canola fields forever

i have said this a million times over, but i love the country and i love the wheatbelt. no lies. my long term dream would be to buy some land so i can enjoy the open space, grow things and just listen to the sounds of silence. to me, the country is beautiful, often in unconventional ways, like the colour of wheat against the blue sky. the sunburnt paddocks when there hasn't been any rain for months... and the dirt tracks with the green trees hugging their edges.

but i also find the things that should be pretty too - like the canola fields in full bloom on my drive to york today. they are just breathtaking. very few things are prettier than them in fact. they were so striking that i pulled my car over to take some pics, then a car pulled over on the opposite side of the road and waited and waited, so i thought i was being watched by a local who was making sure i didn't walk out into the fields for my own personal photoshoot. they have a lot of issues with that - and my friend keryn who lives in york takes great delight in yelling at people who do it because it's super disrespectful and it ruins the crops!

i hung about for a minute or two more just admiring the view then got in the car to keep driving - as which time the other person got out, phone in hand. looks like they had been waiting to do the same thing and was too embarrassed to get out while i was there. crack up! 

it's the country life for me. ❤

my favourite place

i grew up in a teeny tiny country town in the wheatbelt called clackline, 80kms from perth. i loved it then. i still love it. everything is far away, your neighbours are not at all next door and you can be as loud as you want. the most fun bit though, is the friends you make that are from seriously all over the place, because your high school caters to students that live ages away and we all turn up on buses that can take up to an hour to and from school. a lot of the "local" high schools (still 20 odd kilometres from ours only go to year 10 - so for their last two years they are bussing it in each day to hang with us. i also am from 20km out of town, but add in (as far as) dowerin, york, goomalling, toodyay, grass valley, spencers brook, bakers hill, wundowie... there's some massive ground you're covering there, so you really end up with mates all over the place.

anyway. one of my dearest friends from school is from a town called york and every now and then, we like to go to york and catch up with her. but it conveniently just so happens that the best opshop ever is in york too. boom.

so, today we drove out to york to see my beautiful friend keryn annnnd hit up the salvation army jumble sale there. i have said it before and i'll say it again, i am convinced that the guy who is in charge of pricing the items as you leave gets bored with his job cause he counts for a while and then just announces a total, (which is always way lower than it should be) which you hand over gleefully. today we paid (between mum and i) $30 for 65 items - which is just 46c each. sorry perth - but you'll just never be able to compete with that!

the way home from york to mums though, is my favourite place in the world. there is a certain point where all you can see is crops and sky. i love stopping there and just taking it in for a few moments, as well as grabbing a snap or two. you can take the girl out of the wheatbelt, but you can't take the wheatbelt out of the girl. ❤

home for the holidays - trekking around the wheatbelt

we spent the past few days at mum and dads hopping around the little towns that neighbour their house. i love it out in the country, there is always something fun to do - and i always feel like i am home when i drive those roads. we had the best time! 

we spent one day in york, conveniently during their town festival. the kids were loving these massive animals placed around the town... this fish was even made so that you could walk through it - and the inside was all paneled like an old church roof. so much work went into it. 

we also got to try our hand at archery in the same park... madeline and joseph thought it was the coolest thing ever and are still talking about it. even more so, because nanna did it too!

madeline did a pretty amazing job at it and got a few great shots in, hitting the target each time.

i love watching these kids learn something new, they put everything into it and give it a good go. i am sure they'll want to do it again, so we will have to hit up the archery park near mum and dads house. that's where i learned as a kid.

we also spent a day in toodyay, looking at the old buildings... like the old goal museum

it's hard to believe that these little country towns were long ago thriving and completely independent of the rest of their surrounds. each built on an industry that kept them going, with people coming to work and set up their lives... while now they are full of empty shop fronts and tourists who only come for the day. it is so sad to me.

it does, however, make for some wonderful history and things to look at.

the boys hanging out in the old goal building across the road from the main museum... joseph was pushing the pram about to make him giggle.

we also had to take a photo with the coca-cola museum for aunty dom. it's only her favourite thing in the world after all. haha

i love the old connors mill building, definitely my favourite one in toodyay.

and our last stop? the christmas store in toodyay. open all year around selling christmas things, people come from everywhere to see what they have on offer. i must admit it is pretty impressive, it's massive and just brimming with christmas. the kids, especially alex, loved it!

i love the country. still not ready to move out here just yet, but i love to be here - and for the kids to spend time here too. i think it's so good for them. the wheatbelt is amazing.

western power in the country

i have spies... everywhere! a friend of mine sent me these sneaky snaps today of the western power boys working out in the country town of york. unfortunately doug isn't actually in the shot, but it is so good that i wanted to share it anyway! the awesome bright colours (just looking at it makes me feel hot...) and their set up is really cool to look at. 

my husband is amazing, working hard to provide for us, rain, hail or shine!