with hazelnuts + other miscellaneous chatter

Hello loves,

How are you?

It's Friday morning here, the girls are all off at school, Bren is somewhere outside (I think I can hear some kind of power-tool), and I'm sitting up on the green armchair in the corner of our studio, wrapped in a colourful crocheted blanket. The house is quiet except for the howl of the wind outside and I should feel calm and be able to concentrate, but instead I feel scattered and in a hurry.

Most weeks by the time it gets to Friday I pretty much know what I'm going to write about. Most weeks I have a bit of a theme of thoughts, so the writing is just a matter of getting them into some sort of order. I read in Rachael Treasure's book Down The Dirt Roads the other day that 'according to neuroscience expert Dr Joe Dispenza...of the thousands of thoughts we have per day - around 50,000 to 70,000 of them - 90 per cent are the same thoughts from the day before.'

Unusually, this week hasn't felt like that for me. This week I can't really pin point a point of view or a perspective that has dominated, but instead have found myself stuck in the practical world of picking and preserving and putting on a smiley face despite the sudden turn of the season, the house full of emotional girls and the fact that I feel a bit scattered and unsure at the moment.

So this morning over our porridge with honey I asked the family what they thought I should write about.

Bren said he'd like me to write about spurtles. 
Over the past few days he's gotten his pole lathe up and running and has a new found fascination with all the possible forms that he can now create. He said he'd like me to find out how they came to be, why they are round and why people use them instead of their spoons.

Indi asked me to ask you guys about your stress management techniques.
There has to be a better way to deal with life in her second last year of school than feeling constantly overwhelmed, teary and not sleeping. Unlike Bren and I at school, she has made a personal commitment to complete everything thrown at her and give it her 100%. It's tricky because she's starting to get a glimpse of the big wide world beyond school, and that excites her and makes her question what it's all about and for, but it doesn't free her from the stress.

Gosh I could write a whole blog post about how much I dislike the way the current senior school system robs our kids of the love of learning, with all the emphasis being placed on assessments and assignments and essays and exams. At 16 and 17 our kids are wide awake and open to the world, shouldn't we be encouraging them to fall in love with subjects, to follow pathways of their own interest, to ask all the hard questions and to challenge what they're taught? Shouldn't learning be about more than preparing for tests?

But in the end it's not about what I think. Indi has five school assessed courseworks (SACs) over the next few weeks and if you have a fave meditation app, herbal tea blend or breathing technique, she'd be ever so grateful.

Jazzy wants me to write about her.

When she saw that Jackie wrote this on my last blog post - 'When did Jazzy grow up? She has become a very attractive, elegant and tall young woman. That smile and those dimples are to die for. I haven't noticed many photos of Jazzy perhaps that's why it hit me so hard this time.' she was thrilled!! And then she proceeded to trawl my blog for mentions and photos and stories that she featured in. She wasn't impressed at the outcome over the past year.

Funnily enough, way back when I wrote my book, Vantastic, in 2013, my designer Michelle Mackintosh, herself a middle child, counted every single photo and made sure there were equal numbers for each of the girls.  

But in the present day, in my defence, our early teenage Jazzy has spent most of her home time in her bedroom rather than with us outside on the farm. And if you're not out in the orchard picking apples, then you're not in the photos of picking apple, then you're not on my blog.

Having said all that, since this is her bit of my blog I want to acknowledge how happy we are when she joins us around the farm, how she makes us all laugh like crazy, how much we love her stories, her ukulele playing, her outfits and hairdos and how lucky we feel to have her in our gang.

Pepper suggested I write about the first apples.
She wouldn't elaborate on what specifically she wanted me to write about the first apples, but I guess that living on an apple farm in apple season with fruit hanging from the branches, sitting in crates and baskets and bowls and stewing on the stove, it makes sense.

My mum thought I should write one of those blogs where I tell you what I'm reading, listening to, watching etc.
But honestly I'm really not a fan of the book I'm reading, I don't have any particular podcast I'm loving and I can't think of the last time I sat down to watch anything. Better fix that.

And me? 
I guess I'd like to mention the fact that even though we're having a pretty crappy fruit season, there's still so much fruit to be picked and preserved. I guess that's the great thing about biodiversity. Apples, pears, hazelnuts, nashis, tomatoes, they're all ready and ripe and filling up space around the place. Not to mention the vegetables.

Next, I'd love to thank you for your messages on my last blog post that came from everyone from mothers who felt like they had found themselves in motherhood and didn't feel the need to search for anything else, through to mothers who had a glimpse of their past selves and made a dash to grab hold of her and continue her journey before they changed their minds, and everyone else in between. I've had women suggest art projects that I might like to take on, books that explore this theme, and many expressions of feeling the same. I've also listened when people have told me that they felt like I do live an artistic life - 'The way you live, the way you raise your children, the way you write and photograph your experiences...' I'm taking this on, thank you!! I love this community in all of our various stages and phases.

And I suppose that over the past week, during the busiest time of the year on our farm, I've had to make do with finding art in the everyday: making small films on my phone of the dancing shadows on my bedroom door in the afternoon light, arranging cucumbers and herbs in the pickle jars and then spending time shaking them up and watching the herbs and spices fly around in the brine and then slowly settle like snow globes, gathering groups of colours of yarn for someday projects, dreaming of botanical themed water colours...

And then I feel like I should talk about the photos above. Last Monday I spent hours alone in the hazelnut orchard, stripping the trees of their fruit. Even though the sun often glared into my eyes as I looked up searching for the treasure, it was still a pretty idyllic way to spend the time. Just me and my basket and my pockets and my shirt to fill, podcasts to listen to and dreams of all the ways we could use hazelnuts in the kitchen in the months to come.

Later on, once I'd finished picking the three rows, the girls and Bren came down to help me carry them home. I snapped some shots of them and lucky I did, because they turned out to be the only photos I took all week.

So the hazelnuts are drying out, the photos are sitting here, and I've found myself going back to 2014 and another series of photos I took in that same orchard but that time under some quite difficult circumstances after I'd just found a lump in my left breast. Coincidentally, or maybe not, I'm booked in for an ultrasound and mammogram this coming Tuesday. Look how much my girls have grown since then. Oh and look Jazzy, there are lots of photos of you in that post too.

Oh gosh, and there I was thinking I had nothing to say this week.

I'd better sign off before I write another few hundred words.
And how about you? Has your week had a recurring theme? A problem to be solved? An idea to be built on?

Lots of love to you, honey bunches!
May you trust the process, and the people, and yourself.

Love Kate xx

PS To save you the work, Jazzy, I counted for you: Indi is in four photos in this post, you are in five, Pepper is in three and Bren in in two. x

harvesting the hazels

'











Autumn, you might just be winning me over.

A sweet sunny day spent harvesting our hazelnuts. Speckled, sparkly shadows. All the twittering bird songs. A new spoon carved. A tiny nest found and admired. Blackberry scratches all over my arms and legs. Warm sun on our faces and backs. A bit of humming, some chats about plans and stages, a lot of silence and listening. Sweet, cardamon spiced, Turkish coffee brewed on a flame and served up in little cups. A chunk of apple cake unwrapped from its waxy paper package. Nuts cracked and eaten, coffee drunk.

One basket full.



I hope your season is the reason for your gladness.

xx

twenty second

On the twenty second day of the new year my farmer boy took me on a detour past the hazel-nut orchard but wouldn't tell me why.

I wandered up and down the rows chatting about how the blackberry vines needed to be cut back, how last year when we picked the hazels I had just gotten out of hospital and my world felt like it was upside down, and how we should make sure we finish eating the last crop before we harvest the next. But I had a feeling he was too involved in what he was doing to really hear me. That he had other plans.

After we found what he wanted we came back up to the house, I started on the laundry and then lunch and he disappeared for a bit.

When he returned he gave me a bunch of gypsy flowers he'd made from the hazel-wood.

I'm not sure who's getting more from this new wood cutting love of his. What a gift. What treasures.

I feel like when we made the almost impossible decision to minimise our business a year an a half ago, that this is exactly what we were hoping for. Time. Love. Passion. A focus inward rather than out. I feel like it took us most of that time to get here but it sure was worth it. I think I said this the other day but I have to mention again what an incredible thing it is to watch someone you love doing what they love. What an honour.

I look forward to seeing what happens next.

I hope you are feeling the love, my friends.

Bye!

xx

a nest among the prickles

A week or so after we got back from our winter break up north I had a mega tantrum.

I think it started when I went down to check the asparagus patch only to find it waist high in prickly weeds. The very same thing happened in the raspberries and the strawberries. After that I was a mess. I wandered around the farm with tears streaming down my face for hours. I felt overwhelmed, out of control and completely hopeless.

It felt like we had left this place in the depths of winter and while we'd been gone the sun had come out, warmed the earth and everything had shot up and taken over. It felt like in another few months we would be like Sleeping Beauty in that fairy tale where she goes to sleep in her castle and the vines and creepers grow up and cover her home until no one knows there is anyone or anything there at all. It felt like it would take us weeks and months to get on top of all the vines and thistles and that was precious time we didn't have considering it was the start of spring and things needed to be planted.

So I wandered and wept. And I wept and wandered.

And after a while my farmer boy came and wandered with me and tried to console me and make practical plans for mowing and slashing. He would put in a few days on his tractor and I would follow behind with the brush cutter. It would be hard work but he promised we would see results quickly.

But the truth is that I knew then that we were having the same conversation but thinking two different things.

In my head I was planning a war on weeds. I would spend as much time as it took to get this place in order. I would slash from sun-up to sun-down. I would prioritise it and I would be super proud when in a few months or weeks time I would stand back and look at our manicured farm.

On the other hand I knew that my farmer boy was thinking a very different thought. He would happily mow the orchards and clean up a bit around the place, but he didn't see the horror story that I did. To him weeds aren't the sworn enemy but another part of the farm's ecosystem. He certainly doesn't want them to take over and bury us, but he doesn't want to eradicate them all together either.

So we did as we planned, we spent a few days mowing and cleaning up this place and almost immediately I felt better. I felt like I could breathe. I felt like I could cope.





But then this morning as we were walking from the house down to the bottom garden to gather some rhubarb and asparagus and broad beans for lunch, we decided to check in on the hazelnut orchard to check for fruit set. And there, under a tree, tucked into the prickliest blackberry bush there ever was, was the most beautiful little nest. A nest for a tiny bird. A nest for a bird that needs undergrowth for it's habitat and undergrowth is not really something that our local forests, having been disturbed over many years, provide.

And as we walked down and then back up the hill for lunch I opened my eyes further and saw this place differently all over again. Not so much overgrown but biodiverse.

We're thinking the nest we found is probably a fantail nest and I'm thinking good thoughts about that fantail family living happily in our hazelnut orchard. I'm also thinking about picking those hazelnuts and eating those hazelnuts and cooking with those hazelnuts come autumn-time, fingers crossed for a good harvest.

Fingers crossed I can keep seeing the habitat and move onto other pressing farm jobs.


I hope your fairy tale castle has a clear way in my friends.


Love Kate xx

hazel nuts

For all your messages and stories and thoughts and wishes and prayers, thank you!

I'm doing OK. Living the in between week; after hospital but before the appointments. I'm feeling better as each day goes past. I'm trying my hardest to stay positive, to stay in the moment, to surround myself with goodness and love. And when I absolutely cannot, I am acknowledging the thought, seeing it for what it is, noticing my reaction to it, and then letting it flow down the stream. Flow down the stream stupid lump!

I'm not great at this stream thing but I know it's worth working on.

I'm not great at taking it easy either, but my farmer boy is insisting and I'm listening.

I just want to get through this. I just want to finish picking all those hazel nuts, cleaning up that orchard jungle, and baking some hazel nut biscotti.

Biggest love

xx