If you know me on Facebook you will have seen all of these pictures but I just have to share here too ;)

 

We were out on a drive on the weekend when we came across a beautiful little barn owl who was caught in a barb on a fence :(

We found him like this.

 

 

 

It was about nine in the morning when we found him so I imagine he must have been there like that for quite a while.

Heartbreaking.

I had my mum with me luckily, so we were able to free him (wouldn't have been able to do it alone), and then wrapped him up in a quilt from the car.

 

 

We then went on a long mission, which felt like a wild goose chase, to find a Wild Life Carer who could help him. His wing was damaged, he was unable to fly.

Such a beautiful creature, we all fell in love with him.

I think he was just so exhausted, so calm he was, just letting us wrap him up and nurse him.

 

 

Eventually we made it home to follow up more leads

 for a carer, make more phone calls.

Meanwhile, Ruby found him the perfect spot

 to recuperate...........in her vintage dolls pram.

 

 

He could not have been happier.

We all wanted to keep him.

Eventually we got in touch with a lovely lady with

the knowledge and the environment that was best for him.

Ruby had named him Fluffy Bob.

We drove nearly an  hour to take him to his new carer, and the next day when I called to check on him, she told me he was on his way to a Raptor Sanctuary (another couple of hours travel for him) to have his broken wing pinned.

 

Good luck Fluffy Bob, and safe flying.

I love a good country show.

 If you've never been to one, it looks a little bit like this...

 

loads of fantastic art from local school kids.

 

 

 

Top notch ginger beer brewed by locals, competing for glory in the home brew stakes.

Flowers.

Lots of.

Fenced in for their protection.

 

 

Insect displays, put together by the local high school students.

Baked goods.

Award winning baked goodies.

Butters, jams, chutneys.

Relish.

Blue skies.

 

Your child may or may not hand pick exactly which goat

they would like to take home.

Mine did. We didn't.

 

Tractors.

Big ones.

 

No words needed here.

 

 

Champion ducks.

 

 

 

Random eggs.

Competition eggs.

And things that kind of make you wonder what other people are all about?

I am re-aquainting myself with my camera

 (rather than my phone camera) by taking 'bad' shots that make me happy.

If there's one thing I've learnt over the past few years it's

 that the photos I love the most are usually the ones that fail

 all technical requirements of a 'good' image :)

 

 

Ruby is training for the Weetbix kids TRYathlon.

 

 Our local pool was wiped out with the floods on January 26th, today was the first time she's been back in a pool (this is not our town pool, we travelled to the next town along for this) since then.

 

The swimming was a little rusty but I know she'll have it nailed in no time.

It's been a while between swims.

 Just some spots around the house.

This one just inside the front door.

It's ever changing.

 

My kewpies.

They've been with me forever.

 

One of my favourite pictures, ever.

{this is a canvas print hanging on my wall, I took this photo of it late

 at night with my phone. should be ashamed of myself I suppose}

I probably took the legs shot about four and a half years ago.

 The kids were playing dress-ups and then got up to dance on the table.

I love it more every time I look at it.

 

 

One of our little spots where an abundance of things sit,

 waiting for little hands to come and use them.

 

 

Back to the front door where we popped a bunny
 under the cloche for Easter,

 a pumpkin carrying felted lady for Autumn,
 and a beautiful smelling candle

 because we love to spoil ourselves
 and be able to smell it
 when we first walk in the door.

 

 

I started making my own face moisturiser a month or so ago and thought I'd share the love with you. Because it's pretty nice really.

 

I am a lover of natural things on my skin (and pretty well everywhere else but for the purpose of this post I'll stick with skin).

Unfortunately, as with many things which are much better for us than their synthetic, toxic counterparts, the natural option often comes with a higher price tag (and often isn't as pure as what the marketer of the product might have us believe).
 

In my ongoing quest for simplicity (I feel like I really parrot that word sometimes, but there are days when that one word is my mantra, so yeah, I use it a lot), and belt-tighening, money-saving, tight-assedness, I bring you homemade, smells utterly divine, good for you, way cheaper than boutique organic face creams, FACECREAM.
 

You're gonna love it.

 

you need:one cup of shea butter

                 two tablespoons of apricot oil

                 two tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil

                 one teaspoon of vitamin E oil

                 half a cup of coconut oil  
 

 

side note: I have noticed that extra virgin olive oil is often abbreviated to EVOO but I decided not to abbreviate here because, seriously, the first time I ever saw that abbreviation I was stumped for......way longer than I should have been. "EVOO", I wondered,"What IS that? hmmmmm"

 

come on..........I CANNOT be the only one.

 

Anyway.

Put it all in a bowl (preferably stainless steel) and whip it up! It will take a few minutes, I used a freestanding mixer and I'd say it took a good five minutes to whip up. Let it whip away, it practically goes fluffy.
 

The first batch I made the coconut oil was solid when I put it in, the second batch it was in liquid form (much warmer that day obviously)  and I did wonder how it would go but it was fine. Once it got whipping, no difference at all.

 

This makes a massive amount of facecream, in fact you could easily halve or even quarter that recipe above.

At first I thought it was too greasy and reserved it for night use only, but I have been using it for whenever just this last week. You need only the tiniest amount. I still find it greasy at first, but for me it soaks in within about half an hour or so which works fine if I'm not having to shoot out the door first thing in the morning.

I guess it may not be for everyone, but I love it, and it's gonna save me a ton of money.

 

 

The first batch I made went into pretty little jars and was shared. The second batch went into whatever I had on hand. Old moisturiser jars, vanilla bean paste jars, jam jars, plus some little pots (downside with them is that they're plastic) I bought ages ago from the crafty section at the $2 shop. Those little ones have proved to be really handy for travelling.

 

 

Happy Easter everyone. I'm away at the beach for a few days, hope to be back blogging soon :)

 Despite the fact that I have, ah, about zero time to ever sit down and read,

 I remain a die hard book junkie.

At one stage last year I thought maybe the Kindle

 would work for me................but no.

 Not at all.

I need my book to be a book. Exactly.

This is what's on offer at the moment.

"Dinner A Love Story"  I've had a while, purchasing after I stumbled upon this blog one night.

The idea of a family with two young children and two working parents who are able to put nutritious home-made meals on the table every single night (with enthusiasm, no less) intrigued me beyond  belief.

As with most of my books, especially cook books, I go back and forth to it, taking snippets from it here and there. A good book to remind you of the importance of eating together, the importance of food and family.

"Screen Doors and Sweet Tea" was a Christmas gift, and feeds my fascination with Southern culture.

"Healthy Bread in Five Minutes a Day" I have had for a good two years and never made a single loaf of bread. But there's only so many years of your life you can bare the absolute rubbish that is supermarket bread, and I think the time has come. The master recipe requires Vital Wheat Gluten which, for the life of me I could only find online (seriously, if you can get that stuff at  the local IGA I'll be so embarassed that I went and purchased online) so I await the arrival of that after which I plan to tackle to my first loaf.

Will keep you posted.