rara republic

L O V E : : A M O U R

2011-11-04T21:24:00.004+13:00

Bali, Indonesia.

Love:

family

friends

blessing

beach

barefoot

simple

laughter

dance

Celebration.

2/7/2012

♥

It is only right that former nomads choose to celebrate their love on a beach on a faraway tropical island. Of course, this celebration wouldn't be complete without you... You're welcome to join us from 24/6- 8/7. We can recommend accommodation for you nearby.

Getting there: airasia have the cheapest flights (airport code DPS) from New Zealand and Europe. Singapore, Kuala Lumpur and Bangkok aren't too far away and are super transport hubs; airasia fly on from there... Once you're in Bali we'll help connect you from Denpasar to the celebration.

♥

Bali, Indonesie

Amour:

famille

amis

plage

pieds nus

simple

rire

danse

Célébration.

2/7/2012

♥

Quel meilleur endroit pourraient trouver deux anciens nomades pour célébrer leur amour, si ce n'est une plage sur une île des Tropiques? Bien sur, il manquerait quelque chose si vous ne veniez pas. Vous pouvez nous rejoindre du 24 juin au 8 juillet. Nous pouvons vous recommander un hébergement.

Y aller: a partir d'Europe, la compagnie la moins chere est Air Asia. L'aeroport de Bali s'appelle Denpasar (code DPS). Une fois la-bas, nous vous aiderons a nous retrouver.

without leccy

2011-07-09T23:09:00.002+12:00

did i tell you the story of life without leccy?

it took 2 weeks until the power was turned back on. two weeks.

you know, i used to live in a bus for 3 years, without electricity. i've camped. i've travelled. done without. but there's nothing quite like living in your own house without electricity. nothing quite like the 'before dark' ritual.

it's a story of being organised.

the sun traverses the sky in a slow arc; it's summer, luckily. it's warm, so we have no need to heat. but every afternoon, after tea but before sunset, i wander the house checking.

the torches are there, where they're meant to be and the batteries are charged. there's a light half-way between the lounge and the bedrooms- just in case. and another one in either room. just in case. there's one by the bathroom and one in the lounge itself. we don't use candles. (you don't live in a wooden house in earthquake season, using candles.)

the sun sets. we wind up the radio and listen to talk-back radio. i hate talk back, listening to sorry tales of sorry lives. but just now, these are my peers. these are other people sitting there in the dark and the radio has become our link. our tales are all similar, of no water, no power, of no sewerage. while being disconnected, we're all trying desperately to reconnect by a forgotten medium.

there was something that was attached to the terror of sunset that still hasn't left.

each night i still have my ritual. i check that torches are in place, charged. i fill my water bottle. i make sure there is a path, clear from clothes and toys- my escape route.

two weeks.

each night, as our home and suburb descended into a black so complete, it was hard to compare, i had a fear that rose. looking out of my windows (why draw the curtains?) to a neighbourhood that was dark... many neighbours had left, so i didn't expect to see light in their windows, but the street lights were out too. nothing. and quiet. even the sea paid its respects.

so, we carried water. we washed our smalls in buckets at the well across the road. we invented a complicated colour coded system for bucket usage, making deposits in the portaloo across the way. it was kinda like festival camping, just without the music, or fun.

and i've never known such charity.

some church ladies from the west side of town came by to collect our washing, returning it two days, ironed, later with freshly baked biscuits.

the army were out, purifying water. there were water stations at the civil defence posts. there was free food left and right- more bbqs and sausage sizzles than you could poke a stick at. a free 'supermarket' was set up, where we shopped for baby food and nappies. the hari krishnas, the sallys, the lot were there, dishing up delicacies. there was even a bunch of folk flying hot meals in by helicopter. cos without 'leccy, many folk couldn't cook food, let alone sterilise their water.

it seems so long ago now.

but the fear still lives in me.

statistically speaking

2011-06-16T12:48:00.002+12:00

there're a bunch of government types who study earthquakes. it's all historical; they gather statistics and analyse them then later they share their opinion.

there was another man, the moon man, who did the same. but he added another twist to the equation: he added his prediction

the city was alive with gossip. this moon man's predictions were eerily close to the reality. we were all frightened. even folk who normally pay no heed to soothsayers were wondering.

the world watched our turmoil and witnessed our pain on the internet and telly. two weeks later, the day after the electricity was turned back on i took the kids and with a friend, headed up north for a little break.

i met a woman in a park. she called herself a clairvoyant. she told me stories that within days had revealed themselves to be true...

my poor wee heart, my poor damaged head.

(here's an amusing little side story- one that would unwittingly play a huge part in my life for the following months.... one week post quake (the 2nd quake) we tried to go out on a family outing, you know- engage in something 'normal'. we went to a gathering at the local civil defence spot where they were giving out free water and food. calix went on his running bike and i followed on my rollerskates. yes, you may wonder- what the fork?! but, believe it or not, i was(am) a good skater. but i'll never be able to tell you what happened. we said our goodbyes and then i was on the ground with a bunch of faces circling mine. police, army, pascal and calix.... somehow i'd fallen, somehow i'd knocked my head. somehow i'd earned myself and my family a free ride in an ambulance to the hospital, while the city (and nation) was in a state of emergency, from a freaking rollerskating accident!)

home again, my panic continued. little did i know i was suffering from post-concussion syndrome. my behaviour became erratic. i couldn't cope with the earthquakes and aftershocks. i couldn't cope with my children. i was constantly tired- more so than breastfeeding-and-aftershock interrupted sleep allowed for. my head continued to swim, i often struggled to focus and my balance was out. i couldn't read -and for someone who reads a book a week this is a big deal. life was trivial, i felt all i could do was survive. of course, the person (and people) closest to me suffered more.

the date of the moon man's prediction approached and my horror and panic grew. i couldn't cope with the possibility of more, or worse, but i couldn't convince my family to understand how i felt.

the came, the hour passed. we breathed out.

12 hours later it struck. not the earthquake he predicted, but one worth noting all the same.

all i could do was hide in my bed, fully clothed but shaking. my heart racing faster than perviously i'd thought possible. within minutes i was asleep; i'd never known such fear without reason.

although the moon man apoligised the fact remained, in my eyes, that statistically speaking he was right. the full moon's proximity to the earth added a gravitational pull to the equation... the full moon, as history will tell you, increased my panic and my madness...

the new normal

2011-06-16T12:16:00.003+12:00

my eyes were like giant orbs on stalks as i drove the slow journey of escape from my home. the street was filled with people, crying, hugging, looking around in bewilderment at their strange new world. the road, cracked, bumpy and filling with pot-holes and flooding from liquefaction would remain in this state for months to come.

the air, although still, was filled with a sense of panic. everyone was on their way somewhere- home, to school or somewhere else- simply escaping.

my eyes hurt.

in my haste to leave, gathering the few belongings i could carry, i failed to notice our chimney had fallen over and smashed a hole in the roof.

we arrived at the swedes, our refuge, and gathered with our friends. we hugged, we swept up; the children carried on playing although a little confused by suddenly being instructed to wear shoes in the house. we opened a bottle of wine- as much to celebrate being together as to calm our nerves. we clung to the battery operated radio (a crab who normally resides in the shower), listening for updates- hoping for good news.

the earth continued to shake. each time we all looked quickly to one another to see if we needed to take shelter. helicopters flew low overhead.

suddenly it dawned on me- our german exchange student would be returning from her school camping trip this afternoon- where was she? how would she get home? i tried her mobile- no answer. i sent a text. i tried to call her school but with 400000 other calls being placed at the same time, the system was overloaded.

i ran to a nearby friend's place knowing she had a very old dial phone that would work without electricity.

no luck.

i ran back. i tried the phone again, texted- nothing. no reply.

where was she?

pascal and tom decided there was only one option: that was to drive to the school in tom's 4WD van to find her... the 16km round trip took nearly 3 hours.

while listening to the radio we heard calls from people, pleas to help find lost friends and relatives. i called the radio station and let them know i was looking for our host-daughter...

just as i'd finished my call, call waiting told me i had someone trying to get through: an international number.

it was linnea's father.

"i'm sorry, i don't know where your daughter is" was all i could manage as my throat choked and tears ran down my face.

"it's ok," he says in his stilted accent. "she is with friends."

the school, unable (or unwilling) to make it to brighton, dropped her with a friend in a suburb more than 10km away... i was furious, but relieved.

later we shared a nervous meal with friends as the earth continued to shake. we had no water, no power, no sewerage but we still had each other- a lot more than some people had. we later returned home, to darkness and fear. wondering what would this mean- is this now our future? is this now our new normal?

Just when you thought you could relax

2011-06-04T22:16:00.003+12:00

it was a strange day, one that would forever be filled with 400000 stories of what-if.

this day could be a film.

it rained. not heavily, but that annoying drizzly kind of rain that soaks you all the same (you know, lets you think you might get away without a coat...) but heavily enough to make me reconsider my plans.

the children slept, the rain fell, i thought let the day be; we stayed home. i was organised, for once, and decided to cook the evening's meal, setting it to reheat in time for tea. i surfed the net, boasting to friends online about what had i left to do other than to get drunk.

luckily i remained sober.

jola awoke, she ate. she came and sat on my knee while i continued surfing, waiting for her brother to wake. his gentle sleep on the couch behind me finished with a stir and a cry; jola and i went to comfort him. within minutes (was it hours?) our world changed again.

there was no warning sound that i heard. just a bang. and the sound of the house rising up and dropping down again. and the children screaming. and me screaming. and cupboards opening and their contents falling to the floor. of glass breaking. in slow motion (or real time?) i looked round the room while i saw books pour from the bookshelf onto the seat where i had been sitting. a picture fell from the wall. a mask leapt to the floor. and something happened behind me that made me act, throwing my children to the floor, sheltering them with my body.

we, three, in the middle of the room in a blind panic. my son chanting -veux dormir, my daughter's face wet with tears despite me trying to calm her with my breast. typing 'frightened' doesn't even contain enough heartbeats to really encapsulate its significance.

we, three, in the middle of the room unsure of where or what or how. i saw the floor littered with broken things, knowing we wore no shoes in the house but unsure of the solution.

i held them tight.

it seems, before the earth had finished its prehistoric dance, my phone was ringing beneath the clutter and debris on the floor. papa pascal.

we cried into the phone, come home. the earth continued to shake; the children screaming, i had no idea what he was saying, but i asked him the impossible -i need to know where it was!

this shake was so violent, so intense, that it had to be closer than darfield. was it under my house? was it at sea? we had no way of knowing. we just had to carry on living for that moment.

it seems, before the earth had finished its new boogy, (the fandango chachacha?) i heard the noise of the gate opening. papa? already?

we, three, holding each other tightly, the phone clenched in my fist, turned to see our beautiful friend and her son shine the brightest ray of hope my life has ever witnessed. she opened our door and came in, hugging us, reassuring us that in fact, everything was going to be ok.

we went outside and while the earth continued to shake it didn't seem so threatening outside. the boys, happy to see each other, immediately went about the pressing business of play and when i heard my neighbour's door slam shut i went to see if they were ok. on the footpath we met, talking small while sweating large. i turned and again witnessed the surreality of slow motion as the road in front of me swelled, rose up, and exploded, sending a filthy brown fluid flooding towards my home.

i turned and ran.

my beautiful friend met me half way -there's water coming up quickly in your back garden; grab some stuff, we gotta go!

at the same moment (was it?) her very capable husband arrived. he put the two small boys safely in his van, where they carried on playing oblivious to their peril. with dirty brown liquid flooding towards my house from two directions i ran with a panic a blind man would be proud of.

in our two years of living in this home, (my first) i'd two trial evacuations. both with a little humour and no real threat, but evacuations all the same. they meant shit.

from our garage i grabbed what i could find, amongst the turmoil and rising floodwaters, of our preparedness kit. i puzzled myself with the dilemma of noshoesinthehouse while trying to get the things we needed to go quickly- passports, hard-drive, nappies, the dinner i'd cooked, some toys. all piled into a washing basket.

i scribbled a note to leave on the door -gone to t&l. i replaced it with another, -watch for broken glass. i couldn't open the door. the house had moved and the front door wouldn't open. with force (my beautiful friend's husband has both good timing and considerable force) the door opened, but wouldn't shut again properly.

my poor brain couldn't really cope.

we drove, slowly, to my friends' home to see what would happen next.

The Big One

2011-06-04T22:03:00.003+12:00

our isles exist due to tectonic plate movement. the constant movement and evolution of the earth brought aotearoa to the surface. we studied these movements at school. the backbone of my island is rippled by the alpine fault; in geography lessons this would be the cause of The Big One.

before dawn we learnt, from our car radio (the best $3 ever spent), that the earthquake measuring 7.3 was centred in darfield, some 50km from my home.

but heck, i live an hour and a half's drive from the alps! darfield, even on a bad day, wouldn't take me 40 minutes! what was this, fault? and heck, what are you talking about, aftershocks? we didn't learn this word at school!

once brave enough to venture outdoors to face that morning's new truth we were to learn many new ideas of normal. but heck, what had we to moan about? by midday there were no reports of any fatalities. earlier that year there'd been an earthquake of similar magnitude in haiti that killed people in their thousands...

in fact, we were quite pleased with ourselves. we'd been prepared, after all, and had supplies as simple as water. our road was a little broken, but nothing too bad. our house had a few new cracks, but nothing too bad. we'd just survived The Big One.

oh, yes, those pesky aftershocks. they numbered in their hundreds. and then their thousands. they woke us when we didn't need waking. and while they shook us night and day they always revealed themselves beforehand with their ominous rumble. they shook my fear of lightning out of my soul.

in the middle of the night.

2011-06-04T21:36:00.003+12:00

(glass of wine being poured)

I look at the date of the last post. that was a long time ago; from a time when life was 'normal'. I doubt anyone visits anymore other than to post spam. which is fine. i'm writing this for me.

this story has several beginnings.

one beginning was once, when we were doing the dishes. i blogged about it, even. i thought it was a ghost, but in fact it was an earthquake. it was the beginning of the awareness. we got prepared.

another beginning is at school. we still had gas heaters in the classrooms so this was many, many cold moons ago. while folk in europe were being drilled for emergencies of a completely different temperature we, too, were learning to jump under our desk. being prepared for earthquakes. we learnt words like tectonic plates; civil defence; faultlines. we talked about The Big One.

another beginning finds us naked in the dark in the middle of a shaky night, holding our confused children as close as we could manage while we waited for our world to stand still. wind that clock back 30 seconds (2 minutes? several hours?) i was woken by the strangest of noises- 10000 birds in flight, light with freedom, but heavy with the knowledge of what was about to come. the noise then changed from light cacophony to heavy rumble, of the waves water rushing beneath the earth before shock waves themselves arrived. i wondered (where did i find the time?) what this all was. i discovered swiftly.

not two weeks post-birth i leapt from my bed and found my daughter, swaddled in her hammock (no doubt swinging), and ran/glided/crawled to the door frame. pascal searched for calix in his room but couldn't find him- he had been shaken from his bed.

naked, i squatted beneath the doorframe while i watched the ghost of a formerly illuminated lightbulb swing in a wild arc.

naked, i breastfed my hungry child while i waited for the world to stand still.

once still the earth seemed eerily quiet. no sounds of bird nor sea. we waited, not really knowing what for, but waiting seemed like a good idea.

within minutes (hours? years?) doors slammed. cars started and drove off. -is there normally this amount of traffic at this time of the night? i asked pascal. -what time of night is it? he replied. but then (of this i am sure) in the darkness we looked at each other and without even mentioning it we knew why everyone was leaving.

my home by the sea, i love you. i love your balmy air; even your keen easterly embraces me. i admire your strength, your continuity.

tsunami?

oh technology you are a blessed companion in my life. i will forever keep you by my side. my mobile phone will always be charged. but any other tools? what use without electricity! i texted friends locally who knew not the risk for they were without power too. i texted mothers in europe who simply panicked for their children and homes.

as my dad said, it was a panic wasted.

we survived the night, huddled in bed while it rocked and the house continued to shake and roll. we woke in the morning to a perfect, cloudless sky on a still, calm day: earthquake weather.

encore- new beginnings

2010-07-23T08:58:00.003+12:00

it's been a funny old winter, with one thing and another. mostly, though, with being pregnant and having a 2 year old, well, i guess you can figure out that.

i've gazed longingly at my garden through the window, from the couch, and carried on dreaming. i commissioned the chickens to do my work.

and then, in between times, i was asked by our community to write the fortnightly eNewsletter.

i can do that! i thought. and the more i do it the better i become at it; i've become even more passionately involved in my community.

because, you see, the chances of us being self-sufficient here are pretty slim. but we can become more self reliant. and we can make a difference in our community which has a chance of being self sufficient.

so, despite being inactive, on my couch, i have become very active in another sense.

i have engaged.

(i post the newsletter to a blog, check it out- cos it might just inspire you to make a visit sooner!)

and then, one day, while surfing the net, i came across a writing competition. it looked interesting and i felt inspired, so i entered.

well, it wasn't what they were looking for for this competition, but, (not all buts are bad!) the editor loved my piece so much she invited me to write for them!

so check out my first story- you know it, of course, but it's just seeing it somewhere else that's exciting...

so, now, when an editor introduces you like this, well, you kinda have to carry on!

once a week i will be publishing from happyzine.co.nz and, if you're interested in our neighbourhood and what's going on, check out the new brighton project blog.

which means, what with being a full-time mama to two, part time peasant, and trying to fit in being a student (Dip Permaculture) and my paid/volunteer community work, i might not get back here all that often.

sorry about that.

maybe i'll just have to pester pascal into writing eh?

xxx

mama b

hurricane season...

2010-06-09T22:51:00.002+12:00

i'm totally over winter already.

it arrived with a bang and a bucketfull of water last week. with a roar and a hiss. it started with the rain- the rain, that special super penetrating rain that will even soak things claiming to be waterproof. and then we had a frost.

of course, i can't really complain, but i will.

so it's only been here a week, winter, and, well i'm over it! i'm over my lounge looking like a laundry as i' try to get clothes dried inside. i'm over the humidity. and being indoors all day - over that as well!

but, even still. i have it lucky.

my girlfriend sent me an email linking me to photos of a little town in guatemala. a town called solola, where, 5 years ago, her and i were trapped between landslides; with sporadic electricity and barely enough wine and cigarettes to see us through the emergency that was really happening outside our door. quick lessons in spanish taught us lluvia and derumba. while other lessons taught us that cigarettes and wine weren't all that was needed to survive...

but this time solola wasn't so lucky. judging from the pictures, most of the town has succumbed to the pull of sliding mud.

once again, from the comfort of my warm house, with electricity and heating i can thank my lucky stars.

mama b

summer in winter

2010-06-07T12:37:00.000+12:00

it is very confusing writing about summer while the horizontal rain pelts the windows.

it was a very confusing summer.

at the beginning of the summer pascal and tom went for a surf on tom's birthday. mid-november, the sea's temperatures haven't yet caught up with the season so surfing is a brave thing to do.

but this is what men do when they're dedicated surfers.

they made a deal, that, henceforth, the pair of them would make either of their birthdays the first and last surf of the season. pascal's birthday, being in april, was an equally brave commitment.

but april arrived and despite the earth having already tipped on its axis, nobody noticed it wasn't summer any more.

the problem with summer in april is that there are choices to be made- is it too late to consider buying a second pair of jandals?

can i make the last of the suncream last the last of the sunshine?

while march is considered an early easter, usually by an april easter we've already experienced our first frost of the season. but not this year. our first frost wouldn't come for another 2 months!

mama b

Big Surprises

2010-06-05T09:30:00.002+12:00

summer rolled on

march, usually signaling the end being nigh, was quite the opposite: summer had arrived!

and so had nannie.

some time before christmas nannie couteleau emailed me and said -i'd like to come over to visit for calix' bday, but i'd like it to be a surprise...

and so for the whole summer i was charged with a secret!

i'm hopeless at keeping secrets. i had to tell somebody! and so, i told everybody. everybody that is, except pascal and calix. then it became the job of everyone else to guard the secret!!!

one by one i told all our friends. i told all the people at calix' playcentre. i told my midwife. the woman at the supermarket knew. the cat knew.

several times i nearly let the cat out of the bag...

but swiftly managed to recover by changing the subject.

pascal's suspicions were never aroused.

nannie arrived on calix' birthday.

calix and i went to playcentre and pascal (who wasn't working that day) stayed home to cut the lawn.

granny (who is equally useless at keeping secrets) had been charged with the important role of getting nannie from the airport.

she arrived at the house

- i have something in the car for calix, can you help me bring it in? she asked pascal.

and so nannie arrived in the rara republic in time for a party with lots of chocolate cake!

with happy birthday sung in 4 languages.

and suddenly calix embarked on the business of being 2.

mama b

a short hop to the beach

2010-06-02T13:27:00.002+12:00

the summer recovered.

meals were shared in the garden, or at the beach.

nature was being generous & handing out salads left and right.

linda, originally from freiburg, a town that's about 500km from the beach, visited the beach nearly every day. we were all very happy to be so close to the sea.

until one sunday morning.

the phone rings. it's 7am and i mutter something about having a pretty good excuse...

kerry -ah, i don't know if you've heard, there's a tsunami warning; they're evacuating the peninsula.

i guess that's good enough!

in milliseconds i'm up. pascal's at work. i try to gently wake linda and give her the news: pack your bags, we're going on a bit of an adventure. we fill our bags with stuff and put it in the car. by all accounts the forecast wave won't be that big- but i wasn't about to take any chances.

-this sort of thing never happens in my town, linda says, still excited about living at the beach.

we spent the morning at granny and grandad's in town. we went to the market, which was filled with people who would normally be up to sunday business out on the peninsula.

they forecast more than one wave, but by the afternoon we'd all but given up.

round here, a 1m wave surged through the estuary at low tide. it topped walls and jetties. but it didn't do any damage.

luckily

mama b

the summer of love

2010-06-01T14:22:00.001+12:00

with broken heart and heartburn, two residents of the republic mostly moped their way through a cloudy january, not caring to notice one thing or the other...

...until the month's end, when a new visitor brought a suitcase full of sunshine with her.

the clouds lifted a little when linda arrived.

part of the local college's foreign exchange programme, linda wanted to come and stay with a vegetarian kiwi family while she was visiting from germany.

bringing with her the hope of a warm summer (and some german chocolate) she immediately healed calix' broken heart.

every morning calix would get out of bed early to 'help' linda prepare for school- handing her a specially ripened plum to put in with her sandwiches, or a red truck.

he quickly learnt that linda said danke instead of merci and it didn't take long for calix to call out tchus every morning when she left.

smitten.

and when linda's friends came to visit.... we could barely bribe him out of her bedroom with papaya or chocolate!

he wouldn't be the first french man to fall for an older woman.

good things tend to happen when love is in the air... and so the summer recovered sufficiently to bring us plenty of tomatoes,

some nude bicycle riding

and a good bunch of potatoes.

mama b

coming up- more tales of tsunamis and sunshine.

a summer in the shadow of el nino

2010-05-30T20:38:00.003+12:00

i've not stepped foot in my garden for a week.

it's not been any old week either.

for example, this week, the week of the full moon, we had a month's worth of rain in 24 hours.

and then it kept raining.

so i kinda figured, if it can do a month's worth of rain in 24 hours, then maybe i can do a month's worth of blogging.

or, if you like, i could so 6 months worth of blogging in a week.

i'd forgive you for losing faith, for giving up, for buggering off all together even.

i have been a bit slack.

but it's not without cause.

it's like this...

it was one of those summers. we went camping, we had our beautiful traditional kiwi beach fest where we decorated a tree in the camping ground for P. Noel to drop off the goodies. that bit was alright.

sun coming out our ears.

but then we went to marlborough for a bit, the sunshine capital of aotearoa. but would you credit it? it rained. lots.

we came back to the republic to full rain barrels and news of el nino.

el nino, the child, the very naughty, petulant child, who stomps around and cries a lot and generally makes a mess of the summer. not terribly many sunshiny days. the soil doesn't heat up and those veges that require a longhotsummer just become disinterested and don't do what their told.

it's a good thing we didn't choose this summer to invest in solar whatsits cos we'd be disappointed on that front as well.

but, if you're looking for good news all is not lost:

the family in the rara republic is expanding.

i'm not talking about the fertilised eggs we left under our chickens (strange things happened there! but maybe i'll let you in on that story another day)

i'm talking about us.

la famille may-bouffandeau has been blessed.

so, coinciding with the petulant summer was a rather large dose of morning sickness. or rather, mid-afternoon poorliness. i tell you, i wouldn't mind if i was feeling crap first thing. i'm not a morning person, so i could just stay in bed. nothing really lost. the problem with this mid-afternoon nausea is that the morning was the best part of the day!

what a waste!

so while the sun wasn't shining there was a couple of months devoted to lying on the couch feeling very sorry for myself (while secretly having to still feel grateful that i had been blessed in the first place).

the garden wasn't the only place where there wasn't a hell of a lot going on...

horizontal in my couchdom i had uninterrupted views of the floor beneath the dining table and there were times when i thought it would be more simple to plant something than to sweep up after my family.

years and years of being vegetarian, of eating healthily, of prattling on and on about good diet and all of a sudden, here i am, only able to eat white heavily processed bread, pasta, noodles... in fact, i only fancied white things: tofu, almonds (luckily), cheese, yoghurt. nothing acidic. everything gave me indigestion. even water.

but you'll be pleased to know i persevered.

someone had to eat the chocolate!

and now, into my third trimester, we await the arrival of la nina in the spring

but this time we're not talking about a weather pattern.

mama b

ps, seriously, i'm thinking of a week worth of blogging. a month per day, with photos and all sorts. what do you reckon?

Sunny!

2010-01-03T13:42:00.000+13:00

what would a summer be without sunshine?

but a summer without love, could you imagine that either?

meet Sunny Lee, 5 years old. sunny and her mum, sally (who calix called 'mum') have been visiting from england. this was their first big trip to the southern hemisphere, their first beach-side camping christmas and so it's only fair that she was calix' first love.

on arriving at the airport, the boy who was too big to hold his mama's hand, gladly took that of sunny while she led him across the carpark; when he woke in the morning her name was the first he uttered. he laughed at her jokes, burried her with sand, offered her his marmite sandwiches. they bathed together, played together, danced in the sea together.

alas, these summer romances always seem to come to an end with someone jetting off into the sunset... sunny and her mum yesterday caught the plane back to england.

the house is empty and quiet.

calix still asks after his petite amie.

and her mum.

xx
mama b
(not quite planning the wedding, but still looking at hats all the same)

new year, new eggs

2010-01-03T11:54:00.000+13:00

we've got one very clucky hen. she's always clucky. she lays about a dozen eggs and then she'll just stay on the nest and brood.

the other day we went and visited a wildlife park where they have an old farm yard (amongst other things) with a collection of old breeds of chickens (and pigs, horses and goats...) where they advertised fertilised eggs.

and so it is, four little eggs of the silver spangled hamburg variety are now being loved beneath the fluffy black feathers of our ever broody silkie.
we've only got to wait 21 days!
xx

wishing you a very kiwi xmas

2009-12-28T16:56:00.000+13:00

this year the citizens of the rara republic threw tradition out the window.
we celebrated the solstice with wine and food with friends and family( -there was plenty to be celebrated!)
and after the sun set on the longest day it felt like the summer really began. long, warm days, covered in sun-screen and sand. we packed oursleves into the car and traversed the hills to camp out on another beach for a couple of days over xmas. we made decorations and hung them on a nearby tree (so santa knew where to leave the stash, of course!). and, as opposed to 'traditional' christmas images of snowy landscapes, we woke on christmas morning to the sound of surf breaking on the beach... we sat in the shade of the decorated tree while we opened presents and then (after coffee) went to the beach for a bit of a swim and some kite-flying.
we liked this new tradition so much that we're thinking of doing it again next year!
hohoho
xxx

yaourt!!!

2009-12-20T19:37:00.000+13:00

we love papa's yoghurt!

home handyman

2009-12-20T19:34:00.000+13:00

it looks like we could do with a bit of paint here

this'll do nicely

'op, it looks like i may have missed a bit

come dance with me

2009-12-20T19:26:00.000+13:00

after a year of dreaming we're ready to dine and dance outdoors

you are welcome

nor'west

2009-12-09T20:55:00.002+13:00

the hot wind sears the plains as it makes its way to the sea. gusting at over 40km/h it bends trees in its wake.
today is not a good day for a fine hairdo
this morning, while i had other things to do, i was once again in the garden. i could see my beans dancing with the wind; soft ballet coreographed by nature's whimsy... me, i was wandering about, string poking out of my pockets like a true peasant, trying to secure everything to anything in the vain hope that i might save something.
and it's not just the beans that dance. in the wings the apples play their part, swaying somewhat violently with every new gust.

monty's surprise lost 7 apples.

to others, 7 is not necessarily a magic number. it's only significance is that on the scale of this year's harvest it was a part of the majority. and, as far as fables go, it was worth a week's accomodation for a doctor outside of the republic.
when you translate your apples into real terms, it's a whole new story, eh?!

but, busy is as busy was, we were. in the garden. after countless voyages to the beach to get sand i finally got to start laying the bricks that many hands cleaned last week.
inside the house it's painting season again; walls, ceiling, window, trousers and shirts given a fresh coat of paint in the old office in preparation for new guests.

and otherwise, other than the occasional bout of madness brought about by the wind, all is well in the republic.

xx
mama b

rainy days at the beach

2009-12-01T21:06:00.002+13:00

it's raining. it's grey. we're indoors surfing the internet, not out watching waves.
but it's not all bad, the internet is like a giant library without smelly old men looking over your shoulder. and just now the research subject of choice is cheese-making.

i got a book of instructions on cheese making for my birthday a coupla months back and interest has been recently rekindled since we've managed to find a local source of raw milk.

(i say local, but it does come from a town almost 100km from here... but being as we're part of a network of 100 folk i guess it's 1km a piece, so it's not all that bad)

so, local(ish) raw organic milk. just as you remembered it from when you were a kid. when milk came in bottles and was delivered daily to your gate. what happened to that? full fat milk. is the world so fat obsessed that we had to abolish it entirely for the lack of adult-abled choice? or, as my dad suggested, it's just merely the milk companies getting fatter on the proceeds of milk by-products as they ride the trend for lo-fat and deliver lo-quality products.

lo-fat my arse.

so, local(ish) raw organic milk. that, sitting in the bottle, is actually coloured cream. where the cream sat on the top looks almost the colour of butter (admittedly, sick butter; or butter from non-grass-fed-cows..). that p describes, poetically, as unctuous. (you might have to queue your french accent to grasp the thickness of the description of the milk)

and when, mixed with the yoghurt culture, it makes something so devine, so fresh, so, so...
it is so good that i had it without honey.
nude yoghurt.

so, local(ish) raw organic milk. soon to be local(ish) raw oraganic cheese. being as we've just ordered ourselves a thermometer and stuff and, given the right evening with appropriate amounts of wine, and friends, and moon slinking over the horizon, and cultures (not just the yoghurty variety) we should be able to, according to research, go :
voilà! fromage! fabriqué dans la rara republic

xx
mama b
apprentice fromagère
(i'll post photos, but you might just have to come round for a cheese tasting workshop!)

men at work

2009-11-30T12:47:00.000+13:00

between us we managed to clean more than 220 bricks!
of course, we'd have gotten much more done if the grown ups didn't do so much talking...

how does your garden grow...

2009-11-28T11:20:00.000+13:00

what may look like a pile of rubble to others is in fact the beginnings of a paved area for the folk in the rara republic.

many moons ago a plan was sketched out on paper; eyes closed and imagination set sail as we dreamed the winter dream of summer dining, al fresco -grande banquets and little picnics. slowly slowly over the last months we've excavated soil, broken up old concrete paths and moved it into position, ready, to be the base for our bricked outdoor kitchen/dining/lounging/living area.
winter became spring turned to summer and before you know it, november's end was in sight!

how can we celebrate mid-summer without somewhere to dance outside?

so beneath the hottest sun we worked like peasants, digging, smashing, sweating and cursing. we moved a tap from one side of the garden to the other. we raked concrete pieces and rubble and p hired a machine to compact it all. now we are ready for the next phase.

parked on our driveway for some time now is a rather large pile of old bricks. not any old bricks these, they're old dirty bricks. bits of old mortar cling to the side in memory of once was a fireplace or chimney in some other story. old dirty bricks are practically free.
mostly because they need cleaning...
i've had a go, i've probably cleaned about, say, 20. i can see why some people give them away. when it's only 20 you need to clean, it's ok. but 1200? yikes!
luckily we're part of a new community initiative- a timebank, where you work for others in exchange for them working for you elsewhere.

so tomorrow we'll be hosting a working bee.\

a working bee it seems is a particularly kiwi thing. it means inviting good friends and neighbours around to work for you in your home -cleaning bricks, or painting, or gardening, in exchange for love and scones and a cup of tea. and the promise of exchanged labour later on if ever you need it...

and in the second garden, the nurturing garden, all is well. the broad beans, taller than capt c and nearly taller than me, are producing beans faster than we can eat them now. the tomatoes, courgettes, peas, pumpkin, lemontree and potatoes are all beginning to flower. the strawberries ripen to the deepest red and the raspberries aren't far behind. the garlic, planted on the winter solstice, will be pulled on the summer solstice, along with onions and shallots. we have carrots a-plenty which is nice, as we were recently gifted a juicer. (now there is one appliance i've always dreamed of owning, and now i own one i really feel like i have arrived in the kingdom of appliance ownership). however, those little orange gems haven't yet made it to the kitchen as we eat them up straight from the soil (we wipe the soil off on our trousers first!)
we seem to have a happy balance of insectery- pests and predators abound. bees buzz, busy.

and today it is raining.

xx
peasant b
(having the morning off)

beach visits with buddies

2009-11-25T23:20:00.000+13:00

oh go on, you know you want to!

on y va!!!

teeta max!

whilst ripening..

2009-11-25T23:15:00.000+13:00

that one's mine!
as we watch them ripen, we pre-book our strawberries and then it becomes a race...

despite all the work to be done, being spring and all, being folk of many projects, we've still got time for coffee and a bit of contemplation in the garden

gatherer/hunter

2009-11-15T22:26:00.003+13:00

being vegetarian i became fascinated with the idea of gathering wild foods while i was a teenager.

the maori arrived with limited resources but were keen hunters, and the land produced an abundance of fish and birds- but humans cannot live by flesh alone.
they imported kumara, or sweet potato which they cultivated but their fruit and medicine had to be found in the bush. obviously this knowledge took generations to accumulate- without universities or google the knowledge was passed down through story-telling.

this knowing became part of my yearning. bushcraft and survival, selfsufficiency and living 'off the grid' became the basis of my studies.

in classrooms i studied horticulture via modern means; although i served the time honoured method of learning as an apprentice these teachings made me even thirstier.

i wondered -what about plants and peoples in other parts of the world? what about their relationships, their medicines...

i gave a lecture to fellow apprentices on 'native edible plants' and from that moment forward i would always be searching. can i eat that plant? what's its nutitional value? does it carry any medicinal qualities?

finding plants in their native habitat has always delighted me, although i've been satisfied many a time by plants in cultivation. p can tell you a nearly notsofunny story involving a steeperthanitlooks rock and someone who is slightly passionate about orchids and carniverous plants... (photographing it from below and using a digital zoom afterwards is not enough!)

i spent a coupla months living with this greek dude. a former bio-medical engineer and fervent vegan this guy taught me about wild foods. at the time i wasn't so enthusiastic. i was volunteering on his farm as a wwoofer (willing worker on organic farms) for my bed and food and after working for 7 hours i fancied something a little more substantial than a plate of weeds! but he managed to convert me to being vegan (which i continued with for a number of years- until i discovered french cheese, actually) and taught me a thing or two about foraging, about gleaning, and about finding medicine in the plants around me.

i took this knowledge with me.

a few years later, coupled with the rest of my botanical knowledge, it really came in handy.

while traversing the mongolian steppes i soon discovered that there was not a lot on offer for your average vegetarian. i ate snickers because the peanuts had protein, pascal introduced me to chocolate on toast, i could have bought shares in la vache qui rit cheese and ate approximately 250 individual serves of instant chinese noodles.

but one day sheltering under the heavy coat of our mongolian friend during a down-pour i noticed wild onions growing. i pointed them out, our mate shrugged. i noticed thyme growing, creeping across the rocks. not interested, at all. one morning i noticed a field full of mushrooms.
oh the delight!
- my mate told me that if you can peel them, you can eat 'em! i said, knowledgably

this sort of knowledge isn't always sage advice.

we didn't get ill, luckily. it turns out there is no rule for identifying mushrooms other than to know what you're doing. i read my girlfriend's blog the other day and was very interested when she mentioned doing spore prints. i feel the need to investigate further. (have a read of this: http://theroadislife.blogspot.com/2009/10/spore-prints-for-mushroom.html )

and this brings us to this stage in my 21st century tale. mushroom hunting on the internet. aquiring knowledge that would be much better learnt in the field.

i am confident identifying herbs, trees and other miscellanous weeds and taking them home to make meals, tissanes, compost tea, or food for the chooks. but those little champignons that grow on our lawn, in the forest down the road.... aiie.
i guess i need to learn a little more to become a confident hunter of fungi.

xx
mama b

when the farmers come to town

2009-11-12T19:42:00.004+13:00

on one of his first visits to our shores, capt cook left behind some sheep and a couple of rabbits and was 'quite surprised to see how well they'd done for themselves' when he returned.
it is possible to buy our 'local' produce almost anywhere in the world- i've seen enza apples in bangkok, dairylea cheese in a nicaraguan supermarket, and listened to tales of mythical snowy white sheep from a greek wool seller.
word gets around. and of course, word gets exagerated.
what better way to sort it out other than to put on a show.

the agricultural and pastural show

farmers come from far and wide to compete. their wares, the finest cattle, sheep and fowl the country has to offer. rare breeds, some of them, but all of them prized for their ability to perform.

c and i sat on the judges bench, taking a pause. there was a young boy sat there with a special stick that i saw the other farmers prodding their cows with. i asked him if he was competing.
-my dad's the one their with the blahdeblah (the name of the breed; he might as well have said something in mandarin, i'd be just as likely to understand)
he then described to me the things that the judges are looking for. he could quite equally have been describing what he might look for in a girlfriend... his cow (actually, it was a bull) came 6th.
i thought they were all pretty. but then, i am a vegetarian.

we moved on.

we went through the pens, where all the cows with calves, sheep, pigs and poultry were lazing about. munching hay. quite an aroma i tell you. we saw various breeds of chickens, stripey pigs (kunekunes) merino sheep (which were awfully dirty- not at all like the greek bloke described them) and goats. there was also a city farm, an area for the children to go and pat the baby animals.
our c was more interested in watching the girls and jumping off the bales of hay.

finally we went and watched some horses jumping over fences which calix thought was hilarious. then a tractor came to remove the fences before the prizes were awarded- this he thought was even more amusing.

out of our back yard

2009-11-11T18:37:00.002+13:00

we note the change of seasons with the passing of one vege to another.

the red silverbeet wants to set seed, i cut it back daily, fighting nature with the gardener's sword. but as it finishes the broad beans begin: early on in the season you can eat the young broad bean like you might a french bean- sliced, steamed...
my first lot of rocket is rapidly starting to flower. i let it; i want to collect its seed. likewise the coriander. we've already munched our first lot of lettuce that were nursed through the winter under a cloche.
the potatoes and yams pop their heads up, the tomatoes and courgettes have started flowering, and the shallots are setting their flower buds too. the carrots are fattening as are the apples on monty's surprise. the branches of both the olive and the feijoa are filled with flowers, anticipation is high. and, we're still picking lemons (we've been rationing ourselves a bit there- p has plans to make another batch of confit de citron again that will hopefully see us through till next season).

the chickens vary in productivity. cher, of course, gives an egg every day. the silkies, ever broody, spend hours on the nest, but like their silver sisters, are lucky to produce an egg every second day. which is a shame, as we were doing a roaring trade with those precious blue eggs...

we inspected the strawberries again tonight- oh la la. it's going to be a fight with the birds for those! and the raspberries!

i'm still sewing seeds- sorrel, thyme and spaghetti squash more recently, and waiting on others... i surf the internet, obsessed now with seed buying. trying to find rare and heritage seeds that have higher nutrient yield per plant... purple podded red peas, purple moari potatoes, italian broccoli, red and welsh onions, chinese bokchoi...

and i can't turn down any plants either! i came home last week to a bag of sprouted potatoes in a bag on my doorstep- a gift from a neighbour... a chap across the road pops his head over the gate- fancy any cherry tomatoes?, and despite already having 14 plants in 2 different varieties i say yes. and yes to mizuna seedlings, and yes to asparagus seeds, and yes to cabbage seedlings (i can make saukraut!) i've planted my spare courgette and i'm eyeing up a spot for my spare pumpkin too.

not to mention the front lawn!
long has been the debate of vege production on the front lawn. i'm quite keen on digging the lot up and putting in a cereal crop- like quinoa... p reckons it's madness. we've already planted a feijoa and a cherry tree there; i snuck in some cabbages, and it turns out the only place to put the gifted potatoes will be on the front lawn as well... and what about those asparagus p is so keen on?!

it's all very exciting. there is nothing sharing a meal in the garden, in the last of the day's sun, that came from the garden. we look over each other's shoulders at the meals to come.

these are the joys of spring in the republic.
xx
mama b

the perfect bath

2009-11-07T18:39:00.001+13:00

the perfect bath comes after a long day, in the sun, playing sport with your friends. (ok, does drinking cider while playing pétanque qualify for this?)
the perfect bath usually has some things in it to alleviate sunburn, sore muscles, fatigue
for this alone i'd add 1/4 c baking soda, 1/4 c epsom salts, lavender and sandalwood oils, about 5 drops each...
then of course i'd add my 2 favourite men
and put the whole lot in my garden

who needs a bathroom?
xxx
mama b
(squeeky clean)

a revolution in the air

2009-11-07T18:24:00.002+13:00

the night sky was heavy with the aroma of gunpowder, but there was no revolution to be had. at least not this night.
what a strange thing to be celebrating though- some spanish dude trying to blow up the british parliament. good on him, i say. not that i've actually got any political opinions, but why not express yourselves if it means that one hundred odd years later we have the right to ignite fireworks and dress the heavens in gold and silver.
the crowd goes oooh
and aaah
and calix, witnessing his first lot of pyrotechnics was asking two questions:
where's his buddy max?
and was there any more?
who knows what acts of terrorism we'll be celebrating in years to come
xx
mama b
(perhaps one part green, one part anarchist)

waiting for the train

2009-10-28T21:46:00.000+13:00

c and his good friend aramaya.
obviously uptonogood.

xx
mama b

preserves

2009-10-28T21:41:00.000+13:00

what was once a driveway full of poorly performing leeks has made its way towards an afternoon of pickling and now we have to wait, once again until the leeks are ready.
2 weeks, they say.
i've waited months already.
perhaps the tiny piece of soil beside the driveway was not the best position for my winter leeks, but we did try. we parked the car at inconvenient angles for months on end and still they didn't grow. i mounded them up, i observed them. but those lazy-arsed leeks just wouldn't move. i'd almost given up hope when one of my edible garden buddies told me -if you don't pay attention they might bolt!
bolt indeed. these leeks would be the only creatures in the world who didn't fatten through not moving. bolt? bolt! i'd be lucky!
but bolt they did. in their waif-ish way those skinny leeks lept skyward all of a sudden and so i was obliged to pull them out all at once. and being as it's not soup season i had to come up with a cunning plan b.
my pickling and preserving book had a recipe within for leek and cashew pickle.
i assembled the ingredients
i busied myself sterilising jars, chopping leeks and other technical stuff.
i pretty much did everything but read the recipe from beginning to end.

what is it about us humans that we think we can get away with this sort of behaviour?
we have a go at it before we read the instructions and invariably have to refer to them halfway, with some sort of mystery part in the left hand and the screwdriver nowhere to be seen. or in this case, realising that the leeks needed blanching minutes before i was about to put them into the jar.

well, problem is now i've done it. the lids are on and the book says i've gotta wait! 2 weeks. all sorts of things could happen in 2 weeks.

-so just how do you eat these pickles? asks p
-with cheese?
he snorts; he is insulted with this reply.
to his approval the book suggests coupling with pork or beef of some description... great.

i reckon it'll go great with some wine ;)
xxx
mama b

mon château fort et mon bac à sable

2009-10-27T12:05:00.000+13:00

coocoo! regarde moi! j'ai une boite spéciale que mon grandad m'a guardée et papa a decoupé ce trou... maintenant c'est un chateau fort!

mama, un verre s'il te plait pour célébrer!!

a+
c

developing

2009-10-20T12:22:00.003+13:00

do you ever wonder the origin of words?
i'm not talking about from the etymologists view point, i'm talking about from 80-something centimetres, from the prospective of a 19 month old friwi.
our wee man has a series of words that we can understand. take hmmhmm -this we know to mean dog, or chien, depending on who you're talking to. (he's recently shortened this to hmmm) the origin of this word is obvious, as it's the noise a dog makes. likewise mao, bokbok and tweee.
but how does ah-ee mean ouef? when we point out to calix that the correct word for egg is ouef, he then repeats 'ach'.
it took me a while to figure our that 'didit' was voiture, but 'wewo' being velo should have been obvious!
our son, the mini polyglot, has even ventured into translation. his granny insists that cheese is the correct word for momage, that car is the correct word for didit. perhaps calix thinks that maybe it's just granny that uses these words as he always points out things in his language to grandad.
he calls a telephone 'bye', and honey and jam are both 'ma-ees', but there's no mistaking marmite or pain, yaourt or jjjjjjjjjja (chocolate).
he'll happily point out the bain, douche, bottes, couche, and he's ecstatic when you mention going to la plage.

but the greatest joy has been his recent ability to express his gratitude with his own little way of saying merchi.

his little community of friends include a swiwi (swedish kiwi), diwi (german, or deutsch kiwi) a briwi (brazilian kiwi) and i'm not sure how to describe an english-kiwi.
as max points out something to calix 'teeta caca!' he says, calix is happy to repeat it. and little aramaya says 'zu' when he shuts the gate, calix repeats that as well.
our little men, are they the future of united nations peace talks? or a super football team with a language all of their own....

xx
mama b

admiring the greenery

2009-10-16T15:43:00.000+13:00

we welcome spring to the republic, with open arms. we rejoice with the traditional barefooted peasant dance, we drink cider on the terrace until our cheeks glow a rosey red and we picnic on the grass.
from the window, on the chillier days (cos it's still only spring) we watch the buds fatten and burst. the green becomes greener until it's as green as can be.
which is pretty green.
the shade of grass.
or, new leaves.
or aphids.
not bothered with immigration formalities these clandestine insects snuck into the garden and hid amongst my lettuce, disguised themselves on the sage leaves.
obviously these freeloaders haven't read the book on companion planting as they've made a home not 30 cm from my garlic.
so now, i wonder to myself, do i wait for their natural predators to arrive? as nature would have it that's the logical next step. or do i make up some sort of witches potion to kill them all (and disregard nature)? or do i just ask them, politely, to move on (using my best britishpoliceman voice)?

so far, i'm using the zen approach to gardening- that it's their darma to be eaten & that someone else will be along shortly...

in the meantime, we have been blessed with rain. august was unseasonally hot and dry; but what it offered in unseasonal parchiness september countered with its damp and cold: do not pass go, go directly back to winter...
alas, without the spring rain the spectacle would be short lived! but while each droplet was filled with the promise of new life (not in the biblical sense, of course), it also imported certain fungal blooms, known to the gardener as powdery mildew (and silently cursed under the breath).

aiie aiie aiie! already!

quickly i mixed up a teaspoon of baking soda in a litre of water, and sprayed it over the leaves.

nature countered with rain.

i picked some comfrey, nettles and chamomile and set to soak in a bucket with seaweed tea for 2 days. comfrey, stinging nettles and seaweed contain silica, which adhers to the leaves and makes it's difficult for the fungi to spread, the chamomile contains a mild anti-bacterial action... they'll also help fortify the plant's general health...

and it rained some more.

and they forecast more.

so even before my plans for being selfsufficient in the vegetable department have germinated it appears that it is going to be more difficult than i first imagined...
it's not quite a case of counting your chickens before they hatch...

xx
mama b

sorry tales

2009-10-12T21:34:00.003+13:00

nee-naw-nee-naw went the red fire engine.
the siren sounded loud and i turned to see it flash red passed our window. and then again. and then again.
-that was close, remarked a visiting friend. yes, very close. closer inspection via our back window revealed great swathes of black smoke bellowing across the sky.
yikes!
as all good neighbours and naturally curious people do, we were obliged to go and have a closer look.
the three fire engines were parked at viscious angles across the road, hoses transporting water, but not fast enough, to the flames that were belching from the red hot tin roof. men yelled instructions while a crowd watched, mesmorised. i saw a man, not dressed in the traditional firefighters uniform (but wearing soot all the same), helping to move a hose and then give up. he looked to the gods and then to his feet as he walked in sadness away from his home, the flames and the gathering crowd.

this punctuated the week of tsunami warnings, earthquakes and unseasonal snowfalls that left more than just my neighbour a little sad.

all but my neighbour's stories carry the wrath of the earth under their breath...
but, all the same, my neighbour's story needs an audience. it's a story i know i shall learn a little from. it's the story of one man, cold, trying to warm his house against the unseasonal cold front. the story of a man using wet wood in his fire place, a man who couldn't/wouldn't chop the wood smaller, or maybe did, but still decided to use kerosene to get the flames jumping.
and jump they did.
onto his hands. he spilt the kerosene. he ran to the kitchen, dripping the kerosene and flames in his wake. by the time he'd washed his hands and relieved his light burns he turned to see his floor alight.
he fought this fire only to find once extinguished that he could still hear the flames roaring- but not in the fire place.
within minutes that hungry fire, having turned its nose up at the wet wood, had licked, devilishly, the camping equipment stored too closely to the fire, the walls, the ceiling... a fire doesn't wait to taste a wooden house.
dialling 1-1-1 calls the local volunteers, but by that time the sorry tale was already spun.

our week of bagpacking, of warnings and practice runs, of forecast snow but not forecast woe has sent me a couple of lessons on the way.
namely, some times you can't plan for an emergency, but you can be prepared. not necessarily just by knowing where your keys are, or where your passport is, but by simply knowing that your loved ones know that you love them.
and secondly, there are no short cuts. time can not be saved, i am sure of that. it always seems, to me, when i try and do something a little simpler, or quicker, it goes wrong. i break the thing. or it bends, or i spill it. all things are meant to take the length of time they take. not even instant means instant, and anyway, if the opposite of instant is time-consuming, maybe it's actually worth investing the time, if it's worth doing.
and finally, despite everything, shit happens. and it happens to everyone. all the time. and sometimes being the best prepared person in the whole entire world, it might just happen to you as well.

as well as being prepared, we need to just be. now. be happy, be sad, be jubilant, be angry, be jealous, or outraged, or guilty.
but it's better to simply be,
or be simple.
xx
mama b
(trying hard to just live in the here and now)

ingredients

2009-10-03T17:19:00.002+13:00

i'm not sure how long it's been that i've been interested in making things 'from scratch', or how widely known this is, but this year for my birthday i was given a really great series of books on how to make stuff.
cheese, preserves, mosaics and cosmetics amongst other things.
one of the books, 'domestic goddess on a budget' had some great ideas, and the recipes matched the things i had in my cupboard. all that was really missing was some wine and some friends to share it with.
so i invited over some demi-goddesses who brought along some wine and nibbles and prepared to pass an evening together, eating, laughing, drinking and pampering ourselves with homemade cosmetics.
we soaked our hands in hot water while patchouli oil wafted gently towards our noses; i made a honey sugar scrub which we used to really clean and soften our hands. next i whipped up a coconut oil cream (with lavender oil) to moisturise our lovely skin. we nibbled, sipped and gossiped while we applied a honey-yoghurt face mask (with lavender blossoms and banana). and we laughed outrageously while we sat with granny's cold cream all over our face.
the reason we laughed was really because this cold cream was quite unlike granny's traditional cream.
me thinks that granny never tried to convert her recipe back to imperial measures to match the ancient scales (she was probably already using these scales and wasn't confused to start with)
me thinks that also granny hadn't drunk the better part of a bottle of wine before trying to undertake said conversion either!

i put in double the amount of beeswax prescribed....

needless to say, although it wasn't quite as granny intended, it was delicious. after washing it off our faces felt fresh and rejuvenated.

some might think it was a dangerous time to gather, the night before a full moon. but no. we had a great time, discussing all the issues that interest a series of fine women.
and decided to do it again.
before the next full moon.

xx
mama b

the recipes are simple- try it yourself!

honey-sugar scrub:
1T honey, 1/2C sugar, 1/2T lemon juice.
heat honey to liquid add lemon juice & mix; add to sugar and mix well.

coconut oil cream:
1T coconut oil, 1/2T almond oil, 1/2T rosewater, 10 drops of essential oil
combine...

honey-yoghurt mask
1t finely minced lavender blossoms, 1/4C yoghurt, 1/8C mashed banana, 1/8C honey
soak lavender ablossoms in yoghurt for 1hr or more; gently stir in banana; add honey last & stir to incorporate.
wash face & generously apply; leave for 1/2 hr. rinse off with warm water

granny's delicious cold cream
84ml olive oil, 28g beeswax, 28ml rose-water, 10-20 drops of rose essential oil.
put the oil and wax in a double boiler and heat until the wax melts; gently warm the rose-water and pour into the wax-oil mix; remove from heat, add rose oil and stir until it cools.

use the best ingredients you can afford.
pascal made the yoghurt, the honey was local manuka honey, the lavender blossoms from our garden; the wine from our island and the goddesses a delicious blend of local and imported goods.

a practice run

2009-10-01T12:42:00.002+13:00

wednesday morning me and calix dragged our weary heads off the pillow and trundled into the lounge. i was supposed to have organised a picnic for some kids but the weather was looking like we'd have to cancel, again. i turned on the internet to check my mail.
nothing much in my inbox, i flicked to the weather. as i thought- rain.
while i was waiting for the kettle to boil i clicked on stuff- a kiwi news website. the headline reads:
TSUNAMI WARNING
almost similtaneously the phone rings. it's my girlfriend lina. she also lives at the beach, on the beach front. she knows we don't have a telly and so potentially, i don't know the news. -check it out, she says.
an enormous earthquake and subsequent tsunami hit samoa that morning. the wave would arrive on my beach in 2 1/2 hours. enough time for coffee....
i searched further.
they were predicting the wave to be 1m high.
at low tide, this would just be a surge.
at high tide, this would mean a lot of extra water.
i searched further.
the civil defence website suggests staying away from the beach, estuaries and rivermouths. like, pretty much where we live.
i tuned into the radio to try and get some updates. there was an idiot going on about it 'only being 1m, why wasn't anyone out surfing'. obviously this guy didn't live at the beach! i tuned out.
second coffee and time for action. but what do i take? i know pascal and i had spend a whole evening talking about this, but now, well, there was a wave on the way....
i made a pile of clothes for calix; nappies, toiletries and other essentials. i packed the cameras, computer and hard drive into a box. i went to the garage to get my old back pack out of retirement- one more adventure ahead...
i looked around: 1m of water wouldn't destroy our house, necessarily. but a metre of seawater and debri in the garage where all our books are stored would be devastating... and then i looked at the garden: wow, 1m of saltwater would completely take out the vege garden, and leave it that way for some time too. and the chickens? do i take them? and if i take the chickens, do i take the cat????
so in my demi-panic i settled on taking just our digital memories and enough stuff to keep capt c sorted. i shoved it all in the car and headed to my folks', inland two-storey house.
they'd not even seen the news and were quite surprised with my call
-hi, can we come to yours?
-yes, of course. what's up?
-there's a tsunami warning. i'll be there in a bit...

but no one else was preparing themselves.

the wave had arrived in the north island and while they evacuated some low-lying shore front areas the wave was little more than an unexpected hightide. for us.
for the poor folk in samoa it's another story.

strange, though. the things i thought important. obviously we were under no real threat. we weren't expecting a 3m wall of water like in samoa. but the prospect of leaving my home, of having to decide what i would take... well, i'm pleased i've had a good practice now. i know that we're (mostly) prepared.

xx
mama b

when i grow up...

2009-09-22T11:26:00.002+12:00

people always suppose that when i grow up i'll be an accountant, lawyer, astronaut. stuff like that. but what i really want to be is a dancer for a rock n roll band...

sometimes i'm too cool for clothes

2009-09-22T11:23:00.000+12:00

it's not like we're all nudists or anything, but some things can be enhanced by being done nude.
like painting
or going down the slide
or generally just hanging about.

SpRiNg

2009-09-13T22:10:00.002+12:00

out on the bike spring's heavenly scents assault the nostrils, both left and right. apricots and peaches waft past me, subtle and yet sublime. spring. green. and pink.
today was an entirely barefoot day for both me and capt c. we were the both of us in the garden this morning from before breakfast (which was weetbix (for c), if you're interested) even though the ground was still a bit chilly beneath our nonstockinged feet first thing.
we fed the chickens, collected the eggs, ("ai-ee" in calix speak) watered the seedlings in the glasshouse; gave the pirate her biscuits. all business.
if we were living in europe, or in the northern hemisphere, we would be excited about the shades of may-green that acompany spring. this used to please me when i was there, being a may-child and all. but here, in the republic, and on our little peninsula, there aren't that many deciduous trees about to notice it being re-greened.
autumn slinked past. autumn isn't fragrant!
but spring!
oh, those lucious, fresh buds!

of course, the problem with spring is the fact that it's not cold! barefootbicycling at night. which really means that i lost a glove on the way home cos i wasn't wearing it!
but at the end of the longest winter in the world ever i'm not complaining.
(aren't they all the longest???)

we're kinda hoping that our wee man will be nappy free by the end of the summer. already he has enjoyed several afternoons sans couche. his announcements are always mal-timed. 'peepee' he says, afterwards. but, as with other things, he is fascinated with everything that papa and mama do. he mimics our every move- from cleaning teeth to visiting the toilet...

my little man, ever the socialite. we made a new friend the other day; pascal introduced himself, offering his hand. hand extended, calix did likewise.
and tonight, as the night drew on, i noticed c was getting tired. -do you want to go home? i asked, he nodded. and after we had dressed ourselves for the bicyclejourney back to the republic (500m) c went round the room and personally said 'bye-bye' to everyone there (being careful to offer a kiss to the girls).

only half french?

xx
mama b

community barter

2009-09-05T17:16:00.002+12:00

something i've always dreamed of is being self sufficient. it's a little more complicated than just growing a few veges, and while we may be able to have our little urban homestead we will never be fully selfsufficient on 500m2. we can try. we've planned and built a vege garden with fruit trees, we have chickens and we dream of bees. we've small pencil sketches of solar hot water heaters and solar ovens, but we'll never be 'off the grid'. we can't produce milk, nor wheat, nor chocolate!

but we can swap!

our neighbourhood edible garden network has set up a weekly swap-meet for all things edible. the philosophy is if you've produced it, bring it along!
all week i'd been chewing over what i could take along to swap. what have we got in abundance? at the debut to spring we've mostly got hope, but we can't swap that!

but a quick look round and we thought- ok, we've got chickens, we've got a fab lemon tree, i've got some chutney made from last summer's tomatoes that we'll more than likely not use... and so to this weeks swap-meet we took along just that: eggs, lemons, chutney and some heirloom courgette seeds. we returned home with some silverbeet (both cut and plants) some radishes, some rosemary, 2 bottles of homebrew beer, 2 loaves of bread, some sunflower seedlings and some parsley. what a swap! our little blue eggs went down a treat! (we were even asked if we were likely to get any little blue chicks...) we swapped ideas and orders for next time- yoghurt, french bread, seedlings, more lemons and of course, more little blue eggs!

and so it's like this, little by little, that we work towards selfsufficiency. so we can't grow wheat, but we can swap our eggs for some bread.

all that's really left to do is to find someone in our community who grows chocolate!

xx
mama b

attention!

2009-09-03T16:19:00.000+12:00

beware girls, this man will steal your heart

on the move

2009-09-03T16:14:00.000+12:00

bokbok

2009-09-02T22:05:00.003+12:00

if the rara republic was to have a dept of immigration it would have busied itself today stamping pieces of paper and issuing citizenships while the welcoming committee was arranging fanfare and the likes.

this morning the family expanded to include donna summers and the supremes: 4 lavender araucana chickens.

this breed of chicken are of south american origin and have lovely silvery plumes. their eggs, when they are ready, will be sky blue and apparently have little or no cholesterol.

but inside chickensville there was no welcoming committee. there was no fanfare, nor peace love and flowers, or any of the other means you might use to welcome your sisters. there was plain, outright, chicken warfare. oh yes, these lavender lovelies imported their fiery latin temperament.

actually, just one of them did. mrs boss.
or, donna.

their previous guardian told me it wouldn't take long to tell who was boss. and after a brief war and a set of negotiations (handing over of best perch, etc) cher (previous mrs boss) submitted.

pascal and i watched on, a little dismayed for our girls, wondering if we'd done the right thing.

as the girls faught it out cliches ran rich through my head, the girls were simply establishing the pecking order. later on in the evening cher was knocked off her perch. donna rules supreme, and hopefully, by sunset tomorrow a treaty will have been signed and we will be back to our unitednations omlettes by the weekend

xx
mama b

this time last year

2009-09-01T21:51:00.000+12:00

From calix sur le pelouse

bannished to the beach!

2009-08-30T20:12:00.004+12:00

there's recently been an outbreak of measles in our fair city. an outbreak comes about when there is no longer herd immunity... this is what they say. being as we don't consider ourselves to be cattle, we've taken a more natural approach to immunisation.
namely, swapping marmite sandwiches with a measlee at playcentre.
needless to say, we were 'banned', or excluded (if you prefer) from attending playcentre for a period of 14 days; sufficient time, so they say, for us to develop and get over measles. or not.
no worries. we've had plenty of other things to get on with!

nyum!

2009-08-30T20:11:00.000+12:00

c meets some wallabies with granny

spring, in the republic

2009-08-30T20:07:00.000+12:00

the head gardener, always busy....

and the garden; now all we've got to do is wait!

revolutionary road

2009-08-16T09:15:00.002+12:00

this is a case of not judging a book by its cover. or rather, not judging a dvd by its name (or actors, or director)
this is not a film review; other than to say there is no revolutionary action going on in the film of this name.
however, one potential revolutionary wasn't tired last night, so rather than spending hours trying to get the non-sleepy toddler back to sleep we thought we'd try the traditional adult method of falling-asleep-in-front-of-a-film.
except, when it's your first film, your eyes are glued to the screen.
for c, it was all a bit confusing. normally he sees nannie via skype on the computer screen. who were these other people? he pointed to the screen and asked -nannie? no, calix, nannie's sleeping right now.
in one scene the actor turned to leave the room, c waved bye-bye.
another scene, there are four characters around a table. c says -hmmhmm, and sure enough, there are 2 china dogs sat on the shelf behind the main scene.
so it turns out, like his dad, he's not interested in kate winslet either!
it was a shame that for his first film we couldn't have managed something a little better.
(that's what happens when you send me to get the film!)
xx
mama b
(not one of the judges at cannes)

how to make a garden (part 3)

2009-08-13T16:37:00.004+12:00

in the final part of the garden making trilogy i'm going to talk about planting.

plants are what gardening is all about; that, and how you arrange your collection. some people choose to make each plant into an individual specimen, while others make great sweeping brushstrokes of colour. if you're anything like me you've been collecting plants for years. the back of my head is like a filing cabinet of plants seen growing, flowering, rambling. each drawer is divided into seasons and climates, soil types and positions. unfortunately sometimes it seems like someone has nicked the labels off the drawers, but the collection is still there, all the same.

my plant collection is vast- evergreen and deciduous trees, roses, shrubs both flowering and 'not', herbaceous perennials, alpines.... but being as we don't have 3hectares at our disposal in the republic we've settled for anything edible. if we can't eat it, (or if it doesn't fit into the ecosupportsystem) it's not coming in.

the plants you choose will have an immediate effect on the amount of time you spend in your garden. for example, an experienced gardener will spend probably 10 minutes dead-heading (cutting off spent flowers) each rose bush, every fortnight in summer. they're things of beauty, roses, but have you got that time? because without that maintenance your rose will fail to perform. (not to mention pest control; in this instance roses are probably one of the highest maintenance plants to have in a garden) it'll probably still be lovely, but not magnificent, which it deserves to be. if you've not got the time, maybe you could choose another flowering shrub instead, or a perennial.
weeding is also an issue, unless, like me, you expand on the definition of weed (-a weed is a plant that is not in the correct place). many plants that might traditionally be considered weeds in others' gardens are welcome in mine. they might be considered chook food, nursery plants (plants that provide shelter for smaller plants, seedlings for example) or salad items- dandelion is a classic example! personally, i abhor weeding. i'd rather devote a bit of time in the winter to weed prevention by applying heavy layers of mulch.
mulch serves many purposes by suppressing weeds, minimising evaporation, and acting as a bit of insulation against those bitter frosty mornings. mulch feeds the worms, and therefore nourishes your soil as well.
what can i say, i am a lazy bugger. i'd rather spend my time peacefully watering my plants, harvesting them, or simply looking at them!
the last thing i can advise you on before i set you off to design your own dream garden is compost.
if you imagine life in nature at the bottom of the forest floor you'll see right down close to the soil worms, fungi, and all sorts of insects, doing their job at breaking down the 'litter'. the leaves fall, branches too, the odd bird or other forest creature and the disposal team will be busy breaking it down into small elements, carbon, nitrogen, phosphorous; the occassional forest fire will clean up what's left and sweeten the soil, adding also potassium and magnesium. this is the ideal. this is nature providing for itself. habitat.
this could get a wee bit messy in your garden. so we collect our leaves, our grass clippings, our hedge cuttings, the occassional dead bird, some poo (if you've got chickens, otherwise you could add horse or cow poo). add a bit of water, make sure it's well aerated (poke a fork around in it) and then leave it for mother nature to send in her team. provided it reaches the right temperature it should kill all the seeds, germs and nasties and about a year later: voila! the perfect garden tonic. all those lovely nutrients your garden used perviously returned to the soil. things you can add to increase the nutrient levels include comfrey, seaweed, the old ashes from your barbeque. the thing is, you don't want it to be all one thing- grass clippings for example.
our compost system has 3 bins, one that we're adding to, one that's composting, and one that we're using (that's finished composting).

i think that about covers it.

i've enjoyed writing about it as much as i've enjoyed doing it! of course, you're all welcome to come round and have a look and give me your top tips for gardening. (actually, we're hosting the local edible gardens network in a coupla weeks time. bring your sandwiches!)

next time i'll put some piccies, i promise

xx
mama b
ps, progress report on the glasshouse:
p was working hard in the rain today while c and i supervised from the window. we're ready to put the roof on tomorrow, windows in saturday!!! next week i'll be digging and carting soil as fast as i can so then i can sow my seeds! woohoo!

how to make a garden (part 2)

2009-08-12T08:43:00.004+12:00

so we've already asked our garden some questions- climate, aspect, soil type and condition. we can improve the soil type and condition to suit our needs but this will take some time and a lot of effort. we could even work a little on the climate by creating 'heat-sinks' and microclimates as we have in our garden. - in some cases it can be as simple as painting a north facing wall black, or providing a little shelter from a prevailing or cold wind.
but your aspect you're stuck with.
ours is northerly, which down south, is good.

that established, we ask ourselves: who is going to use the garden, and how?

the citizens of the rara republic all have varying needs and desires. as do their guests and other creatures who visit this garden on their daily forage. calix has a little trike and would dearly love somewhere flat to ride it. he's also into moving small parcels of soil around the garden, diggin and raking. so he needs to have a little patch all of his own- somewhere in a little bit of shade, but sunny enough where he can grow something. papa imagines long summer evenings grilling meat in the garden. he also quite fancies the idea of picking fresh veges to make a salad, but he doesn't want to be a slave to the garden. mama wants to garden. after years of gardening for other people this is her chance to plant something other than an annual and be around to see its fruit. she imagines plenty of herbs to make tissanes for her family, sweet organic veges, and plenty of little spots to sit and contemplate. the chickens, as former forest dwellers, need a tree, some shade, a bit of space, some dust and plenty of food and in return they give us eggs and a beautifully blended organic fertilizer.

the next question you need to give a lot of thought is: how much time do i have to spend in my garden? because despite popular belief, there is no such thing as a low maintenance garden, unless you're talking about a piece of concrete.

my mind's eye recalls many images of my mum in the garden. the hairdos vary according to the decade, but she was always on hand and knee, seemingly in prayer. for her, 8 hours a week in the garden was a religion, she did it more frequently than she went to church. but for me, as a child, working in the garden was a chore. it wasn't until i was older, when i appreciated the importance of 'time to think' that i appreciated the dull monotony of gardening. because that's what it seems- weeding, raking, wandering backwards and forwards behind a mower.... for me, now it's zen. i clear my head of clutter and concentrate on the task. and after a very small while i am calm. but wind the clock back several years and i'd be cursing that broom and dreaming of using it like a pony, galloping off with my mates...

once you've catered to everyone's needs, finally you can down to the nitty gritty of pen to paper.
gardens are filled with symbolism, as we use shapes that are found within nature to worship and admire. as gardeners we are all part-time pagans- worshiping the sun, following the seasons; and at the bottom of every garden you'll find at least one faerie (if you look hard enough). as a designer i like putting pen to paper, then crayon or watercolour as i wander the many paths in my mind for inspiration. other people need to see the shape on the land. one method my mum swears by (and my mum is a very able and creative gardener) is laying a garden hose on the ground and moving it about until the bed's shape materialises before your eyes. more often than not, you'll find your garden beds' shapes take the form of the spiral (or a part of it), a powerful symbol repeated constantly in nature and reverred for centuries. or perhaps, if you're a more formal person, you'd like straight lines and sharp angles. or, if you're a bit like me, you like to dip your toes in both ponds and combine all of nature's simple geometry.

when creating a garden bed it's best to not make the bed any deeper than 60cm (a comfortable reach). or, if you can access it from both sides, 120cm. this avoids having to step on the soil and risk damaging the soil structure. of course, if you fancy digging to alleviate the compaction, by all means, make those beds as deep as you fancy! but sometimes, you just can't avoid it. so don't worry so much. your garden is going to be a thing of beauty and sometimes beauty beats practicality in the paper/rock/scissors war of design.

when creating our garden i knew the shapes i wanted to incorporate. my list of specifications were quite stringent. in the area closest the house i wanted to use spirals to symbolise the sea's waves unfolding. it needed to be paved because, as an area of high traffic it needs to stand up to long winter rainy periods, and many dancing summer feet... also, as it's where our outdoor kitchen is going to be, all the culinary herbs of the mediterranean will be growing 'wild', scattered about. in maori culture the spiral, or koru, symbolises newness, birth and development.
in the other half, the 'vege' garden, i wanted to combine the essence of the french potager with the principals of permaculture: 4 raised beds (to allow for crop rotation) alligned for points of the compass (which also represent the elements, earth, fire, air and water) encircled to create a safe and nurturing environment.
we wanted fruit, plenty of it. so the obvious solution was to create espalier, the ancient art of pruning trees to grow along a flat surface. this way we could accomodate our apricot, apples, pear and nectarine.
honouring the wild aspect and wishing to create a whole ecosystem we've chosen species of plants that encourage preditory insects into the garden, letting nature take care of itself.
we've also chosen heirloom vegetables, the seed collected by hand and passed on through the generations.

have i painted the picture yet? have you painted your own?

(please excuse shoddy copy & the fact i can't seem to rotate it!)

xx
humble gardener and mama b

how to make a garden (part 1)

2009-08-11T10:52:00.003+12:00

when you're making a garden the first thing you need to do is to set aside a little time to dream. you need to imagine those long lovely days of summer: sharing your early morning tranquility with the birds, finding a precious piece of midday shade to dine in, sipping drinks at sunset with your friends.... whatever it is you want from your garden it's best you've spent a long time dreaming about it because despite what you might see on the telly, good gardens don't arrive over night. a good garden will continue to evolve over a series of years- centuries even; but a good garden's bones will have been planned before even the first spade cut the soil.

ideally, you need to pass a full set of the seasons in your garden so you can feel exactly how it is, and how it will be, once you create your dream garden. the sun's hasty winter journey across your yard will cast long shadows, and areas that are in full sun in the summer may not see the sun at all for 2 months in the depths of winter.

however, some of us don't have the luxury of a spare year of contemplation.

but before you jump in, boots and all, you need to know a few things about your land- be it a pocket handkerchief or a good kiwi quarter acre.
ask you garden a few questions: what's your soil like? you can make an easy assessment of this by looking at the species of plants that make up your lawn. in our case, i spotted some docks and buttercups growing that told me that that patch would be very wet in the winter. the fact that our grass remained green all summer long despite no watering told me without digging that the water table was very high. (in our neck of the woods, this is a blessing)
soil assessed, you need to see what's growing in your neighbours' gardens. this will let you know what your climate is like. there is no point planting all sorts of tropical whatsitsnames if you're constantly battling thick white frosts every winter morning.
what direction does your garden face? lots of sun? prevailing winds?
these last 3 questions are in fact much more important than the first one of soil type as your soil type can be ammended to suit the things you want to grow.
you can't change the aspect of your garden.

in our case, our garden soil is quite rich, more acidic than alkiline, free-draining, north facing but sheltered from the prevailing easterly wind. it's longer than it is wide. and mostly, it was a blank canvas.

so while i spent a lot of last summer moving that purpular carpet from one patch to the other, i observed how we used the garden. how far did the shade go from the pine tree? was it unbearably hot at midday? (would we need more shade?) where did the sun set? which line did we take while walking from the house to the garage? believe it or not, this is important too, because while you might be prepared to take an extra moment and regard it as recreational, most other people will take that short-cut through your garden, unless you create a firm barrier.

we'd not managed a full set of seasons before we leapt into our garden filled with enthusiasm. from years of gardening i knew how dangerous it was to take this shortcut, but my experience as a designer allowed me to take the plunge anyway. so far, i have no regrets!

in part 2 of how to make a garden i'll share with you how we came up with the plan and our work programme.

xx
gardener b

take one green rectangle

2009-08-10T19:43:00.003+12:00

(counting on my fingers) six, seven, 8, almost nine months ago we moved the republic to its new headquarters. the garden was a neatly clipped green rectangle with a lemon tree, a pine tree, some silverbeet that were busy setting their wildness free and a straggly hypericum.
one of the first things we did, dad and i, when we got the keys to the house, was to rip out the hideous purple and brown 70s carpet and drag it into the garden. i cast evil looks at the loitering nettles and silverbeet and muttered 'i'll be back'.
the next day i was. fork in hand, i made sure those weeds knew who was boss. i then dragged the carpet on top of them to keep them subdued till i could really take care of them.
little by little, though, i peeled the carpet back and stealthily planted tomatoes, lettuce, courgette, corn, yams, and various other salad items.
but while i regarded the garden with one squinting eye i drew plans behind the other, for its magnificent transformation.
p and i spent many an evening discussing le jardin. i had been inspired, long ago, by french garden style in my first visit to paris in the spring: great long lines of pleached aesculus (horse chestnut), and the formality of versaille, along side items of folly. we were both impressed by many of the gardens we visited in the castle district of france- again, these gardens combined the classic formatilty of neatly clipped lines alongside colourfully arranged vegetables, fruit and herbs. these gardens were potager gardening on grand scales.
we wanted our garden to reflect the unique cultural blend of the republic's citizens and its postion by the sea. we also wanted to be nourished by our garden, both physically and spiritually. of course, our garden had to be organic and be as close to the principals of permaculture as we could manage.

for two former nomads (and a future one!) the putting down of roots is a very serious affair.

a list was devised and a plan soon worked itself onto paper, allowing for all of our gardeneering dreams: fruit, vegetables, herbs, a home for our chickens, somewhere to eat ourdoors, somewhere to dream outdoors, somewhere to bathe, to work, to meditate, to relax, to share, to play- to grow.

and now, dear friends, with spring perched, ready to pounce, we think we're nearly ready to welcome her.

i've not taken any photos of work in progress.

but instead, i shall try and paint a picture with a thousand words, and the load some pictures once spring has started to fill some of the gaps.

xx
gardener b

oeuf!!!

2009-07-28T20:47:00.000+12:00

check out our number 1 silkie egg! one little black hen has started to lay.

this is proof that the sun is coming back and reason enough, in my book, to celebrate!

(27 refers to the date, not the 27th egg)

moments in history

2009-07-26T20:41:00.002+12:00

i refer to these moments in plural as that's what they are. they are several moments.
sorry to be so esoteric, i'm actually referring to the construction of the Mediocre Wall.
i'm sure, while the chinese were in the business of building their wall (oh, it's not all that- i've seen it. some of it has fallen down already) they had their bad days. it had nothing to do with marauding mongolians or anything. or at least my wall hasnn't. i'm going to blame the mortar. and then i'll blame the bricks. and then i'm going to blame the poor weather (check out the chinese 'diaries of a wall builder' and i bet you anything you'll see something written the same.)
the thing is, it is actually the fault of the bricks. and the weather. and the mortar mix being too dry. seriously.

i'm building a glasshouse.
fair question- what do concrete blocks have to do with glasshouses? well, we've got some second hand windows which we're going to sit on a wall and make into a glasshouse. obvious? no?
ok. back wall of the garage and that of the neighbours is north facing; i've painted them black and made me a microclimate (get your inspiration here, rolling stones). two walls black, two walls glass-ish. with brick bottoms in a kinda mediocre rendition of a wall.

anyway, it'll have soil over it.

and eventually we'll be able to look back and smile at this occassion- the one when b fancied herself as a brickmason

xx
brickie b

winter sun 2

2009-07-23T20:33:00.000+12:00

winter sun

2009-07-22T12:01:00.000+12:00

c says hi to his buddy

2009-07-21T13:56:00.002+12:00

survival skills

2009-07-19T20:20:00.002+12:00

fear not, last week's earthquake wasn't even enough to make me spill my wine.
it did, however, have "lampshades swinging up to 6 inches" (who has time to measure these things?), so they say. i've no idea, most of our lights are recessed.

but the earthquake people say (the ones who measure them, not make them) it was the second biggest recorded earthquake here; although in a district with an average population of 1 person and 1 sheep (and several million sandflies) per square kilometre it wasn't nearly as devastating as it might have been. they say (the earthquake crew) there are over 17000 earthquakes registered every year in these shaky isles; this is only the second one i've felt since we returned.

it was, however, the first for pascal.

where he's from the land has well and truely settled, it is as old as history remembers. nothing changes except the seasons. there are very large mountains as reminders that it wasn't always thus, but now, it's settled into its somewhat sedentry retirement village.

so, understandably, he erred on the side of 'drama queen' when the earth started her gentle gyrations. it wasn't one of those shocking, violent 'quakes you see in films, more of a seavessel upanddown motion that made me wonder if there was something wrong with me. i heard a strange noise, and saw things moving that shouldn't be- i assumed it was a ghost. until p announced "i'm moving!" at which point i could dispense with theatrics and diagnose an earthquake and get over it. p, drilled in 'earthquake preparedness', instructed us to assemble under a doorway.
and before you could say, oh i wonder where i left my glass of wine, it had finished. as gently as it had begun. but not without leaving subtle traces of doubt.

the remainder of the evening was spent discussing our Earthquake Plan. we asked- how prepared are we? we pondered -could we survive?

the answers were of course and not terribly. but not in that order (the conversation was fuelled by the remainder of the nonspiltwine)
we live by the sea, we have fishing rods, and even though it's winter and our garden seems bare we know how to find wild foods- seaweed, normal 'weeds' and how to prepare them. we have a forest at the end of our street (it's kinda more like a forestette) where we could collect pinecones for fuel because, apparently, burning driftwood releases dioxins into the atmosphere and isn't advised (unless of course you've just left a shipwreck). we know how to collect, clean and store water, we know how to make a solar still, a solar oven, a solar shower...

we made a list of things we'd need to add to our 'list of things': candles, matches, batteries & radio, UHT milk, boiled bottled water (the earthquake folk suggest 3l/person/day)

but heck, how much chocolate do you pack?
if you're planning for a disaster do you include wine?
or coffee?
cos we are talking essentials.
some cheese, a little olive oil, saltpepper. a good book.
and how do i know what i'll want to wear?

these things weren't registered alongside the series of aftershocks that rocked the little mountains in the deep south. the earth, apparently, will continue to reverberate for some time.

[sigh]

mother nature likes to keep us on our toes, eh?

xx
mama b
(mostly prepared)

concept development.

2009-07-13T13:10:00.003+12:00

"teeee nyum" calix says as he indicates to a blackbird foraging for worms amongst leaf litter, thus offering me his first sentence. the brain is making connections; our wee man is developing concepts.
words are arriving fast: weetbix, pain (bread) bot (gumboot), as more connections are made c is able to tell us what he wants. his recognition skills go beyond food, he recognises his best friend (ma' -max) in a photo and last night dragged me into the office to point at the computer and say 'nannie' (i think a skype rendezvous is in order!) at dinner time he announces 'à table!'.
he's happy to repeat anything you say- petit bébé, for example, after meeting his first little baby.
one of his favourite games is pointing to his various body parts: tête, nez, bouche, oreilles, yeux (head, nose, mouth, ears).....

but why limit yourself to just learning french?

calix recognises that chien and dog are both hmmhmm. listening into an english conversation he will just as easily offer hmmhmm or repeat 'dog'. how he learnt this i'm not sure, as p and i only speak to him in french.

soon, no doubt, he will be able to offer us lessons in modern liguistics- what's cool, or what's not hip...

xx
mama b

the optimistic gardener

2009-07-06T20:01:00.002+12:00

while the weather continues to bite, i trawl the internet in search of heirloom vegetable seeds for sowing in anticipation of the summer garden. salads, tomatoes, maori potatoes. all high nutrition food, all frost tender.
in a brief weather interlude this afternoon i busied myself in the garden, making the last of the preparations for our fruit trees: tickle the soil, layer thick newspaper, twigs, seaweed, compost and peastraw and leave the rest of the work to the worms. of course, my seaweed supply ran short so later on we were combing the beach.
today's wintery high tide threw up many luscious species of algae; my marinebiologist friend informs me all of which are edible (although some are better than others). the beach was dressed for a party as the algae lay like pearls spilled from a necklace, like silk torn from a ball dress, or like the great long leathery seamonsters that had landed on the beach, uninvited and spoiled the occassion. today's wintery wind whipped my imagination into a frenzy as i stuffed these ocean gifts into a bag to take home to my garden.
being a gardener not only allows for year round optimism, while carrying out those meanial tasks it demands it gives you time to dream a little.

xx
mama b

impressionism

2009-06-30T21:37:00.002+12:00

"i seenk, een fact, zat ze impressioneests were copeeing ze smaller peeeople. abstract art deeepends from where you are looking." says monsieur c
[translated from the original by mama b]

the brussel sprout bandwagon

2009-06-30T18:51:00.002+12:00

there are some things that aren't so great about winter.
sworn as i am to a locally produced seasonally available diet i sometimes feel my obligations weigh heavier than they should. take, for example, that little green gem of the winter: the brussel sprout.
i was going to grow some this winter -i found the seeds in my seed drawer last week, but i never got round to it. i think it may have been my taste-buds subliminally controlling my brain that stopped it from happening. when i saw the seeds, still sealed in their little packet, all i could come up with was 'oh well', as i filed them to the back of the drawer to forget again next season.
but you know how it is, right?
mmm, boiled brussel sprouts.
oooh, steamed brussel sprouts.
the opportunities seem endless!

but then something happened.

sometimes something so big happens in your life that you have to share it with your friends (i don't know where i would be without blogging!!!) immediately.

friends, republicans, countryfolk: this may be the moment you have been waiting for.

baked brussel sprouts!

oh yes, cut those babies into quarters; swirl about in a small bath of olive oil and balsamic vinegar; toss in some pine nuts and bake them in the oven for 20 minutes. when they're done shave a bit of parmesan over the top and voilà, bob est ton oncle!

now bring me the next person who dares say brussel sprouts are boring! and i'll cut off their ears.
xxx
mama b

things that begin with 2

2009-06-27T21:49:00.000+12:00

we're on to two syllables now.
we don't count words like papa, or mama, or hmmhmm. that's just simple repitition, right?

we're talking about marmite.

for about 96% of the world's population right now, reading this, i can hear a collective 'what?'...

since the day after the beginning of time (tuesday, or thereabouts) the commonwealth countries have been waging a battle based on yeast extracts. for those of you who consider yourselves to be amongst the 96% questions based on WTF are acceptable just now.

in aotearoa we consider our mate, marmite to be far superior to those aussie's vegemite. or the pom's marmite.

and our wee man has confirmed this by expanding his lexicon to include Marmite as his first 2 syllable word. (you may note in several photos on this blog and on our web album that c always seems to be doing his best impersonation of a beardybloke- this is marmite). You either love it, or you hate it. it appears c has formally lodged himself with the former.

and on the second of two subjects concerning 2

this time it does follow one. as in one two. or, un deux.
actually, it should be un deux trois as we introduce all arrivals (ball throwing, emptying of cup of water over head, etc) by way of un deux trois, always with 'a certain tone'.
c has started repeating it. his intonation is correct -slightly nasal. but he hasn't got time for trois. oh no, no 3 hasn't arrived yet in his life. it's all un deux go! and yes, he catches me out, every time...

aiie, the new generation eh? they just have to go and reinvent stuff don't they
xxx
mama b
(i actually fell foul of the water over head thing when c experimented with his first undeux in the bath)

the littlest corsican driver

2009-06-23T19:16:00.003+12:00

in aotearoa you need to be 15 years old before you drive; in the republic we let our citizens get behind the wheel at 15 months!

beepbeep!!

merry matariki!

2009-06-23T19:01:00.002+12:00

the maori refer to a bunch of stars that appear low upon the morning horizon in late may as matariki. in other parts of the world these stars are called pleiades and subaru. down here they're significant as their arrival brings on the new year. in ancient times the maori believed the brighter the stars, the better the harvest. traditionally the period of time between the sighting of matariki and the following new moon was the time to connect with your family, tell tales, feast, and to prepare the garden for the following season.

last week we were busying ourselves in the garden in preparation for matariki. we finished making the raised beds, put in fence posts, dug, moved and raked soil. our garden was readied for the celebrations, for the new moon plantings and the oncoming spring.

in the republic we celebrated many cultures- yule's simple lighting of faerie lights on a tree and leaving little bundles of food for the faeries; we feasted with friends, told tales and shared wine; and on the morning of the shortest day the citizens of the republic busied themselves planting garlic and collecting seaweed.

today is the new moon, the beginning of the new year.

we wish you all good luck, love and happiness a plenty for the next year!

kia ora
xx
mama b
ps. so, it may not come as much of a surprise, but i didn't manage to rise in time to see the matariki. maybe next year, eh.

the comparitive speeds of mother nature

2009-06-19T18:55:00.002+12:00

of course i adore mother nature. i dance the moons, pray the sun, worship the seasons as they pass. i'm a gardener aren't i?
but what i don't get is mother nature's many arms.
today i harvested the carrots. in the name of progress and all that, the carrots were just in the way. so despite the fact that some of them could have done with a wee bit longer in the ground, out they came.
i sowed the seeds, when? (all good gardeners keep a diary) um, let's just say a while ago. the quantity of seeds sewn accounted for thinning (done by my apprentice gardener, calix) and other general losses. but my cunning didn't deal with mother nature.
my cunning didn't need to worry about pestilence or foul weather, mother nature has been kind this carrot growing season (apart from the odd carrot fly, but we won't go into that)
what my cunning didn't allow for was that a while ago, when i sowed the seeds, my wee man adored carrots. he loved carrots. if he could have been a legume, he would have chosen to be a carrot. (or perhaps, if he was going to be a garden pest, his beast of choice would be the carrot fly).
but that was then
now, well, he's kinda over the carrots.
orange is no longer his favourite colour.
so as i pulled out each of these orange, nearly vegetarian treats i was willing mother nature to wave one of her many arms in the direction of my son and then, lo and behold: tonight's rissotto contained a couple of said orange treats and guess who didn't refuse them!

yippee!

xx
mama b

playcentre

2009-06-14T14:41:00.004+12:00

everyone needs to play

c has started going to playcentre twice a week where he learns through creative play. he learns interaction and social skills; he plays in an environment designed for children to learn. so far he's learned the taste of colours, the textural qualities of water, the vibrations of sound...

from the grown up perspecitive we learn that we are not alone. that in fact there are thousands and millions of families going through very similar experiences. we learn that all our toddlers like to climb, poke the cat, throw their food. it's all part of exploring, of development, of growing from a baby into a toddler to a child. we learn how to cope & how to best guide our children's behaviour by teaching them skills that match their age.

playcentre is a parent led co-operative. there are always at least 2 qualified teachers at every play session. children under 2 must be accompanied by a parent or guardian. calix goes twice a week for 3 hours. one session, a 'babies can play' is peopled by folk the same age and height as calix. the other session is 'normal' - children ranging in age from 6 months until just before school age.

the babies can play sessions are quiet and structured. we sing, we dance, we paint and we play. we discuss developing positive relationships between children and caregivers. all the babies leave exhausted.

the normal sessions are comparitively quite intense. no apparent structure, lots of noise and children of all ages. i was a little overwhelmed, especially when a big boy almost immediately came and pulled calix' hair. but c wasn't fased. he looked at him as if to say -now, why would he do that? it didn't take long until calix was at the centre of the game, getting his short self in amongst the action - where he wanted to be.

so my baby is no longer a baby. he's a toddler, fast becoming a boy. he's a happy, well adjusted wee boy who is independant and brave beyond his stature. despite being a little short for his weight, he's content. and he's learning!

points of interest include dogs (hmmm hmmm) cats ( ca - maow) chocolate and girls. he can say mama and papa and ganda (grandad) and has quite an extensive lexicon of his own.

bless him, he makes us very proud!

xx
mama b

the things i like about winter

2009-06-10T20:21:00.002+12:00

the things i like about winter:

crunchy white grass
leaf piles
frozen puddles
snowy white distant mountains
mother nature's bounties: tangerines, feijoas, tamarillos, apples...
soup that always gets better towards the end of the week
wearing big boots for crunching said grass/kicking up leaf piles/cracking icepuddles

winter, it seems, is kinda like revisiting your youth. i was rather pleased to discover the other day that calix' glee was equal to mine when we discovered a gardener's secret stash of autumnal leaves. oh those cripsy brown leaves of all sorts of shapes and sizes- they fly! they tumble! they twirl in the air. they are so much better off redistributed! mother nature never intended we make piles of them, otherwise why would she have come up with wind? in amongst the leaves c discovered an acorn. he asked me, in his special way, what it was.

have you ever not known what an acorn is?

it's not nearly enought to name it an acorn, un gland, because what does this mean?
so we set aside the leaf tossing for a couple of minutes while i explained the significance of the acorn, why it is, its potential. calix regarded my face with seriousness, he listened to every word. then we got back to leaf tumbling because really, that's what it's all about. sometimes you can be too busy pondering the life of an oak and meanwhile all the good leaves have blown away.

xx
mama b
(still learning!)

sou'west

2009-05-23T12:27:00.002+12:00

it's blowing in hard and fast from the south. they say it's not going to ease until monday.
i'm no longer sure what day it is, but monday seems a long long way away.
until then, expect more wind, hail and snow.

when is it going to run out? there has been so much cold wind, hail and rain from the south that you'd expect, by now, that the south would be a giant void. the weather storage warehouse- empty. but hang on, isn't there supposed to be a recession going on? how come the weather factory hasn't reduced its hours?

here it is, not even the end of may, by rights, i shouldn't even be mentioning winter, and yet i am over it already!!!!

xx
mama b
not even dreaming of tropical holidays

CRISP

2009-05-20T21:18:00.002+12:00

we're not talking about a wafer thin piece of english potato snack here. we're talking about the state of our winter.
don't be fooled by p in a t shirt, what we're really looking at is c, rugged up and winter ready for cycling adventures outside of the republic.

cos boy, winter caught the bus and arrived in the republic today.

after days of balmy beach going weather, of sultry nor'westers and barefooted garden follies all of a sudden that busload of winterywhatsits arrived with all its white luggage. it has rained and rained and rained so much that even the english crisp would be soggy. the hills are wearing their snowy white winter coats. and the mountains - well, those southern alps that had spent the whole summer standing there, trying to look inconspicuous, in some sort of mountianconspiracy, are now Mountains. they dominate the horizon in a spectacular and not at all discreet mountainish fashion.

if you were planning any expiditions to the rara republic in the next 5 minutes i would suggest you bring along a set of thermals. or, a rather smart fluffy ensemble that c here is wearing, brought especially from france, by his nannie; from his super-nannie.

despite all our efforts to install lovely passive solar heating (nothing posh, we're talking large, northfacing windows) it only actually makes a difference if the sun is out.

oh well. tis a good thing we've got a lovely great heater and a jolly good set of pinkbats (insulation- neither of which are standard issue round here)

i pity the chickens. poor things. their yard is looking rather slick and with the other citizenry onto winter soup mode the kitchen scraps aren't so plentiful as a month ago. tis a good thing that c has gone off his weetbix!

xxx
mama b
(i've got slippers- bring your own!)

no need for drums

2009-05-19T20:10:00.000+12:00

you've waited long enough- we have too. it's fabulous to see really, to scroll down and look at the other collage and think- heck, is that it?
not every photo has been taken from exactly the same angle- to tell you the truth i was just to imaptient to see the thing myself. but all the images are of the same old bland spaces that were there 6 months ago.

gosh, was it 6 months already?

last night p and i spent our first night in our very own room; i won't elaborate further other than to say it was, well, quiet.

so, ladies and gentlemen, no need for a drum roll (but feel free to open a bottle of something), let me present you with the
(almost) finished article.

all that rests to be done now is several kilometres of skirting boards, architraves and window frames. and the rest of the garden (did i tell you we went and collected 700 bricks today?).
and a little relaxing and loving and learning and growing and nurturing and nourishing and

xx
mama b
(tickled pink)

(room colour nomenlature includes such beauties as astronaut (c's room) summer green and aubergine (living space) passion and effortless (big bedroom)... who'd have thought?

2009-05-17T22:04:00.002+12:00

it's late at night
the house squeaks and sighs

and sleeps

i was hoping to have filled you in on our progess, to have presented you with a delightful collage of updatedness.

but as it turns out, i went on a tour de maison, taking photos to present in said collageryness and bugger me- not one single room is finished.

not
one
single
room

obviously, that drew a swift line under that little excursion into creativity.

so. ho hum. paint under fingernails and in the hair (i know, that excuse is drawing a little thin- it's not grey hair, it's paint!), i think this time we can allow ourselves the opportunity to open a bottle of something:

tomorrow

we shall be moving into

our

own

room

oh yes. we're not completely prepared, but whattheheck. in the spirit of the rest of the house we're going to move in before it's finished. then i shall do some v creative, softfocus photography & give you all a good look round of how it all is.

xxx
mama b

before

2009-05-07T23:01:00.001+12:00

i made this collage with the intention that i would make another, matching collage to go with it. shots taken from the same angle...
well, my intentions are honourable. so tomorrow i'll try and do the same thing again.
obviously, the house hasn't changed so much from the outside, besides the garden. but internally- well, i struggle to make the connections between then and now so i'm not sure how you'll do.

the woman who used to live here came round to collect her mail the other day.
she was shocked.
as i was; she had lived here, with her family, for 8 years.

xxx
mama b

uptonogood

2009-05-01T14:45:00.000+12:00

"what?"

it's hard to believe it wasn't him with a face as innocent as that!

xx
mama b

going up?

2009-05-01T14:29:00.002+12:00

tired of the old word recycling and all that goes along with it?
how about upcycling.
it's my new favourite word. i stumbled upon this term the other day and decided it needed further investigation. according to wiki:

Upcycling is a component of sustainability in which waste materials are used to provide new products. It is generally a reinvestment in the environment. "Upcycling is the practice of taking something that is disposable and transforming it into something of greater use and value."^{[citation needed]} This process allows for the reduction of waste and virgin material use.

The term upcycling was coined by William McDonough and Michael Braungart, authors of Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things.

it turns out it's even better than recycling and it's what we've been doing all along. brilliant.

xx
mama b

what is wrong with the world

2009-04-30T10:05:00.002+12:00

i bought a newspaper the other day.
living without a telly and seldom listening to the radio i quite often miss out on news events. unless they're big and somebody tells me about it. by which stage it is usually an international event.
but not this time.
i went to the supermarket early the other day, thinking i could beat the crowds. unfortunately, the supermarket was having a cheapas tuesday and so there were nearly 100000 people there. (ok, i exaggerate, slightly. there were lots)
subjected to sneaky subliminal ploys of merchandising and stuff, i bought a newspaper cos it was on special.
"swine flu reaches south"
reads the headline. a quick glance at the article and words like global and pandemic pop up.

now, don't call me sceptical but don't you think this is just a little suspicious? the world's economy is in strife and what better way to force it to recover than threatening us with more doom and gloom. quick, go out and buy lots of stuff before it's too late....

anyway, i bought a coupla extra vege plants, some seeds, and extra wine and loo paper.

cos you never know.

xx
mama b

tricot

2009-04-25T11:54:00.002+12:00

we're at it again.

with the impending cold of winter almost upon us thoughts move to wrappingupwarm and great big knitted jerseys. and being as we have nannie (knitter of extraordinary woollen winter items) staying with us, what better way to pass our evenings than to attach ourselves to a set of needles and a ball of wool.

except, you may recall, suffering a severe case of déja vu, i seem to be once again, knitting in foreign languages.

take two idiots (ok, we're not idiots- we do know one end of a knitting needle from the other)
one expert
and a knitting magazine in english....

you see, despite the fact that p is a master translater, fluent in both english and french, this whole knitting business is entirely foreign. and although i know a little about knitting, my knitting experiences are somewhat international. having been taught by my english nanna when i was younger and reprogrammed by an argentinian collegue whilst reading a knitting book in france it is no wonder i have, basically, no bleeding idea.

keep it simple: don't be taking on elaborate aran jumpers or anything.

buy big needles- big progress- big mistakes.

anyway, we do hope, that some time before the end of the winter, we will have knitted ourselves something slightly more significant than a rectangle. (or, un rectangle if you like).

xx
mama b

with nannie

2009-04-17T10:27:00.004+12:00

nannie is on holiday. she came by plane from paris; it took a whole day.

nannie and me have been very busy. we've fed the chickens, played, eaten chocolate, been to the beach and chased a dog and planted a tree.

here's me and nannie. we're watering our cerisier- cherry tree. it's our favourite fruit and it's planted outside my bedroom window. nannie also planted a hedge while mama planted a small forest. the pirate and papa mostly watched.

then, yesterday, while papa was working, we went for a drive over the hill to lyttleton. we visited a cafe. mama had a mocca, nannie un thé and i had a fluffy. they are the best- warm fluffy milk in a grown up cup.

today we're going to the river to collect some rocks.

xx
c

le sport

2009-04-11T17:04:00.002+12:00

men the world over are united by balls.
round balls, oval balls, dimpled balls. of all sizes.
our little man has passed over previous obsessions of vacuum cleaner plugs and hammers and progressed to the more manly ball. his collection consists of a round, green, rubber ball; a small spongy 'basket' ball; a tennis ball; and of course, a rugby ball (- we're not raising our son to be sport biased).
his throws are becoming increasingly coordinated.

can you imagine his glee when he discovered that the pirate also has a penchant for chasing balls?

the little boy and the grown-up cat spent a good half hour in pursuit of the fluffy round tennis ball. c was in charge of throwing and laughing (great, round, belly laughs) while the pirate was in charge of launching elaborate attacks from under the table, giving it a left and a right hook that i think even maradona would have been pleased with the results of.

and after a couple of lessons from his number 1 french nannie (currently taking her vacances with us in the republic) c progressed to kicking the ball about!! given a little encouragement he was pleased to mimick mama on the sideline yelling 'goal' (with his hands up in the air).

you can see where my saturdays are going to end up now, can't you.

xx
mama b
(footballer's mama?)

the post

2009-04-04T15:31:00.003+13:00

i'm not a gambler, me. apart from the occasional splurge on lottery tickets (i would make such a great millionaire!) i don't like to throw my money away on something so intangible. but sometimes you just have to.
i'm talking about like when you post stuff.
when you post stuff it's like buying a lotto ticket. will the item make it to the other end? in one piece? unopened? un-messed with?
it's the only service in the world where it is acceptable to receive a disservice. the prize you win, not millions, is your packet arriving at the other end, unscathed.
we've had several packets recently not turn up. a painting sent to nannie in france, a letter from france and a couple of parcels from germany. the french post, la poste, are notoriously bad. it is accepted in france that if la poste goes on strike while your parcel or letter is 'in circulation', well, that's it. it'll go on a pile untill the grievance is settled and the postal servants get a spare moment to catch up. -get in the queue at the lotto shop, you're just as likely... deutschpost don't really have a reputation, except for the fact that they're german, known for efficiency & like volkswagens, i expect they'll be working forever regardless.
new zealand post, (no longer the post office) well, i don't know. when my parcels didn't arrive from germany. i asked- what has happened to my post? the post office chick replies (with special post office chick accent) -is it track n trace?
-well, no; does that make a difference?
-if it was track n trace we'd be able to trace it. without that we can't do anything.
-so it's lost?
-we don't know that. you may have to make a claim on your insurance.
so how is this? you pay your money to post your stuff, and it's not cheap, and off your parcel goes. you cross your fingers and you never know, it may turn up within the week, or maybe, if you're lucky, within the year.
my girlfriend made me a gift for my bday, back in september she posted it with plenty of time. it didn't arrive. she confessed that there were chocolates inside and maybe the customs folk got it... we waited, and after an acceptable period of time (like mourning), we gave up waiting.
my girlfriend made me another gift. she packed the chocolate and cheekily left a note in the packet for the customs guy "dear customs, if you need to take the chocolate: feel free. but PLEASE forward the box to my dear friend!".
she posted it.
and we waited
and waited
and waited some more for good measure. and then we gave up.
until last week i read an article in the press about a fat lazy arsed post man who hadn't been delivering his post, who had been hording it at his house for months on end.
my girlfriend said -perhaps he scored the swiss chocolate and now he's addicted and searches all packages on the off chance, growing fat.
his post mountain growing like his girth.

but this morning
in my letterbox
was a parcel from germany.
:)

a beautifully made box filled with swiss chocolates and love.

xxx
mama b
(diet starting tomorrow)

ps, there were loads of postfolk about today delivering parcels left and right. and me, woo hoo, i'm off to buy a lotto ticket. just after i finish this chocolate...

....autumn...

2009-04-02T15:57:00.003+13:00

over the fence the gardeners said- there might be a frost tonight. and so the whole city held their breath in anticipation. i fretted for my courgettes, not yet ready to hand them over to the autumn.
but it's a bit of a relief really, autumn. theoretically it means that i won't be watering my garden any more; that maybe, one day soon, my grass will stop growing for an instant.
do you know the other thing i like about autumn?
big jerseys.
after months of shoefree and lightcardis i donned, yesterday. for the first time since november, my boots. i wrapped up in a rollnecked jersey. oh so toasty.

and then spent the whole day sweating.

it was minus2 out at the airport this morning. but here in the republic, between the river and the deep blue sea, it was a bit nippy outdoors this morning. but no frosticles for us!

but just in case i was busying myself this arvo in the garden, bringing in the last of the tomatoes and salads. tut-tutting over the how poor a tomato season it was. the gardeners say- it wasn't a particularly warm february. i didn't notice. the gardeners say- it was a bad year for caterpillars. that i did notice!

so i sorted out the good from the bad, the green from the red while calix, my apprentice gardener sorted the rest- he took individual bites out of individual tomatoes that the caterpillars had spared, he thinned the carrots that weren't quite ready to be thinned, that were thin enough already, he picked up pots and transported them to other parts of the garden and overwatered them and himself while he was at it....

readying ourselves for the wintery wonders, i sewed some silverbeet with the hope of keeping our soups and stews all topped up with iron for the winter.

it's still sunny out, the doors and windows are all open and really, being as i've still got to bring in the corn and the chillies i better pull my finger out.

xx
gardener b

stunt baby

2009-03-30T12:35:00.002+13:00

currently obsessed with anything he can pull- string, scarves, cords- calix was recently sporting two little bruises just below his eyebrow representing the positive and negative prongs from the vacuum-cleaner's plug. a day later he added another bruise to the collection by diving and rolling down the concrete steps. after watching his best buddy tip himself out of his high-chair in the company of his mama and i (he bumped his head and cut his lip with his teeth) i asked myself: do i take care of my son? do i really take good care?
he's a wee boy. and boys, apparently, are prone to climbing, jumping, banging and anything else they can come up with to test the limits of themselves, their environments and their mamas.
[he's just come into the room, towing a length of speaker cable, tried climbing a set of tin trunks which proved too difficult and so now he's settled on the task of dismantling the printer or making an overseas call using the fax machine...]
we do the best we can. that's all we can do; we try and gently reinforce 'that's not for you' while we explain why not- saving the big 'NO' for when it's really necessary. but that's all we can do.
that and kiss better the lumps, bumps, bruises and grazes.
the world is filled with educational toys: bright colourful (mostly plastic) things that have been designed by experts to help our children become better, more intelligent adults. but calix, given the choice, will take the real hammer, or the pot plant, or press the buttons on the stereo instead of the baby computer. what ever the choice, his is, invariably, the most inappropriate.
as i recall, i think i was the same (still am?).
ok, best i be off as he's just managed to haul a set of plugs out of the 'childproof corner'.

is it too early for wine yet?
xx
mama b
(eyes in the back of her head!)

bottling

2009-03-26T08:25:00.002+13:00

i blame the 60s.
while chairman mao was busy revolutionising culture, women worldwide were liberating themselves- burning bras (so the story goes) left and right. once emancipated from their womanly rolls of cooking and cleaning and catering to their families they were free to join workforces and earn money as freely as their fellow men. mao, seeing the rise in potential capital from the two salary families took advantage of our newfound equality to turn us from creators into consumers.
thus ends the very short 'modern history of everything' lesson from me.
actually, it is relevant.
i've just last night finished my second lesson in a two part series of bottling and preserving classes. the lessons were run by a man. an englishman with a welsh name. the class was filled with middle aged ladies (who, amongst other things, quite probably were regretting buring their bras). the teacher, rhys, also ran classes on sustainability and although this subject would logically be a part of those lessons it was not.
so my grey haired team and i chopped and measured. we poured and boiled, sterilised and gossipped and, whilst supervised, were taught how to preserve food grown in our gardens (or those of our neighbours) to give to our families in the colder months.

me, capitalising on the generosity of my neighbour and her heavily laden peach tree, and my love of pickles, i created some (spicy) peach chutney.

so what did i really learn? of course, i learnt the importance of sterilising my bottles. i learnt how to avoid buring myself while doing this. i learnt the names and faces of a few people who live within my city (but not within my community); we also exchanged recipes (but not phone numbers). however, within my community, i have made the classic gardener's exchange- an excess in peaches for a jar of chutney.
these lessons that in the 50s would have been given to us by our mothers, in the home. in our eagerness to be equal we forgot something. we were busy learning new skills previously only known to men.
since calix was born i've traipsed all over the city searching the information and the skills to use within the new home i was creating, how to sew, how to knit, how to bottle and preserve. hopefully he'll be interested and i'll be able to teach him, at home. in the spirit of new feminism i'll teach my son how to be a home-maker.

xx
mama b

the man and his machine

2009-03-24T21:35:00.000+13:00

hats off and raise your glass to the man who worked v hard in restoring the heart rimu floor to its former glory. with a machine that created a violent storm of dust and noise he walked up and down, up and down, patiently peeling back the layers to reveal the beautiful timber beneath.
and the months of work, of dreaming, of demolition, of sweat, blisters and tears came to this: the creation of a new heart for our home.

tis v difficult to photograph, to capture the colours correctly, to reveal the smell and the warmth... the colour (of the walls shown) is called summer green- a crisp, refreshing bluegreen. the facing wall is aubergine. deep, dramatic, purple (that in some lights is chocolate).

anyway, you're just going to have to come and see for yourself!
xx
mama b

2009-03-24T21:00:00.002+13:00

they call it an indian summer; when the sun loiters, its heat lingering, you'd be forgiven for in fact believing it was still summer. until you spot a deciduous tree looking all forlorn. and then you noticed that the sun was buggering off early. the mornings are crisp (but mostly i'm still in bed so this is only a rumour) but once the sun clears the roof tops it's balmy, beach going weather. but better. cos the light is subdued- not the burn you to a crisp intensity of midsummer, but a somewhat gentler, more refined light. filtered.
but we're still so busy!
i said i'd be in the garden by autumn. well, i went out and mowed the cursed lawn, again, today. but that's not what i mean by being in the garden. i dug a hole the day before and that just depressed me.
when we moved in i noticed a bunch of yellow buttercups, ranunculus repens, growing in a patch down the bottom of the garden. and it was, down the bottom. it made sense that they would be there. because these golden treasures like moisture, they tend to hang about where it's wet. my neighbour said- when it's high tide in the winter your garden gets a bit inundated... so i thought, i'll dig me a hole and make a soakaway pit. by alleviating compaction you can sometimes do away with problem wet areas: dig yourself a hole (actually, not just talking about potentially offensive topics, for a change!) usually to at least 1.5m (taking care to support the sides once you get beyond 1.2m) and then put some rocks, rubble and other bits in there. these larger bits tend to create greater spaces between particles and therefore allow water to drain away more freely...
unless you live between a river and the deep blue sea.
i dug 60cm down and got water. i dug another 20 cm and the hole began to fill up to my ankles. i've taken to visiting my hole at various times of the day to see what happens. like at high tide, for example. or low tide.
not a lot.
so, i can still fill my hole up with various rocks and other bits of debris. but really, i need to just come to terms with my watery garden. plant more trees (they'll drink the water & thus lessen the soil's need to percolate so much water). redirect water that may potentially drain there (like capturing the water off the roof before it runs to the bottom of the garden). or make a water feature.

but with a stunt baby who has discovered he is a fish, making a water feature at the bottom of my garden is just plain asking for trouble.

on the rest of the diy front, we've had a bit of a rest. more like resting on laurels. other than hole digging (and mowing lawns and cleaning up after chickens and baking and washing and being a mama) i haven't really done a lot these last coupla days. and i feel awfully naughty.
cos we've still got so much to do!

putting some photos on is one of them!

(usual story)
xx
mama b

run out

2009-03-20T21:03:00.002+13:00

we're within $150 of the budget's end.
you know what this means?

well, i'm not sure either. other than the end maybe isn't so nigh. the important things have been done; kitchen in, insulation & heating done. it just means that we've got to narrow down on the pretty. and the funds for landscaping, well we'll have to search the freecycle pages for our bricks and continue hunting in the hedgerows for our plants. which is ok. cos we were fancying a garden that evolved naturally. but for the finishing details- the 'pretty'- i guess we'll have to wait a bit for them.
but that's not too bad- good things come to those who wait!

i know, i know. i promise to put photos on- next time i'll do a special.

xx
mama b

last of the summer & wine

2009-03-20T20:36:00.002+13:00

well, when we begun we said 'we better have it finished before the end of summer.'

today, this night, being the eve of the summer's end, we ate our first meal prepared from our new kitchen; in the garden.

my kitchen 'triangle' (you know the one- the one that all designers refer to- ergonomics and all that) previously consisted of: a (former) laundry door performing as a kitchen bench in the lounge, the fridge in the office and the sink in the laundry (which is in the bathroom)...

this evening, even though i still had to march small roman miles in search of the ingredients, housed in other parts of our home, my seamless kitchen gave me everything i needed without the need to run a sub4 minute mile.

we ate sweet roasted veges in the garden

and tomorrow, while papa works, we're going to celebrate the end of summer within the community at the family fishing day- where me and c will practice our first day fishing on old rods- that of my grandad's, calix' great-grandad.

xx
mama b
(gone fishin')

milk!

2009-03-20T20:26:00.002+13:00

calix has taken to the bottle like a duck to water. which is nice, cos i was really rather caught up about it. of course, like any breastfeeding mother, i spent a lot of my time wondering whether or not he was getting enough. but with every weigh-in with the local child-health nurse i was reassured that he was following his growth curve and therefore 'getting enough'.
no formula for this baby.
but now, firmly on 2 feet, he is no longer a baby. he is a toddler. and he no longer needs breast milk- he loves his breakfast/lunch/dinner and the boob was just a comfort. to us both.
on his first birthday he was introduced, via a bottle, to cow's milk. it wasn't terribly successful. but with a little perserverance, from both papa and mama, he learned to love the bottle and the grown-up independance that came along with it.
now that he is fully 'weened' he is more than happy to have a bottle of milk alongside me while i have my coffee.
me, i've been gently trying to catch up on caffeine (etc) that i've missed out on on the last year and a half... don't get me wrong, i've not gone without. it's just i've done everything in moderation.
now, somewhat the naughty mama, my days are filled with umpteen cups of coffee and almost as many glasses of wine.
v naughty. indeed.
xx
mama b
(not even wobbly)

COLOUR ME

2009-03-15T19:23:00.002+13:00

we have so much work to do. the new kitchen arrives thursday and before the kitchen arrives we have to have the polish on the floor down for (the tin says 72 hours) at least a day for it to dry and harden. before that we must of course sand and prepare the floor- it's what p is doing just now- the slow rhythmic bang of him poking nails down into the timber fills the neighbourhood. but before we can sand the floor we must finish the painting (i don't want paint being dripped over our new shiny floor).
and that's where we mention colour
oh colour.
i am so happy to see you, colour.
it's like a little reward, the bounty for all the hard work we've put in. colour.

but being as i have yet to do the second wall coat; sand, prime and paint the window frames; sand and polish the floors before , well, tomorrow night, i haven't got time to put any photos on.

all will be revealed in a coupla days!

best i be off!
xx
mama b

shades of orange

2009-03-12T16:40:00.002+13:00

today is definately autumn.
quite frankly i think i've been in denial for a couple of weeks now. - i'm not letting go of my summer. i'm sorry northern hemisphere folk- i just don't know how we're going to work this either.
but the nights are drawing in & often, when calix wakes at 6 am in the morning i try to erge him back to sleep believing it's still the middle of the night.
yesterday's wind blew the leaves from a neighbouring tree, dressed in autumn.
but i've still got so much to do!
i was planning on having the renovations finished by summer's end so i could then put my efforts into the garden.
the kitchen's coming next week. we're frantically sanding and painting and lifting and relaying floors and a zillion other things we need to do before our shiny new cuisine rocks up. today i've ordered knobs and sourced quotes for splashbacks. there are so many details to consider!
but meanwhile, autumn is lurking. i haven't yet seen its vibrant firey hues-yet- so there's life for the summer-girl yet, and beach visits, and chances to finish the inside before we step out... but each day a day closer to equinox, a day closer to the tip on the axis....
and beyond the deep philosophical questions that surround the summer's end what i really want to know is how do i tell when my corn is ready?
xx
mama b

shades of green

2009-03-06T14:56:00.002+13:00

i've been researching quinoa.

"Quinoa was so vital a food for the Incas that it was referred to as chisiiya mama or "mother grain" in the Quechua language. The grain was so sacred that each season the first seed was planted by the Inca king using a golden spade. Today, quinoa is still a staple crop grown by farmers throughout the highlands of Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru. For the people of this region, quinoa is an important source of protein–a protein of such high quality from a nutritional standpoint, that it often takes the place of meat in their diets." (source http://www.seedsofchange.com/enewsletter/issue_38/quinoa.asp )

i've been pouring over internet pages on all things green. on how to save energy in the home, how to grow quinoa, how to make bio-diesel...
so far we're walking the good path- we've replaced a north-facing wall with a set of windows allowing for passive solar heating; we've insulated the walls, the ceiling and under the floors; we've installed instant gas hot water with flow reducer on the shower & with the idea of building a solar hot water system later on (we've saved the ancient hot water cylinder); we've saved nearly every piece of timber from within the house for use later as a bookshelf, as a table, as flooring (and in fact nearly every piece of building material has a secondary use: the old shower tray can be a solar oven, the old bath can be the new outdoor bath, the old kitchen cupboards are now the new shed and garage cupboards); we're designing and installing a water saving system (we could secretly do a water re-use system too); we've built a compost system that takes what the chickens won't; and we've designed a permaculture garden that references ancient french gardens and local maori mythology as a fusion of the essences of our times.

the point of quinoa was ot try and find a nutritious grain with a high yield that would be suitable to replace our front lawn with. apparently, here in aotearoa it is possible to get 2 crops in a season, with 7kg/9m2.

hmm, that's a lot!

so, plans (there's always a plan!) include sometime next winter diggin up the front lawn (who needs a lawn mower) to prepare the space for out super incan garden. watch this space!

xx
mama b

il y a un an

2009-03-05T15:24:00.000+13:00

the time passes by swiftly, summer fading to autumn, slipping to winter, jumping to spring and back again to summer. and thus the master c has experienced his full turn of the seasons ...
and his first birthday.

the night before the big day we left his pressies out in the lounge for him to 'discover' naturally. however, the wee chef preferred to play with the old favourites- forks, chopsticks, anything out of the cupboards... ignoring the toys designed by experts who understand our children.

so our little man, not so little any more, assisted in the picasso-esque self portrait to mark the end of the premiere year and the beginning of the second.

before getting up on his new 'bike'...

things he's mastered this week include: how clothes pegs work (we quite often use them to keep bags of flour and sugar shut); how to get the lid off pens (and draw all over his face); how to climb up on the couch, the stereo and the underneath of the table- in true mountaineering style; and finally, rightfoot, leftfoot: our wee man has taken his first steps (in the right direction). like an extra in a zombie film calix, the future orchestra-conductorchefprofessional climberartistsocialistsocialiteloverfriendhigh-speed- stunt- baby, put his right foot forward first. which in the world of snowboarding means he's goofy... just like his ma and pa.

xxx
mama b (proud as)

[previous reports of him putting his left foot forward first were wrong- it was my left...]

do you remember?

2009-03-01T17:27:00.000+13:00

do you remember this photo here? taken months and months ago (so it seems) and i was telling you to use your imagination- imagine the wall gone, the curtain gone, the loo gone, the end wall cut out and french doors put in?

well, imagine no longer.

ladies and gentlemen

(drum roll) (open champagne/beer/sparkly stuff to toast the builder)

the wall is gone.
the curtain: gone
the loo- recycled.
the end wall cut out (not using the force)
and using a team of medium strength people the french door was lifted into place.

may i present to you:

zee french doors.

man oh man!
north facing winter sun worshipping lovely french doors!!!!

progress, you betcha!
xxx
(muscular) mama b

zee french doors (instalation)

2009-02-27T17:09:00.002+13:00

this man is not using a light sabre (although it would be lots quicker if he did)

da boyz

2009-02-21T22:02:00.001+13:00

oops! i better put this photo here. in fact i should have done it ages ago as this 'room' no longer exists.

the tool room: barricaded, fenced, fortified. blocked off in general to anyone who's under 1m tall.

bathing

2009-02-21T21:56:00.000+13:00

i thought i better show you a picture of something shiny before you totally lost heart. here's our bathroom. in fact it's progressed a little since then as the plumber has visited again.
we now have a dual function shower connected. (one all round slow relaxing shower and another really intense massaging shower that you really need to pay attention to otherwise you'll end up in a puddle on the floor)
the electrician has been again so we have special lighting and the boiler is properly wired so we can close the window.
we even have heating in the bathroom!
and as for the other half of the house,
the heart
well, it's changin faster than you can almost document it! (this means i'll post photos later)

and do you remember the tooth in transit that we mentioned earlier?

well it popped last night.

xxx
mama b (looking forward to a good night's sleep)

the dump

2009-02-20T12:16:00.002+13:00

i am a squirrel.
i am a squirrel-like magpie.
i am a squirrel-like magpie with womble tendencies.

yesterday we went to the dump. it wasn't the dump of old: the giant landfill crawling with dozers and screaming seagulls circling, where you were free to forage. it was the dump of new, the eco-depot- i giant concrete building where everyone neatly backed up their trailers to the edge to tip their excesses into a hole which the dozer quickly whisked away. the sorting and foraging is no longer done by me and you, it's done by a team of people who decide if it's useful or not and then send it off to the shed.
the shed is a really great shop where you can buy other peoples rubbish (little treasures) for 50c or so and use it to make other stuff with...
so the dump has lost its essence of freedom, of gleaning, of making good use of the things that you find... but it's now taking better care of our earth.

(but it still smells the same)

xx
mama b
(fosicker extraordinaire)