Tuesday, April 8, 2008

Getting Ready

One week to go before bump in for the Art Melbourne exhibition. Above is the last oil finished. All they need is wire and hangers, and a final spray coat when they're a bit drier. I am really pleased with them all. This one I really love.

Now I am doing three small watercolours on the same theme. I'm halfway into the second one, and having a great time!
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Harvest Time............
We have actually beaten the birds to our nut harvest this year, and have a bucket of chestnuts,

and an ice cream container of almonds from our two year old tree

The parrots had already begun to harvest the chestnuts, and there were a lot snapped off the branches and dropped on the ground. Chestnuts have a seemingly impervious coating of prickles, which cannot be handled by hand, no matter how careful you are. The birds don't seem to mind and crack through it easily to eat the soft nut inside.

I was having a huge cut back in the studio garden, and looked up to see all the almonds from our newish tree, pods popped open, and no birds had touched them.

The nuts are soft and super delicious, but I am going to dry them a bit before we use them.

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My man was coming up the driveway last night to see me with the watering can, damping down some mushrooms in the front paddock. After the recent rain, the ground is again drying out and our autumn mushrooms popping through the ground are starting to struggle. I thought I might keep them growing long enough to harvest.

The last few autumns have produced an enormous number of mushrooms, more than I can be bothered processing. Our neighboring paddock that usually produces so many has far too much grass cover, so they'll probably never see light.

There's always next year.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Chestnuts look that when fresh. Oh!

Robyn Rinehart Art said...

.... and they're amazing nasty to handle. Secateurs and kitchen tongs.

Colin Campbell said...

I had no idea about chestnuts either. We used to love these in the winter when I was growing up.

I noticed that we have a bunch of mushrooms in our paddock this morning. After a summer of no rain and hot temperatures, it only takes a week or so of cooler weather and some rain and up they come. They remind me of our worm farm, which comes to life about the same time.

Robyn Rinehart Art said...

Mushroom Risotto..... into the pot they went, and they were delicious. It's still so dry, I had to water them for a few more days. Not a good year for mushies.

Worm farm? I've got two going now. Unbelievable how many worms can live in one space. Like spaghetti. But they take some feeding. I will be giving some away soon.