Making Room For A New Cactus Garden

We are in the process of finishing off the front of our house. It has been a long process as we are doing it by ourselves and we have other projects on the go as well, so it is being done in bits and pieces.

One main project that has been on the back burner for a while now is cutting down the two trees an bushes at the side of our driveway, they are messy and ugly looking and it is a decent piece of garden that they are on, so we decided to take the bull by the horns and cut the trees down to make room for a new cactus garden.

7th February 2026, we started cutting them down.

We continued the following weekend.

We finally got them cut to ground level, now for the clearing up part!

7th March, Scott added panels of wood to the fence.

And painted it white the following weekend.

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Hickory-Honey Ham...Christmas With The Kranks

I got this Christmas movie cookbook during our 2022 holiday to LA see here and I still haven't made anything from it, so for our Christmas in July, I thought I would try the Hickory-Honey ham from the movie Christmas with The Kranks. Scenes from the movie where Nora is running towards the last ham in the store, only to be outsmarted by an elderly lady. I managed to get a couple of reduced shoulder hams from woolies back in May so this gave me an excuse to try a recipe from the book. We also got some Hickory smoking chips for the BBQ. It is a ham that has been smoked over Hickory wood chips for several hours, served with a honey gravy, not out of a tin which it is in the movie. Ingredients 8 cups hickory or other hardwood chips 2 large aluminum foil pans 1 (4kg) fully cooked bone in ham 1/4 cup salted butter 1 shallot, minced 1/3 cup honey 1/4 cup dark brown sugar 1/4 cup apple cider vinegar 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar 1 tbsp wholegrain mustard 1 tsp ground ginger 1/...

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Corned Beef Stovies

We love stovies, the perfect comfort food for cold evenings and an ideal way to use up leftover meats. I had some corned beef leftover from Scott's sandwiches so that became the base for these stovies. Ingredients 1-2 tbsp olive oil 1 onion, finely chopped 1 kg potatoes (suitable for mashing) 300ml beef stock 1 beef oxo cube 1 tin corned beef Method 1. Peel and thinly slice potatoes. 2. Heat oil in a large deep pan over a medium heat until hot. Add onions and fry until golden. 3. Add sliced potatoes, beef stock and crumbled oxo cube. Stir to combine ingredients well. Cover with lid, turn heat up to medium-high, bring to a gentle boil. Reduce heat to medium-low, simmer, stirring every few minutes. Cook for 40-50 minutes or until potato is soft and tender. 4. Using a potato masher, roughly break the potatoes into smallish pieces. Cut corned beef into small chunks. Add to potatoes, season with salt and pepper. Stir until well combined and corned beef has brea...

Daisy Chains and Picnics

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