Popping In From The Garden!!

G'day to you all out there in blogland! The days have been whizzing by again and it's almost 10 days since I popped in for a visit ... the fat bloke in the red suit will be showing up in a jingling of bells and a clattering of reindeer hooves before we know it - EEK!!!

One of the reasons for my absence has been ... I don't have any sewing to share. You see, the spring weather has finally shown up ... mostly!! ... and so my Beloved Geek Boy and I have both come out of hibernation and started to spend most of our free time in the garden. We have a smidge over an acre to keep us busy, so the gardening gloves have been on! :0) In fact ... I thought, since I didn't have any sewing to share, I'd bring you a little garden update ... I hope you enjoy it. :0)

One of the things we love about out block compared to our town backyard (oh, let me count the many things!!) is that we have more room for a good vege patch. There's something very satisfying about munching on goodies that you have grown in your garden and today was the first harvest time this season for my little vege patch.

Lovely, crunchy, good-for-you radishes. And they're one of my fave colour combos ... red and green! :0) I planted two punnets of these babies cos we LOVE them in summer salads. I think I might have to find a spot to plant some more to keep us going through salad season. :0)

And our foxgloves are starting to show off their spring finery ...

... and the first bearded iris has appeared. It really MUST be spring! :0)

We do have a bit of an ulterior motive for our mad gardening. We're hosting a fund raising garden party in our front yard next month ... so the garden needs to be whipped into shape to show it off nicely. :0) We're helping to raise funds for Bloom Asia, which is an education/training organisation that works directly with vulnerable women and girls in Cambodia. Bloom not only ensures the girls get basic education (many have been sold into servitude by impoverished families at a young age, so have never attended school), they are also trained in hospitality, barista skills and cake decorating. Bloom Asia is the fruition of the vision of a lovely Brisbane lady who took her hobby of cake decorating and used it as the basis for this fantastic enterprise. Bloom Asia receives no government funding or assistance and now has two training centres in Cambodia that each have a cafe attached where girls can gain experience in the hospitality industry and when they've finished their training, they are offered employment at a fair wage to help them and their families. These centres are self-sustaining once they're up and running.

With the success of these two centres, the founders of Bloom Asia were approached to duplicate their successful and sustainable training/education/employment enterprise in Cebu in the Philippines ... again, with no government funding. So ... the lovely Brissie lady's sister (who lives in our area) committed to renovating a house in Toowoomba, with 100% of the sale profits to go towards the new Bloom Asia centre. To make sure that profit is a nice healthy one, fund raising events are being held around the local area to help pay for the reno costs ... that's what we're planning to do. :0)

Sorry that was a bit long-winded (no comments from you, Miss Chookyblue!! :0) ) but we're pretty excited to be involved in helping in such a wonderful project, even in a small way. My Mum and I will be doing most of the catering, so it will be a frenzy of gardening and cooking around here for the next few weeks. :0) I'll share some pics as we go along ... in case you're interested! :0)

If you'd like to know more about Bloom Asia you can visit their web site: www.bloomasia.org and if you want to catch up with the house flip that we're raising funds to help with you can visit here: www.bloomhouseflip.org

Righto ... now that this post turned into a bit of an epic tale ... I shall sign off and go in search of dinner inspiration. Hmmm ... what do I have that will go with a nice salad that includes fresh radishes?! :0) Hope your week is toodling along nicely ... and that you're doing more sewing than I am! :0) Oh! OPAM gals ... Sweet Peg has done the prize draw ... was it your name that came out of the hat? :0) Til next time ...

BEAR HUGS!

CHEERS!
KRIS