Our front porch

 G'day, happy Sunday to you! How's your week been? Mine was good, hectic but a good week. Looking forward to the Easter break though. We're having some visitors come to stay with us for a week over Easter, so there will be lots of fun times happening here at The Country House. I can't wait! Anyway, today I thought I would take you on a tour of our enclosed front porch. This is as the room is now and it will do for now, but it is going to go through some changes over the coming months. Next Spring we are going to rip up all the carpet in the entire house and polish the beautiful floor boards that are underneath. I will eventually get around to painting this room Antique White too, but for now the cream will suffice. I'm also on the look out for some big solid comfy white wicker furniture for this room and a suspended swing seat.

 So, standing in the entrance hall way where my Grandmothers sewing table is, between the dining room and the porch....looking into the enclosed porch. For now I have the carver chairs from the dining table set until I find the right wicker set for here. I'm thinking that the suspended swing seat will hang from this spot which looks directly out over the landscape and is a really lovely spot all day long.

 You can see the dining room through the open windows. I keep them open as the view from the dining table is just gorgeous looking over the tree tops. From here we watch the sunset each night. Love it!

 There are two really big windows in this room that run the length of a wall each. There's always a breeze in here, and as you can probably see on the table it is where I like to stop for a cuppa during the day.

 A close up of the table for you minus my coffee and phone lol

 A part of the view...

 When we bought the house the garden was very overgrown and as we were clearing things out we found this wrought iron planter box. It was white and very rusted so my husband threw it into the trailer to take to the dump, but I spotted it and hauled it back out knowing I would give it a new lease on life as soon as I had time. So last week I sprayed painted it black and bought some faux flowers (oh no, not faux! Yes, faux! A gardener I am not. lol) and stuck them in. Not bad hey? What do you think?

 At least it brightens this space up until the reno of this room begins.......after winter.

 Moving around to the 4th and final wall of the room, we have the front french doors. I am planning to attatch some lace to the doors (maybe), but will wait until after the reno to see what's what. The glass on the doors is frosted so no one can see in anyway. I picked up this solid and sturdy rocking chair a few weeks ago for a bargain. Not a scratch or anything wrong with it. Always amazes me what people donate/throw away!

 And back to where we started at the entrance hall. We are going to replace that horrid wall light in the entrance hall too, but so far I haven't found 'the perfect light'. I will though!

 And these two crazy ladies........

 This is what was going on at my feet as I was walking around taking photo's of the porch to show you...

 and the noise level! Geez they make a racket!

Who us? Yes you! lol Gotta love em!


Wishing you all a wonderful week ahead. Catch ya later.....Amanda xxx

Homestyle Pumpkin Soup

Hello, Happy Sunday to you! Are you having a nice weekend? I'd love to hear what you've been doing. It's autumn here....the days are crisp and there's quite a chill in the air so I have been pottering around the kitchen making warm comfort food for my family.

Everyone I'm sure has their own favourite version of pumpkin soup and no doubt they are all delicious (I am hard pressed to find a soup that I don't like, especially pumpkin! I'm easily pleased. lol) so I thought I'd share our Country House family favourite with you too.


Homestyle Pumpkin Soup:

1.5kg  pumpkin (peeled, seeded & diced)

1 large brown onion

3 cloves garlic

1 litre chicken stock

3/4 cup cream

1/4 teaspoon nutmeg

freshly ground black pepper to taste

butter and olive oil


Prepare pumpkin. Dice onion and garlic. Saute onion and garlic in a little oil and butter until transparent (I like mine a little bit browned and nutty, but then again I'm a little nutty too. lol)

Add chopped pumpkin and saute with onion and garlic for a few minutes just to coat the pumpkin with all that deliciousness.

Pour 1 litre of chicken stock into the pot, bring to the boil, then turn down heat and simmer for 20-30 minutes.

Once pumpkin is tender laddle into blender (or use a stick blender if you have one. I can't find mine since we moved house!) Depending on how big your blender is, I blend mine in 2-3 batches.

Pour blended pumpkin back into pot adding cream, pepper and nutmeg.

Serve as is with hot buttered rolls or as in our case today, fresh baked bread lavished with lashings of butter (and take heart that swimsuit season is at least 6 months away! Then dive headlong into denial for the winter season. I mean hey, what's a few curves amongst friends?) To be even curvier, serve with a good dollop of sour cream.

Enjoy!

Love Amanda (aka Curvy Contessa!) lol

The gang's all here!

 Hi girls! Since it's a gorgeous crisp autumn day here out here in the Queensland countryside, I thought I'd take you for a walk down to the wood chopping area where my husband has been preparing the wood for us to burn on the cold nights ahead. The locals tell me it gets to 5 below during winter. It doesn't snow where we are, but it gets pretty cold I hear. A lot colder than where we used to live near the beach!

 Anyhoo! I wanted to show you my new cream and black toile wellington boots. Aren't they just the cutest? Just what I need for wandering around our property during the winter collecting eggs and such.

 And of course since I never go any where alone for my posse is always with me...

 I'd like to introduce you to my girls. Just after Christmas we bought six 4 day old chicks, and well, me being me I had to name them (sadly this trait runs in the family. You should hear the names my sister has for their cows! lol).....here we have Honey Chicken, Apricot Chicken, Satay Chicken, Keiv Chicken..

 and here's Parmigiana Chicken and Coq au vin. These are not meat chickens and we are not going to eat them (how could I? I am their mamma! lol) but I do like to name my 'pets' names that make people laugh when they come over to our house. These little ladies are about 16 weeks old and should start laying in a few weeks.....I hope!

 This little lady here is Apricot. She is the boss and the ring leader. If there's trouble underfoot, then she's the cause of it that's for sure! Many a time she has escaped and I have had to entice her home, leading her down the road back to our property while throwing outs bits of bread to her like a Hansel and Gretel trail....even in the pouring rain. See how she thinks that she can sit up on MY table where I sit and drink my coffee sometimes? Ooohhhh, she's naughty! lol

 Tia TuTu (with the pink tongue) and LuLu La Rue love the chickens, and I do believe that they believe that they actually are chickens too. Sometimes I think the chickens think they are dogs! Or maybe I just need to get out more. lol

 And after Tia, LuLu and I have gone upstairs and into the house....who do we find sitting up on the back porch......

 and looking at us through the kitchen screen door?

Tia just worries that they will somehow get inside and chase her around pecking at her like they do outside. Poor darling, look at that worried face! lol So cute.

I hope you enjoyed meeting my girls. I know they would love to all meet you in person.....our chickens are, er, VERY friendly!

Take care,
Amanda xxx

Just being honest

I have to be completely honest with you here and tell you that I am in two minds whether or not to continue with this blog. I just feel a little lost in blog land and haven't really found my voice so to speak. I read lots of truly amazing blogs, there's so many awesome and inspirational women out there and my tastes range all over the place as I'm reading. I love decorating blogs, and foodie blogs, mummy blogs, craft blogs, travel blogs and lots of ones in between that are a mix of just normal everyday life. Actually I think the ones I love most are just the everyday, daily life blogs. For some reason though I just can't seem to find my place with blogging. So, I'm torn. Do I continue to blog and try to blog more often? Or do I give it a miss and just enjoy reading what others have to say? I was thinking that maybe I might feel more free to really get into blogging if I made my blog private, not that many people read this anyway, but that's another thought.

Anyway, I promised dining room photo's last time so here they are.....finally!

 We bought a new dining table recently and I think it goes beautifully with the hutch that we inherited from my mother-in-law. Also, notice the light fitting. I was rumaging around through an op-shop a few weeks ago and came across this light. I was delighted to find this as it matches perfectly with the wall lights that are original to this 81 year old house and that reside in the living room. I had my sweet hubby rewire it for me, and I couldn't be more thrilled with how it turned out!

 Such a lovely bright and airy room since we painted it white. Still working out what to do with the bricks around the pot belly stove. Have talked about building a mantle to frame it and cover those ugly bricks.

 I'm so happy that we bought this table, it's an 8 seater entender table that has a carver chair at each end, but for everyday use I have the table down to a 6 seater and have the 2 carver chairs on duty else where in the house.

 I absolutely love, love, love this sweet little writing table. I did a post on it's revamp on my old blog Jacaranda Cottage. When I found this desk it was battered and beaten, scratched and wobbly and an awful dark chocolatey colour. A little love and a new crystal draw pull and it's beautiful once again.

 Our home is filled with treasures from our travels, and from antique stores or op shops finds. I am constantly amazed at what people give away, good and bad, but mostly good!

 I got this gorgeous crystal decanter recently at an antique store a few towns away. It was love at first sight!

 This key looks old, but is actually new and from the gift store at the Melbourne Goal where we went to see the Ned Kelly display/tour. One day I'll have to tell you about our family connection to Ned Kelly, it's a hoot!

 The Eiffel tower was bought from a gorgeous little gift store in Bright, Victoria on our last snow holiday

 These darling little ceramic birds were a birthday gift from my lovely Aunty Claire

 On our last holiday to Victoria, we spent some time exploring the wonderfully historic town of Bendigo. This glass Fleur de lys was bought from the sweetest little tea room and gift store there.

 Thrifted items mixed with family heirlooms and photo's.

 This china cabinet was a wedding gift for my Grandparents, who then gave it to my parents on their wedding day, who in turn gave it to my husband and I on our wedding day. I would have to say that this cabinet is my most treasured peice of furniture in the house.

 And here's a close up of the top.

 Thank you for taking the time out of your busy day to visit with me, I hope you enjoyed the dining room tour.

Amanda xxx

Honestly, what could be better...

 than seeing something as beautiful as this field of Sunflowers each day?

Just one more reason why I love living in the country!



Thank you to both Dawn and Deanna, the peanut butter worked a treat and we caught the little sucker. Chickens, mice, frogs, snakes.......yes, SNAKES! What's a city girl got to tackle next I ask?! Luckily the views are sooooo worth it, this country living! lol

Will post promised photo's of dining room soon........promise.

Love Amanda xxx

City Girl V's Country Mouse

We have a mouse in the house. In da house people! And......I do believe that he/she/it? has out witted me. For now. Now this country living is wonderful and I am enjoying my new life here in small town AUS, but there are just some things that take a lil ole city girl like myself some getting use to. Like trying to catch an obviously brilliant mouse.

I first discovered that we had a mouse under the house (in the guest suite of all places. Guess he/she/it thinks it's a guest now or something.) when the dogs wouldn't stop barking, and barking, and for the love of my sanity.......barking.  Upon further investigation the mouse and I.......met. Sort of. It happened in a flash, we saw each other and we both took off running in opposite directions. Good plan. Me upstairs, mouse downstairs. Problem solved, right? My helpful husband, country born and bred, told me that I was going to have to catch it one way or another because where there's one..........

Next day I set my newly aquired traps, and smugly walk up stairs thinking this would be the end of it. Good bye mouse. HA! Checking the trap first thing the next morning I discover the cheese was GONE and no mouse. What the? Re-set trap with bigger piece of cheese. That'll get him/she/it. Who's the genius now?! Yeah.

Next morning, check traps. Cheese gone AGAIN! No mouse. Ok, maybe country girls know automatically what to do, but me, no I don't. So I take the traps back to the hardware guy here in my tiny little town and tell him about the adventures of country mouse v's city girl and tell him that these traps must be faulty or something. After much gawfawing, thigh slapping and shaking of his head he tells me to try again, the traps aren't faulty. Maybe try using pumpkin seeds, he offers. Mice like pumpkin seeds apparently.

So back home to set traps again for this furry genius. Next morning, no mouse but the cheese is still in place. Ah-ha! He/she/it must have moved on/out. Who cares where he/she/it went as long as he/she/it went. Two days go by, no mouse detected. Even the dogs stop barking at the wall. I proclaim Victory!

But then, the next morning as I am sitting sipping my all important FIRST coffee of the day (and you know how important the first one is) and blog surfing.......I see a flash. It's funny how in 2 seconds you can have quite a lot of thoughts as to what it could actually be, then looking down I see this furry genius sitting there looking all "cute" as my daughter called him/she/it, staring at me, almost..... daring me. I certainly didn't think it was cute when hot coffee spilled all over my lap as I tried to get up out of the chair and run screaming into my 17yr old daughters bedroom!

So now we have 2 wild looking women (pj's and bed hair....you get the picture) and two little doggies also wearing their pink pj's (we're from the city remember? That seems to expalin a lot for my neighbours). Funny thing is that the dogs did nothing. No reaction what so ever. Like aren't Terrier's supposed to want to hunt and capture (or kill, whatever) this furry genius?! But no. So teen daughter and I come up with a plan after much screaming and threats to move out and leave the house to the mouse. We decide to suck him/she/it up in the vacuum and leave it for my country boy/husband to dispose of. Sounds like a good plan to us. Easy, clean, no blood.

Ok, so we didn't think it through very well, and we're not very good at this sort of thing. Like, wildlife. At this moment my country boy/husband rings to wish us a good morning. I tell him what's happening and he cracks up laughing so hard, and unbeknowns to me puts me on speaker phone so the guys at work can hear what's going on and get a big laugh too. Great, thanks honey. Just what I need. So, the mouse disappears yet again and I'm still trying to figure out a way to catch he/she/it, this furry genius.

Any suggestions? Please no ridicule. I feel enough of that from the mouse.


Love Annie Oakley.

Life's beautiful...

...and God is good. Just wanted to share HIS beauty with you tonight as we enjoy this lovely country sunset.

Love Amanda xxx