A couple of mornings ago, staggering from broken sleep, bleary eyed, I emerged into the world of consciousness by a beautiful sunrise. For those of you who follow this blog, you’ll probably know I’m a bit keen on sunrises and sunsets and I’m often rushing off at the most inappropriate times (like when I…
With The Boss on the boom-spray practically every day for the last two weeks, our working dogs, Weasel and Law have been hanging out with the kids and me. We’ve been checking out sunsets, heifers calving, watching the tractor go ’round in that ‘beautiful circle‘, Sara Storer sings of. So really, they’re on an extended…
It’s that time of year… The little baby lambs are about to drop is great numbers! And thankfully, this year, the ewes will be lambing onto green grass, not sand, like we have for about the last eight years. But before they lamb, the girls really need to be crutched. After all, imagine (Oh, if…
Once in a while, sad things happen on farms. And once in a while weird things happen. This is a ‘both’ situation. Late last week we had a massive thunder storm which dropped about 40mm of rain over the farm. (It makes for over a 100mm since the start of March, so things…
Silver Clouds by Fleur McDonald Well, launch day is finally here. I’ve got no idea where the year has gone already! It only seems like yesterday I was struggling to finish the last round of edits, waving good bye to my daughter, who was leaving home and twiddling my thumbs (only for a moment or…
I love photos. Photos are memories and I’m always snapping, where ever I go. Every time I release a new book, the call comes for new publicity photos. This is one of my least favourite things to do, because I’m much happier behind a computer screen, or out in the paddock, than I am in…
I will never admit to being good with technology! My daughter has been teaching how to use some of the apps on my MacBook and together we created this clip. It’s a collection of my favourite sunsets, both at the beach and on the farm. As I get better at doing these sorts of things,…
Meet Jody who has a great story about how she met her farmer! I first met my husband on a brown couch at 4am in the morning in the carpark of a B&S, we had a lot of fun on that couch and no not the kind you’re thinking of but a game in…
In keeping with the TV show A Farmer wants a Wife, I thought it would be a fantastic and timely opportunity to bring you some love stories from the bush. Now, pick your jaws up! Yes, I know I have made a huge issue, about NOT writing ‘just’ romance in all of my books and…
Sometimes writing just doesn’t go the way you plan it! Mostly I love it when that happens because if something happens, which I don’t is going to happen, then hopefully you guys won’t see it coming and get the same thrill and feeling of surprise I got, when I wrote it. (phew, do you…
It has been so long since I’ve posted a blog and I really must apologise! I don’t think I’ve ever been quite as busy and that is really saying something. Silver Gums is due at the publishers in exactly 29 days. I’m still putting the finishing touches to it, so I have been head…
June has been a wonderfully wet month and a very busy one! We were screaming for rain in the first week, but slowly Mother nature built her Cold Front’s a sent them one by one, week by week and let the clouds do their job. Rain it did – the second week of June…
Fires can be frightening. They’re unpredictable, one moment moving slowly, the next whipping across a paddock, fuelled by strong winds and dry grass or stubbles. However, this is the time of year that we chose to burn. Chilly mornings and nights, gives us a chance to do what we call a ‘slow burn or…
Do ever feel you can define your life with songs? I do. During earlier posts, I’ve talked about my love of music and how is it a huge part of my life. What I’m really interested in is what music makes your world go around? I went to Boarding school from 1987 to 1991.…
I have just watched a heifer have her calf. There is nothing more special than watching a brand new life come into the world, be it animal or human. A “heifer” is a first time mum and like all of us, when we’re first timers, they’ve got some things to learn. She sniffed it…
It’s that time of year again… Yes, BABIES! This is one of my favourite times in our farming calendar. And this season, it’s made even better by the 60mm of rain we had about two weeks ago; there is a green pick for all the animals. (By ‘green pick’ I mean the clover and grasses…
I grew up surrounded by music. My Papa sang in a beautiful rich voice – I still get shivers when I remember he and my Uncle Grant singing The Old Rugged Cross, in Church. Mum sang beautifully, although she would say she didn’t, all my cousins play the guitar, drums, sing and write songs; one…
Yesterday we woke to our hill being shrouded in heavy, low cloud and gentle showers pushing up from the coast. It was a beautiful way to start the day, especially after the pounding we had on Thursday evening. It was the most incredible thunderstorm I have ever seen and we netted a whopping 46mm…
Weaning is a fun time of year for me. Perhaps not for the calves as they’ve been taken from their mothers for the first time! Weaning is much the same for calves as it is for human babies when mum decides it’s time to no longer feed from breast or bottle. Or when it comes…
My mate, Anna Hill, penned this poem the day she delivered me to the airport, last week. Now I would like to lay claim that it was our talk of farming that twigged her flurry of creativity, but alas, I think that might be taking too much credit! This version of ‘The Night Before Christmas’…
As the time for the unedited proof copies of Purple Roads to go to the printers, nears, my editing time seems to be shrinking – gasp! Late last week I got the third round of edits back and although there’s still a reasonable amount to do, there is a backlog of farm and housework that…
