We are getting Bee Goatee’s soaps out into the world! Last December, we did our first market at Moore Park Beach Christmas Twilight Market. It was a lot of fun and a good starting ground. Since then, we have been to Captain Creek Twilight market. Which is held every second Saturday evening of each month, 4pm to 8pm. I believe it will be a bit earlier in winter. Rosedale market, which is a quarterly Saturday morning market and Discovery Coast Market in 1770 which is held every second and fourth Sunday morning of the month.
We are creating some new scents this year, with activated charcoal, and orange and grapefruit. Also, for those wanting an extra strong aroma, we have single rose and double rose. And a double lavender! I love a stronger scent, but I have friends who do not like any fragrance at all. So, I try to accommodate for all tastes.
Our Minty Rose lip balm has been quite a success with more flavours coming out soon.
We also have a lovely beard balm / wax for the well-groomed, bearded men. Come and try it out!
Reading over my last post, I’m still a year behind. So, here is my super quick catch-up with photos. Of course!
Through March last year, life settled a little. The goats were enjoying eating their way through the paddock. We were trying to train the dogs, but Maremma’s are hard to do that, and we found they had a lust for chasing after kangaroo. So, we decided to harness them for the walks. Much better. We had peace of mind that they were safe. The goats however, found a bit of romance. Terry and Gandalf started speaking a very amusing goatee language as seen from Terry in this video! Needless to say, we were going to get busy in August!
27th March 2023 We had our first egg from Miss White! It cooked nicely and was tasty. Very eggciting!
Easter Sunday in 2023, was the 9th April and at the early hour of 6am, Jason yelled out for me to wake up! “Rosie is having her babies! Quick!” I dressed so quick and stubbed my little toe on the door frame as I made my way out of the bedroom. I hobbled and ran to the shelter just in time to see the third being born. Wow! How exciting that was. Our first Arthur Creek Farm kids! The first was grey like his mum and big sister Lily. We named him George after my dad. Second, a brown and black buck we named William after Jason’s dad. Third, a sweet little doe, another brown and black, we named her Bessie after my mum. Rosie, looked very proud and tired. She was an excellent mum. Tending to them and keeping them close. We were amazed at how she managed to make sure each kid, had equal shares of her milk. Then we were surprised at how quickly she took them out into the field to eat. Nature is an amazing thing. Getting into a more simplistic life has been our dream and this event topped it off!
Over the next six weeks, we watched the kids grow and all of the goats interact and play on the cubicles that Jason made from old pallets and a slab of wood that was lying around. Even the old bathtub, that was a bit too big for the goats drinking water, was repurposed as a stable base for more pallets and poles for the goats to play on. In June, we found another three saanen goats, brothers Tom and Jerry and a sweet little doe we named Pixie. All were six months old.
August was the start of our kidding season. Lots of spring babies to thrill the socks off us and our visitors. Britney was first with beautiful twin does. Our daughter named them Gertrude and Mocha. Terry was obviously the daddy here, giving the alpine gene a touch of the red boar.
Next Jasmine gave us a lovely girl that I named Latte. She is the sweetest doe who loves her mum and us very much. In the second photo she is 3 months old.
Daisy’s kid – Flint. What a cutie. Daisy is a miniature cross landrace and his dad, Gandalf the Grey, is a boar cross landrace. He’s now bigger than mum.
Kimba’s kid – Rand. Kimba surprised us by having Rand in field, whilst we went shopping. What a beautiful boy to come home and welcome to the farm.
After Rand was born on the Friday, Taffy then gave birth to our handsome Errol on Monday. He, like Rand, is such a cute buck, thankfully just a little bit lighter, so we can tell them apart!
After all the fun of having heaps of new kids at the farm, Jason found some more goats! So, at the end of September we bought five. Welcome to Atlas, Nancy, Blossom, Jeannie and her son Henry!
Shortly after we picked up a very sweet trio. Welcome to Gemma, Fred and Ruby.
And then we found Bucky! As soon as he arrived, he was a hit with the girls!
October, Lily gave birth to twins… Samson and Delilah.
And a week later, Lily’s mum Rosemary, gave birth to triplets. Only two survived due to a complication that was remedied and the one that should have come last, came first. I called her Destiny. The other I named Champion because he survived. It’s easy to see that Gandalf is the daddy.
Our November kid, is the cutest little doe, named Chloe! Pixie’s girl and we suspect either Tom or Jerry is the father.
Just when I thought we completed our farm family for the year, Jason found another five goats a week before Christmas. We brought Alpine Mary and her daughter Heidi, Honey and Peaches both Saanen does, and Prince a handsome, wethered, Saanen buck home to enjoy life with us.
And that concludes my 2023 catch up. It was a wonderful & eventful year!
Yes, it has been quite some time since I posted a blog about the progress of our farm life.
To bring you up to speed, here is a quick summary that is also jam packed with animal cuteness! The biggest distraction to my lack of blog posts is that we found more animals to take care of, and what better thing to do on a farm than to have animals. We already had Watson and Cassie our cats. At the end of November, I bought a complete beehive with brood and a super. Luckily, they mostly take care of themselves. Early December after a fleeting trip down to Stanthorpe via the Gold Coast, we introduced two beautiful Maremma puppies to the family. They were twelve weeks old, and we named the boys Arthur (after the farm) and Merlin.
They are livestock guardian dogs, and we needed to bond with them and train them to work. We went on many wonderful forest walks, and they were kind of good at staying with us. They enjoyed eating the kangaroo poo and would dash off on a chase if they spotted a kangaroo, who would successfully get away. As time went on, they disappeared for a little bit longer than we liked and we decided to keep them on leash, for their safety. We didn’t get our first goats till February. The dogs were three months old and had settled in at home, finding under the house is a good place to snooze during the day and they lay out on the lawn at night, keeping a vigil. Almost a year later they are a bit spoilt and still not out with the goats in the paddock, as we wanted but we do like that they keep an eye on the house and as the house is elevated from the paddocks, they do oversee the welfare of the herd and bark if there are any intruders. Mainly bandicoots and kangaroo, maybe feral dogs. Definitely the odd goanna.
So, as I mentioned, we bought our first goats in February. The boys.
Jason found them on Gumtree and the eldest Terry was seven months old. He is a handsome boy. This is his one year birthday picture…
The next in line, one month younger, is Darren but we didn’t like that name for him and considering his colouring we named him Gandalf the Grey. Gandalf or Gandy for short is very affectionate and will win anyone over with his charm. And this is his one year birthday photo!
The next two were twins. They were a part of triplets, but one was stillborn. We named them Sir Lancelot and Sir Gawain. Keeping with the Arthurian legend. Unfortunately, we wanted to wether them, so they would not go into rut. Sir Lancelot was healthy but as he literally lost his balls, he also didn’t grow as he normally would and is now a bit under size, we didn’t realise this at the time. His brother wasn’t well in the first place and despite our extensive efforts to make him healthy. We ended up taking him to the vet to put him to sleep. Ironically, he cost more to dispose of than to buy! But we did try hard to help and gave him food, vitamins, lots of cuddles and tummy rubs. It was heartbreaking but our first taste of survival on the farm. Its life and things happen, one has to accept that. I am happy to report all our boys are extremely healthy. Only a week later, we found Rose or Rosemary as Jason prefers. She is a grey landrace breed and had two daughters, who we named Daisy and Lily. Rosie is a wonderful mum. She was also pregnant!
Another few days and we brought home “The Models!” These beautiful dairy girls know how to stride around the paddock and look fabulous! A little shy at first and I remember getting almost knocked out by one as she was anxious to get out of the trailer and I was inside with them as we let one out at a time or at least that was the plan. These girls, Britany, Taffy, Kimba and Jasmine completed our ‘family’. They will always be with us.
So to complete our menagerie, I had to get chickens! We bought three from a local farmer, which Jason dubbed very original names such as White, Brown and Blue (more a blue grey). They were supposedly around fifteen weeks old. After a few weeks Blue ended up being a boy. The other two hens and almost a month later we were given our first egg! White was going well giving us one a day, then Brown joined in. We were overjoyed! And that completed our very busy February! More catch ups to come tomorrow. 😀
Jason is quite amusing creeping up on the lovely green treefrog family! They have been my inspiration for a short children’s story. Marion.
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I’ve compiled the videos together again. (Let me know if it’s annoying). Sunday 23rd we were just chilling and checking out what the rain did. Nothing bad, it was interesting finding out the way the rain made its way through the property. Monday was clear too, so we had the chance to continue cleaning and organising the house. Then on Tuesday afternoon, we had a nice storm again. This time it took the power out in the area. Great time to test out the generator. It wasn’t the easiest to start but Jason’s determination got it going. On the 25th we managed a lovely little drive to check out the small town next to us in the Gladstone region. Rosedale. We stopped for a drink at the Rosedale pub and met the new owners, Mick and Dee who moved up from Victoria. We played a fun game of darts and took in the ambiance of the quaint old pub, making a mental note to go back for breakfast one day. Unfortunately, this day we were even too late for lunch! As we were leaving town, I wanted to stop at a little shop that took my eye, Clenwood Farmhouse https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100085818264768 check out their Facebook page as they post new produce and specials, and visit for a yummy coffee to go.
When we arrived home, Jason did his usual check of the veggie patch and gave me a nice big dish of freshly picked salad greens. I washed them up and made a dressing, cooked some Tasmanian salmon and we enjoyed dinner at the fire pit. So nice to have a delicious dinner outdoors. The next morning, Jason being the early riser he is, recorded some nice tranquil moments just watching the kangaroos. Jason tried to stop talking so you can see our early morning vista. It was hard for him to shut up, but he did manage to give you quite a while to listen to the birds and I did catch the row of ducklings following their mum. Later in the morning, we had a visit from a praying mantis, then a surprise guest python! Luckily, he was too small to eat our cats for lunch. He simply observed us and coiled himself around the verandah rafters and we haven’t seen him since. Then we finish with a photo of our resident arachnid artist, with his impressive web and our gorgeous Watson. Enjoy.
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I woke up at 6.30am to a wet and naked husband who had been rescuing the boxes that were still in the carport! It had been pouring rain since midnight and he packed as much into the trailer as he could and made a trench for the rainwater to be redirected away. All while I slept like a baby snuggled under the blanket. It was a good sleep. Jason was drenched and dried off before entering the house. He finally went to bed at 7.30am after telling me about what I had missed, apparently, after he saved the boxes in the carport, he rescued the newly planted veggie garden. Which is when he stripped off as he was weighed down by the wet clothes as he dug trenches around the plants that were being pounded with the rain. He never really gets a good solid 8 hours of sleep and true to form he was awake only a couple of hours later! The rain just kept falling most of the day, easing in the afternoon. Jason took a drive down the road and found we were cut off by the flooding of the creek. The best thing about this big rain is we found out all the runoffs from the mountain through our property where we reside. Even though we are cut off from town with the first main weir overflowing, we are thankful that our house is high and dry, and we don’t seem to have any serious leaks. Bonus. I hope you enjoy our photos and Jason’s excitingly narrated videos.
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With lots of work to do but also some exploring, I cleaned up the slaughterhouse in the affectionately named “Marion’s Shed”. My shed comprises a few areas, as you walk up to the driveway, first you see a very makeshift shower area. Then there is a little flat with kitchen, dining area and a loft upstairs. The stairs are quite scary and the loft ceiling is just a fraction over my head. Jason needs to duck a bit up there. The walls are not lined properly on the driveway side and let air in. Probably vermin too. Then there is a slaughter shed, the previous owners butchered their own sheep. It is lined really well and has an air conditioner. I might use this for a kitchen when we get plentiful produce and get certification for a commercial kitchen. That will be next year, no doubt. So much to do! The next section is a little garage workshop area that is very messy and Jason has his eye on some of this because of the lovely drive through along the side but he has his big shed, so I am not sure what will happen with this space. I guess that will be decided as we grow as the farm and need the space for any particular project. His shed has a dirt floor, and if we get goats eventually, they might find his shed quite cosy when it rains. If that happens I will definitely loose the extra workshop space.
We also took a trek down to ‘the mystery dam’ it’s just a water hole Jason found not expecting one to be there! A further walk led to what Jason affectionately calls the ‘rock highway’. This is Arthur Creek, when it’s not raining! Being on the side of a mountain, the runoff is reasonably quick but we’re not sure how long we have water in there for after a rain.
I have to apologise, I didn’t realise YouTube photos or videos should be landscape and I always shoot with the phone in portrait mode. So sorry for the black sides. I will improve!
On our way back to the house we picked up some lilies and water grass to go into the small water hole in the paddock next to the house, so the water doesn’t stagnate. Hopefully, the plants live and thrive. To finish this video I added some photos of the lovely green frogs that reside around the house. They are so cute and there is an abundance of them. They get fat with all the bugs that are drawn to the lights!
WEEK TWO (to 21st October) part two. Another photo slide show for you to view, I’m trying to fast track as time is rolling on and there is so much to do. Jason encountered two new creatures in our garden that borders the veggie patch. The snake like creature is actually a worm snake. Google mentioned how they are good at eating ants and termites! Unfortunately, Jason thought it was a baby brown and moved it roadside. The other surprise was a small scorpion, he was relocated too! They are just a reminder to be extra careful when digging and clearing in a garden. The rest of the photos are self-explanatory but if anyone knows what types of trees are in the last few photos, please let us know what they are called.
Finally the third video is Mr early bird, Jason, going around the garden around 6am. The rain we had overnight made the area look quite magical and misty. Have a good day, Marion
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An early start today to head back down to the Gold Coast and organise the big move. Our cats have settled in somewhat and we are going to leave them home alone for a night. We had thought to place them in a cat hotel for a few days while we did the move, but we just weren’t sure if that was the right thing to do. They knew something was coming to a head and were sticking close to us. They are quite used to being home alone when we go for a day. So, we made sure they had plenty of biscuits and water, gave them twice the ration of meat for breakfast and told them we love them, and we will be home as soon as we can. We left the fans on and windows ajar, so they would be cosy. Then we headed down south.
The roadworks held us up quite a bit and we had the school traffic around Brisbane, but it wasn’t too bad. It was probably an 8 hour trip including water stops. We arrived at the daughter’s home about 5.30pm feeling quite exhausted and happy to have her cooking dinner for us. We all tried to get an early night so we could get to the storage shed at the earliest possible time. Our removalist, Johny was meeting us at 7am. To save time we began emptying the storage shed. Daughter was taking a couple of china cabinets and her partner, and his mate loaded them onto the trailer and dropped them off, picking up a flat packed king bed frame on the way back. By this time, Johny had arrived and began playing Tetris with our furniture and boxes. I must say, the storage shed at National Storage Carrara, was the best thing I did. Over a few months from January to April/May we packed up a whole 4 bedroom house, bar the TV, lounge, mattress, a couple of bedside tables and bits of kitchenware. Of course, we had heaps of things that went to charity and the tip. After 26.5 years one just accumulates … junk! However, the shed was not only convenient it was a peace of mind to make the move flow well. By the time the boys came back with the trailer, my daughter’s car was packed with special items, my car was packed with things and the trailer was heavy enough to keep itself steady on the road. The removalist was even ready to hit the road. I think it was about 9.30am. Our daughter and her partner followed us heading north and again we encountered lots of roadworks on the way. The road will be really good when it’s all finished. We all arrived around 5pm to 5.30pm. Less than a couple of hours later and our removalist finished unpacking the truck. Half was upstairs in the house and half (mostly boxes) was under the carport. I can’t speak highly enough of our removalist, Johny, and his offsider Denis were excellent. For those moving on the Gold Coast, contact us if you would like his details. Good price, great service!
We were all tired, but our daughter was only here for one night, so Jason decided to cook a rotisserie chicken on the BBQ. First time using the BBQ that came with the house, (Jason usually hates cooking on BBQ’s) it was a little burnt around the edges but really good. I did the veggies and wrapped the potato in foil to go into the BBQ too, a quick sauce and we enjoyed a nice baked dinner on the verandah. Not long after dinner we all crashed in bed from complete exhaustion. It was a big two days. **Almost forgot … our kitty cats were happy to see us home and we all gave them lots of cuddles and pats, and a little chicken from our BBQ dinner.
More exploring and cleaning! Today we are highlighting a couple of slideshows for day two and day three (Friday and Saturday). Friday the 7th starts with photos at the crack of dawn from our verandah and a short walk to the fruit trees, a couple of pics inside the house, and then Jason took the mower again to check where the creek is. It was dry and showed plenty of river stones! Take note of this, because soon I will catch up with my posts and show you what some rain will do. 😊 Then Jason rides through the forest to the dams that you can see from the back verandah, and he also found a small water hole at the top of the property behind the original shed house.
On day three we took photos of some kangaroos visiting. There are at least 30 kangaroos and wallabies, and we finished off the night with a dinner by the fire pit! That was fun. We even found that the previous owners left comfy old bench seats with cushions!
On day four, Sunday, we drove down Harvey Bay way to visit Jason’s brother and his wife. Jason picked up a part that he had stored at their place. After enjoying good company, coffee, and cake, we went back home and stopped at Bundaberg Bunnings and bought seedlings for the veggie garden. What a happy day. Jason was very excited and couldn’t wait to get some planting into the veggie garden. The previous owner knew we wanted to have a garden going and he tilled the area for us. It was already in raised rows. I swear he is running on heaps of adrenaline at the moment!
More exploring and cleaning! Today we are highlighting a couple of slideshows for day two and day three (Friday and Saturday). Friday 7th starts with photos at the crack of dawn from our verandah and a short walk to the fruit trees, a couple of pics inside the house and then Jason took the mower again to check where the creek is. It was dry and showing plenty of river stones! Take note of this, because soon I will catch up with my posts and show you what some rain will do. 😊 Then Jason rides through the forest to the dams that you can see from the back verandah, and he also found a small water hole at the top of the property behind the original shed house. https://youtu.be/ixHqMzlx1Ro Day three Saturday has some kangaroos visiting and we finished off the night with a dinner by the fire pit! That was fun. We even found that they left comfy bench seats with cushions! https://youtu.be/jBiGj2br03k
Cheers Marion
PS: when you visit the YouTube videos, please subscribe, like, and leave a comment. You do need a YouTube account to do this and I will understand if you don’t want to make an account. In this case, just enjoy the videos 🙂
Time is flying on the farm. I can’t believe six months has almost gone; we have been so busy! For starters January, February and March were so wet, we had a horrible time with worms. Trying to observe and treat the goats became almost a nightmare. Fortunately, we did get a day or so where we didn’t have rain. When we thought it was going to be nice weather for a week or so, another shower came. They did become immune to light showers, especially at dinner time!
Thankfully Autumn dried up a little and winter even more so. I must be getting old, I’m loving Winter on the farm! Not as many bugs! Like mozzies or midges. The rain brought them out in droves. Though I do hate the cold, it has been very icy at night between 9 and 11 degrees Celsius. OK, some may think that’s not so cold but for me, I’m freezing!
Back to the goats, in between keeping them healthy, Autumn saw a good handful of kids being born! It began early March with Blossom having a daughter (doe), who my friend that was visiting had the honour of naming her, ‘Sunday.’ The day she was born.
The next day Ruby had twins, Hansel and Gretel, named by another friend. The following day Nancy had Julius and Caesar, and Taffy had Ashlee and Asterix. Two days later, Jasmine had Levi and Denim. That was a busy week!
Three more days and Kimba snuck out under the mango tree to have Treasure. Four more days to breathe and Daisy had Patrick. Britney then made us wait almost a month, she snuck into the forest, and we were all blessed with a beautiful girl, Jason named her Bella, as we back on to Littabella state forest. And both her parents’ names start with ‘B’.
It was wonderful to have our daughter come up and visit the property. Hopefully, it made her feel better to know what we got ourselves into. Sadly, she had to go back to the Gold Coast, and she took my husband with her!!!!
I was home alone. With the kitty cats. 😀
Jason had his car at the mechanics before we left and they needed to get a couple of parts. The parts came in the day we left with the big removal. So Jason went back with the kids and stayed overnight then picked up the car, ute actually, and drove back the next day. He must have missed me as he arrived home with flowers! That is not a common occurrence and I felt loved! It was nice to have him home again, even though our cats took care of me while he was away.
Before they left we had a quick drive to the bottom paddock and our citrus grove. The citrus trees are very sad. They are struggling to be healthy and have developed a sooty mould. We did find a large orange or very sweet grapefruit, that I turned into marmalade a couple of days later. I haven’t made preserves for many years and was surprised to have it turn out so well. As Jason doesn’t eat gluten these days, we enjoyed it on rice cakes and it was yummy.
Below is another slideshow to highlight the week. It starts with the beautiful but dreaded full moon on the night of our arrival. If anyone knows trees well enough, please enlighten us with the name of the tall tree with yellow blossoms. The native bees think it’s divine and have been buzzing over it for days. On my first morning without Jason, I had a visit from a very colourful parrot. He and his friend seemed to be very friendly but all they wanted was food! When Jason returned it was back to work on the land, mainly mowing the grass down. Plus, there is always room for exploring and finding things that need more work. As you can see in the photos, some fenced yards need extra attention and it will get it, all in good time. 😀
Arthur Creek Farm 