Doing: ...Admiring our new-for-us gazebo-cum-kiwifruit trellis. It started as this pile of bits and bolts rescued from the neighbour's trash:
And ended up as this:
When our neighbours bought it a couple of years ago it had a canvas roof, but that was shredded in a storm a few months later. Now that they are building a permanent awning they were throwing away the gazebo frame, so I pounced on it! With the addition of a few strands of wire running around between the roof supports, I hope that this will make a terrific trellis for my two new kiwifruit vines (you need both male and female vines to produce fruit). The female is a "H4" variety, similar to the commercial "Hayward" variety but slightly more suited to subtropical conditions.
After putting it together, my DH then kindly constructed a small raised bed from sleepers left over from the new vegie garden beds, to improve the drainage for the vines.
I'm hoping that by this time next year they may have grown enough to cast some shade from the summer sun and make this a nice little spot for lazy lunches :-)
Making: ...Homemade Rosewater and Witch Hazel facial toner, and Rosemary hair "conditioner".
I wash my hair with bicarb soda which is quite alkaline, and needs to be finished with an acid rinse to neutralise the hair again; most people use a dilute solution of apple cider vinegar (1 part vinegar to 4 parts water). After recently reading Melinda's tip to use diluted organic white vinegar infused with spices instead of apple cider vinegar for a hair rinse, today I've switched to using the white vinegar. Melinda likes to add a cinnamon stick and some vanilla essence (yum) but since I have oily hair - and rosemary is reportedly good for dark-coloured and oily hair - I have added a couple of sprigs of fresh rosemary to mine today. I'll let you know how it goes, although it certainly looks pretty doesn't it? I'd definitely rather look at that in the morning than some lurid-coloured chemical concoction!
Baking: French bread for tonight's garlic bread.
Harvesting: Purple King beans, Richmond Green cucumbers, tomatoes (Tommy Toe & Rouge de Marmonde), lettuce, carrots, kale (which should have gone to seed by now but hasn't yet, yay!).
Dinner: Creamy zucchini and leek pasta sauce with wholemeal penne and garlic bread.
Reading: Re-reading Heidi Swanson's chapter on building a wholefoods pantry in Super Natural Cooking.
9 comments:
Your gazebo-cum-kiwifruit trellis is going to be a gorgeous place to spend time next summer.....not to mention the yummy kiwi fruit. Great idea! Love that it is all recycled! Tricia
What a wonderful idea. Once your plants grow it will be lovely and shady and kiwifruit are so yummy.
Hi Tricia,
Thanks! I hope it works and the kiwifruit provide some shade LOL. It was certainly the cheapest option for a trellis.
Hi changingways,
I love kiwifruit too, although my girls are a little ambivalent - all the more for me!
Cheers, Julie
Hi Julie, You have done well with your neighbours trash, it looks wonderful. I will be following the progress of the kiwi fruit.
I was interested to see you had been picking Rouge de Marmonde tomatoes. Were they a great sucess in the subtropics? I dont seem to be having any luck with tomatoes here on the Gold Coast.
By the way my potatoes in the tower were not rotten but I only got a handful! Try try again.
Regards Patricia
PS. We have the same Hat!
Ooo, interesting about baking soda and vinegar for the hair! I'm a bit tired of rubbing poisons into my skin and scalp in order to be socially acceptable; will have to try this.
Hi Patricia,
My Rouge de marmaonde have done beautifully - up until now! The very hot, humid weather has pretty much killed them off this week :-( They are terrific here as a first tomato for the season I think, before the hot weather kicks in and the other take overproduction. I'm much further south than you though, so perhaps that's why your's haven't done so well? Bummer about your potatoes :-( Such a good concept though isn't it, I really want it to work!
Hi lavenderbay,
I highly recommend ditching the shampoo and conditioner! Be prepared for your hair to spend some time adjusting to it's natural oil level though; commercial shampoos strip the oil out so your scalp compensates by producing much more oil than it needs. It might get greasy for a couple of weeks but should settle down after a while if you persist with it.
Cheers, Julie
Hi again Julie,
I washed my hair with baking soda and rinsed with lemon juice, and used the experience as the subject of today's blog entry. Thanks!
Hi lavenderbay,
I'm glad you had a go and it seemed to work really well didn't it? I hope you don't have any issues with "the greasies" while your hair adjusts. Think of how much money you'll save on shampoo and conditioner now too :-) I love it when I can eliminate another source of strange chemicals from my home.
Cheers, Julie
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