Archive | Birds

A Lourie in the Garden

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Lourie

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Lourie6

Jen was working on her English essays this afternoon and I was sitting with her, I looked out the window at the bird feeder and noticed a Weaver scouting around for food. I hadn’t filled the feeder for a while so I brought some seed and a few cut up apples and soon he was back eating happily. Then a huge Lourie arrived, it was quite funny watching him try to navigate his rather large body into a comfortable position on this tiny bird feeder. Eventually he was able to balance and then got stuck into the apple halves. I love putting out food and waiting to see who will swoop in and visit for a while. The other night, I was outside at dusk and an owl flew silently over, I feel so privileged and lucky to have seen him…

Happy weekend.

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Cooking Outside with a “Hay Box”

Bird Feeder

Black Collared Barbet

Some visitors came and ate lunch at the bird-feeders today, this is a Black Collared Barbet.

Crested Barbet

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 Crested Barbet

Hay Box

 

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Jen, Caiden and Erin cooked dinner outside today, the exciting part was that Jen showed us how to use a “Hay Box” to cook the rice. She learnt about it at scouts on one of her camps. All you need is a box, a black box would be better as it attracts and traps heat from the sun but we worked with what we had and it worked just fine. A good time to start would be when the sun is high in the sky, midday.

Line the base of the box with a thick blanket, then add newspaper so that it will surround and cover the pot once it’s placed in the box and then another blanket is placed on top of the newspaper which is covering and surrounding the pot.

First boil the water in a pot on the stove, once the water is boiling, add rice and take your boiling pot outside and place it inside the newspaper in the hay box. Really surround the pot with plenty of newspaper and do it quickly so that not too much heat is lost. Then cover everything with a thick blanket so that it’s nice and snug.

Hay Box2

Hay Box3

Close the lid tight and leave the box in direct sunlight. On a hot day, it should  cook within a few hours. Check on the rice once or twice, not too often, as the heat will escape.

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Jen and Kye repositioning the box into direct sunlight later this afternoon.

Cooked Rice

When she opened the box after approx 3 hours, there was plenty of condensation, heat and the rice was cooked.

Caiden

Caiden preparing the veggies for the stew that he is going to cook.

Potjie Pot

Potjie pot and stand.

Box Fire

Box firewood for cooking.

(PS Erin and Jen decorated their white sneakers with fabric Sharpie pens, I’ll post about that soon).

Veggies

Stew

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A lovely stew with rice has been made for dinner, I can’t wait to try it tonight! What a wonderful afternoon spent outside!

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New

Photos taken by Jen.

Our hand reared doves have a new little family. We rescued the parents a while ago, we found the male first when he was still young and the female joined us a few months later. Such sweet little ones…

Our dear Delilah has doubled in size and is so sweet indeed, she follows us around the garden, running after us as we walk.

Also spying out Robin our Cockatiel, hmmm, we’ll have to watch this one:)

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Knitting, Chickens and Green…

I have really been enjoying knitting on my Color Affection shawl, it’s almost finished and so exceptionally soft! I wasn’t sure about knitting with brushed kid mohair but I’m very happy I did. The feel is comforting and cozy, exactly what I want in a shawl. The size is also wonderful, I knitted the larger shawl because I wanted it to really wrap around me for when I go on walks and then I can just unwrap it as I need to. I am busy with the solid edge at the moment and have about half an inch to go and then it will be finished!

These photos above are of the view from my bedroom windows, I have three large bedroom windows looking out onto our back garden. The first photo is of a sparrow nest, this nest is about 2.5 metres away from my window, I am so excited Mr and Mrs Sparrow decided that this was the right spot to raise a family. We will be able to witness their journey, how precious!

The green photos (I LOVE green) have been taken from the two other windows… I love all the green variegation on the leaves of the ivy and lawn with just a tiny sliver of brown sand…

Our chickens…

Each morning our sweet girls make their way to this spot at the front door and call raucously until we appear and give them a few snacks. They are very inquisitive, forever trying to climb through open windows and see what the humans are up to:)

Erin’s chicken, Bubby having a nap in my planter…

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