Jam

 I bought a tiny little cumquat tree from Bunnings last year, and it kept insisting on setting fruit so I finally gave up pulling them off. And it gave me enough for 4 small jars of jam! 

The rosella is finally fruiting, and doesn't seem to be stopping! The guineas have really been enjoying rosella leaves so I've started cutting off the lower branches for them. 

The cumquat jam was no problem to make, and is the perfect texture, I'm not really sure I like it though so I might not make it again. This is the recipe I used.

The rosella jam however, I burnt the first two batches. First thing I noted for next time was to let it settle longer before putting it in the jar as it turns out it was very frothy and needed to be skimmed. Second is to add the extra water to the seeds next time as it has ended up very thick. Last time I made it I did not have this much trouble, I'm blaming the stove in this house! If you'd like to make some, I used this recipe - that site is also a great place to buy seeds.

Duck romper to dress

 Last year I made Lily a rubber ducky romper that still wasn't long enough with the extra inch added. Since she loves it so much, I chopped off the legs and added a ruffle at the bottom to turn into a dress. Added bonus was turning the legs into boot covers!

It turned out pretty cute, now to see if I get anymore rompers converted before she outgrows them width wise!

Tidy pump area

 Once of the first things we changed about our house was getting the downpipes for our house tank converted to the underground sort - we were very sick of hitting our heads. I also asked for another tap (there was only one outside tap on this house?!) which meant another pump and outdoor powerpoint.

It has been great saving our heads, but it was a mess from all the earthworks - and bare clay is the worst especially near a tap. So I finally fixed it...

Added bonus that I used random free bricks and the rocks I'm trying to clear from the weed garden around the other tank (which are covering old carpet... worst idea ever!)

Eventually I'll add a hose reel, and decide on a better solution for the power box. Long term I'm hoping to get dichondra covering the whole area rather than sugar cane mulch. It has started creeping through some of my first mulched areas and is already throughout the whole property. 

And right where I'm standing to take this photo are two offcuts from a small rainwater tank that our neighbour gave me! I'm really happy with how my garden is starting to look - I should really take some photos of the whole area to share with you.

Rock tumbler

 We have a lot of petrified wood on our property (and with a toddler I'm sure you can imagine our rock collection was getting rather large) so Ray got me a rock tumbler for Christmas.

It has been fun, we started with the rocks that came in the kit, but more exciting was seeing how the petrified wood turned out, especially the pieces that have quartz through them.

You'll have to excuse the terrible before photos, I wasn't planning to post them on here, but it interests many people more than I realised so I thought I would share here as well.

It is definitely a hobby that requires patience, there are five steps and it takes around one month to complete. A separate garage is also a positive so you don't have to listen to rocks tumbling constantly!