ozcountryquiltingmum

Mother Nature knows.

After a very wet winter our days have changed overnight. Paddocks that were sodden a week ago have now dried out enough so that the shiny new red tractor yesterday sowed it's first crop of wheat. This is months later than optimum but hopefully should still work out. There is a light sense of trepidation about this sunshine though, last year it stopped raining on the 8th September and never rained again until January, we certainly aren't locking in any forward contracts!

And with the change in weather I have noticed something else happening as well.

My hands, that have really only wanted to sew for months are turning a distinct shade of green. My poor garden is calling to me. That is the same garden that I abandoned about last November when it had forgotten to rain here and sharing the tank water really wasn't an option. So I just turned my back and tried not to think about it. Well, apparently it is not holding that against me because calling it is.

And I think the main call is "Help!

-as evidenced in this picture.

....and this picture.

...and this picture.

And this, of course, is my rock garden.......just kidding, this is really a pile of stones DH made when he rescued this paddock for cropping. Archie and I visited there on our walk this morning. (1 kg down in the week, 4-8 to go!) It stinks of foxes, Archie loved it!

The sad thing is that in 2000 BQ (that's Before Quilting -for the uninitiated) I actually fancied myself as a future gardener. The garden was getting bigger instead of smaller, I had put all of this in pregnant with my boy and a gardening farming wife I was going to be!

Then I heard about this quilting group and dug out the eyespy pack I had bought in the first flush of nesting after having my girl...... and the rest, as they say, is history

.....the garden did not get bigger, water loving plants passed on to be replaced by their overgrown neighbor or another rosemary bush (because I can really grow them...and they only involve breaking off a bit and pushing it in the ground!) and weeding became an activity that occurred when I was planning entertaining in the garden rather than a regular occurence.

Well, in the last few days those weeds have pulled at me and I have started pulling at them. These photos of my recent lack of interest are posted as evidence that will hopefully motivate me to post the tidy versions very shortly. The thing is that I have a slight suspicion that I may not be the only one who has this confession to make about their garden!!!!

I actually took time to smell the flowers when I took these photos, so I thought I would share what I found.....

This little fellow and his large array of mates decided that I was better ignored. I can, of course, be stung any day but I think they realise that when I start tidying up, these rosemary bushes are usually the first to get the trim, so they were madly making the most of the sunshine and the flowers.

They are not the only ones finally getting to work........

Now you would think when a chook has 2000 acres in which to lay and a multitude of nests, she wouldn't choose the round bale feeder that frequently enters and exits the shed? Well, you would be wrong! I am just pleased though, that they have remembered to lay, the eggs appeared with the sunshine!

And finally, while still on the gardening theme, I need some advice. As well as being able to prune a rose in the time it takes blogger to upload a photo today, this rose is also asking for some attention, picture isn't great but you've seen the roses before. The bias binding is done and ready to be stitched down, the roses are "in the ditched" around the 4, but it needs something in the white, to make it sit properly and to take away the crazy quilt look from the free piecing. Comments most appreciated, tracey