The time has come to officially announce that I have two websites healthycountrylife.com and shobasadler.com showcasing two of my greatest passions – writing books, short stories and articles and healthy cooking from farm fresh produce. From time to time when my two passions cross paths I will cross promote between the two websites. Like now when I want to shout out Merry Christmas from the farm to all who are following my two websites. Merry Christmas From The Farm takes you behind the scenes to two book authors’ lives – mine and Debra Sue Brice as we prepare for Christmas.
Let me take you on a journey on how country folk celebrate Christmas with my Merry Christmas From The Farm. In Malaysia country folk are called orang kampung. I believe wherever we are in the world, country folk and orang kampung share one common bond – a simple and uncomplicated life not dictated by time and we love our land, nature and animals.
I’m taking you on two trips. One to my farm in Australia and another to the farm of my fellow author and friend, Debra Sue Brice in the United States of America. One country is experiencing summer and the other winter but Christmas is the same for us because we live in a magical place called the countryside.
We grow our own food and make most of what we eat or we buy from local people.
My dogs are eating home-made pumpkin ice cream made from pumpkins grown on our land and raw honey from our neighbour and kefir.
Not a whole lot of big events take place in the country and so we have to make our own entertainment. Check out Debra and her mum Linda after church last Sunday trying to catch snowflakes falling from the sky in their mouth.
Yes. They’re having a white Christmas and we’re having a sunny one.
We spend a lot of time with our animals and that inevitably boils down to talking a lot to them. It is not unusual to find my husband, Kevin stop what he is doing and ask, “You talkin’ to me?” and my comeback would be, “Nope. The dog.” or “Nope, the horse.”
And other times we might dress alike our animals
I know I said we like to cook our own meals from produce in our garden, but did I mention we also make our own Christmas cards? Here is a card I received from Nerida last Sunday in church. This is a photo of a Crimson Honey Eater on a grevillea plant called Amy Lou. No, that’s really the official name for this plant. Country folk don’t name our plants, well, not all the time, although it is easy to believe we do that especially christening with double first names, right Debra Sue?
What other people consider litter is gold to us. Cannot understand why these council workers in Malaysia would sweep up and carry away these leaves when they provide organic food for the plants, nesting and bedding material for wildlife and insects that contribute to composting these leaves and creating healthy soil.
>Over in America Debra has sent me a photo with the caption ‘Delicious Manure’. Repulsive to others but delicious to us, I mean to the plants.
During this holiday season why not check out our books to read:
Kevin and I wish you Merry Christmas with our rendition of Drummer Boy which Kevin calls Drummer girl because I am the drummer of the family