Letters from Wetville

Raelene and I have been discussing the fate of her eldest chooks for the last few months. Much as I would have liked all those old bones for making stock, my killer and plucker was just too busy. So today someone else killed ten of her oldest birds and put them in a couple of large feed bags. I collected them and buried them throughout my garden. As I was burying number nine, it occurred to me that I could have cut off the feet, or feet and heads, for stock quite easily and then buried the rest. So I might try that next time. Meanwhile, I'm expecting some bonza growth from my burial ground gardens come spring. I also spent a bit of time tending my live chooks. I pulled all of the peastraw/chook poo out of the coop and spread it around my rhubarb. Then I tipped a big bag of wood shavings into the coop. Yesterday I also squeezed in a little garden time. I weeded around my hydrangea cuttings which have taken nicely. I noticed that some of my rose cuttings have new growth on...

Hello Garden. I thought I'd write you a letter, seeing as I spend so little time touching you lately. I haven't forgotten you, in fact I think of you every day. I watched you and planned for your next shapes through the rain, through the miasma of suspected croup, suspected impetigo, suspected chest infection, definite hail and now I watch you as I feed the chooks and think of you as I seem to cram in everything else which was neglected and yet still neglect you, my favourite. You are still so generous. I've dug potatoes, cut broccoli, picked stalks and sprigs of celery, kale, thyme, rosemary, bay leaves and chives throughout the week. I dug yams and realised I must slow down and be patient. It must be winter proper, not winter early, before I harvest the yams. We had a frost yesterday - Favourite Handyman found the water sitting atop the chicken coop and the trampoline frozen. The vista of bright orange chillis nestled in amongst the celery and the kale that mornin...

It is not the cold or (at least initially not) the wet of winter which grinds me down. It is not the slower pace in the garden or the short days of light. What grinds me down is the slow and incremental loss of control over my family life, my household responsibilities which comes with a lurgy which never quite disappears. Not for days and so far this time we are now on weeks. Every winter. Missed days of work for myself, days of carrying on to save my sick days for the inevitable of sick children. Days of soup and recuperation followed by days of that little bit too much done during the day and no energy left for cooking. Bought dinner, dishes not yet done, a sleep in on a busy work morning leading to yet more bought food. A determination to continue as normal leading to some achievements and still fatigue at the end meaning a household of grime, dust, scary kitchen, overdue library books. It will come right but I'll admit to considerable impatience for it to do so. I'm aw...

Im sure there are readers out there who know the answers to these questions (e.g. Sharon, Nova, Gill?). 1. I have recently been given a lovely wool jersey, man size. It is made from homespun wool and handknitted. The wool was from my friend's parents' sheep and it was his Mum and her friends who did the spinning and the knitting. He doesn't wear the jersey and would I find a use for it? Yes. Only I need to change the collar from the high round scratchy one to something more open, and given I want to wear it out in the cold when I'm gardening and tramping, I want to change it to a more practical colour than white. I would like suggestions on how to dye this jersey and also on the best way to change the neck to something more comfortable. No, more than that. I would love any suggestions on this.

I've been reading my history books this weekend, looking at the 1930s depression and the 1951 watersiders' strike. There are indeed blessings to being too poorly to get out of bed much. On Saturday I read a historical novel called Union Belle by Deborah Challinor. The romance part of it was pretty trite - bored housewife falls for handsome new bloke to town, handsome bloke has no scruples at all about chasing and screwing his mate's wife. So much for solidarity. But the context of the miners supporting the watersiders and the endless perhaps crazy battles between the big union guys and the government, well that got me looking for a bit more information from the non-fiction history books. The other aspect of the novel which struck me was how the men kept on going to the pub through weeks and weeks of strike. Had they no shame? There might be blogs aplenty out there talking up the old days when people had all these wonderful do it yourself skills, but it seemed to me ...

It's been a shade frantic around here since we found what we thought was impetigo on Fionn's legs. Amidst his tears of sadness at the prospect of missing school, a birthday party and league practice, I managed to get him into the doctor's first thing this morning. Locum. I am getting way too much experience of locum doctors being mad or bad. Mostly bad. Good news was that it wasn't impetigo, the dreaded highly contagious school sores which would have meant quarantine at home. The bad news from my point of view was that the doctor related badly to both of us, wouldn't answer my questions properly, claimed that his legs had bites on them from unnamed general household 'things', that I should clean the house more, and prescribed a corticosteroid/antibacterial cream without any guidance on how often or long to use it for. We saw Dr Locum at the surgery. Yes I do need to clean my house more. Those marks on his legs are definitely NOT bites. Actually given ...

1. Finely chop one large clove of garlic, and the same amount of ginger. Then add a heaped teaspoon of raw honey and a tablespoon of plain yoghurt. Mix together then spoon into your mouth. 2. Warm house. After Fionn's scary asthma bout just before Christmas, I have lost the drive to minimise wood consumption. The fire is currently burning every evening and sometimes during the day as well. If you live in the UK, you would still think our house is cold during the day. if you are a traditional New Zealander with a hot lounge and cold bedrooms, you would think our bedroom is lovely and warm. Our insulation efforts each year keep paying off in terms of reduced heat loss. The kitchen (blocked off after dinner) is the only room without pink batts. In Spring, we will get pink batts for the kitchen and then start saving for underfloor insulation. I think there is more curtain work to be done yet also. The lounge and the bedrooms all have heavy duty blackout lining to add to th...