dangerous domestic enthusiasm

This morning no one interrupted me as I weeded the garden. Did you read that? No one. From 7am until 8.30am, I was on my own. I loved it.

Buoyed by a break yesterday from domesticity (we went out for a walk in the rainforest with friends and then back to their place for dinner) and by the solitude first thing this morning, I had much better energy levels.

We put the chooks in the wettest corner of the garden where they decimated the Wandering Jew (Tradescantia). They are so tame and one even let Fionn carry her today. Fionn asked me again how I know that our chooks are girls. He is not convinced, it would seem, that egg laying really is the sole preserve of female poultry.

I made pasta sauce with 6 kg of sauce tomatoes from our local tomato grower. I posted off two containers of kefir. I made blueberry and chocolate muffins for lunch which scored universal enthusiasm. I'm currently straining more kefir in the fridge. I have more sourdough bread slowly doing it's rising and growing thing in the hot water cupboard. I put chickpeas in a pot to soak.

After a trip into the shops for some errands and for Fionn to work out how much more money he needs to earn in order to buy himself another (another) hot wheels car, I came home and went mad. Again. Not content with cleaning the oven, with wiping down cupboards and with other cleaning projects of a serious nature which I've been initiating, I got stuck into the dining room. Gone are the broken clock, the empty containers of glue, the materials for making Christmas 2007 cards. On the mantelpiece I found cards from Christmas 2006, 07 and 08.

I've said goodbye to the pottery vase which I never use and which is very dark and subtly gloomy in effect. I've ditched all sorts of things, moved the iron to the laundry shelves where it is supposed to go anyway, rehomed our wedding photo and now I have a home for my recipe books. And they are now in that new home. I have even, for the first time that I can recall ever, washed actual curtains (I've done net curtains before, a long time ago). If this is boring, then too bad. Incredible events in my life belong on my blog and this degree of cleaning is incredible.

I am a bit funny about major cleanups. They do happen in my life, but not often. Always in holidays. And big disasters do sometimes follow. I cleaned things up in a massive and impressive way just before I turned 21 and then on my actual birthday my student flat got arsoned. All lost. Except a few recipe books at the other end of the house (the fire probably was started in my beautifully clean bedroom) and those recipe books, still fire damaged, are still in my collection above the dining room mantelpiece. In my first year flatting, aged 19, I brought back lovely preserves from Mum and had the kitchen all looking gorgeous when a shelf collapsed and bottled boysenberries went flying at eye level. That wasn't so cool either.

The study is the last bastion of total mess. I know it is still waiting, not going away. But really, overall, our home is starting to be quite nice.

Out the front in the lovely raised bed garden which Favourite Handyman made for me just before Christmas, the potato plants have poked through the ground. Out the back in the old chook run, we have bean and pea flowers. We have quite a few green tomatoes. We have chilli flowers. I've been inspecting all the brassica leaves 1-2 times per day and squashing little caterpillars. So far, much better than last year in terms of damage control.