April - Preparing for Winter’s Quiet

Dear Friends,

April feels like an exhale.

After summer’s abundance and autumn’s first turning, there is a settling now, a gentle drawing inward. Mornings arrive silvered with mist, the paddocks softened to muted greens, the air cooler, quieter. The garden begins to ask less for performance and more for care, for preparation, for patience.

This is a month for tending the unseen.

For feeding the soil with rich, dark compost, knowing it will carry life through the colder months ahead. For clearing away what has finished its season, not in haste but with gratitude. For planting what will not bloom for many months yet, small acts of hope repeated row by row.

Much of gardening, after all, is hope.

In Bloom This Month

The cutting garden grows quieter, though no less beautiful, just softer, more understated.

The dahlias are beginning to fade now, their petals touched by the first light frosts. What remains is delicate and fleeting, still visited by bees on warmer afternoons. I find myself lingering a little longer among them, waiting for seed heads to form, collecting what I can for seasons to come. It’s also the time to carefully tag each plant while it still flowers, once a true frost arrives, that chance is gone.

The tender annuals of summer have been cleared, their work done. Zinnia seed heads are gathered and laid out to dry, small reminders of the brightness they brought just weeks ago.

April belongs to preparation.

Beds are cleared and readied for what comes next. Ranunculus and anemones, along with hardy annuals, are planted quietly into the cooling soil, each one holding the promise of spring. Mulch is spread generously, protecting and nourishing, while the garden is gently tidied, not stripped bare, but eased into rest.

There is a certain elegance in a garden slowing down.

A quiet beauty in the fading, the preparing, the unseen work beneath the surface, where everything important is still happening, just out of sight.

On the Farm

Autumn settles gently across the paddocks.

Potato harvest is in full swing, early starts in the cold. Mist lying low over the fields, and long days that stretch until the soft dark of evening. My husband works tirelessly through it all, looking toward the finish, but also quietly enjoying the reward of a crop that’s taken months of care to bring to this point.

The rams have done their job and have now been pulled from the ewes, set aside to rest until the next joining season. With the focus on harvest, our farmhand takes the lead with the sheep work, keeping everything moving steadily in the background.

This month, the lambs are weighed to monitor their growth, helping us determine when each mob is ready for processing. It’s a constant balance, watching, assessing, and making sure they’re at their best before booking them in with the abattoir.

We also continue with our three-weekly faecal egg counts, ensuring we drench only when needed. This time, the ewe lambs returned a higher count, so they were brought into the yards and treated accordingly. Another small but important step in maintaining their health and performance.

In the quieter moments between jobs, our farmhand has been working on refencing the new block. Previously set up for cattle, it relied mostly on electric fencing, not quite enough to hold sheep where they belong. Slowly, paddock by paddock, it’s being reshaped to suit its new purpose.

There’s a steady rhythm to April. Productive, grounded, and deeply tied to the work at hand, while the season gently shifts around us.

From the Kitchen Table

This month brings the harvest and preserving season to an end. The garden has not been as abundant this season, my tomatoes vines are covered in tomatoes that are still too green, the cherry tomato bush being the only that one that has provided me with beautiful red sweet tomatoes. I have not been able to fill my larder shelves with homemade passata and pasta sauces like I normally do, the hope that next years season will be better.

Garlic is being tucked into the soil and mulched with pea straw, the remaining cloves are used to make garlic butter which is tucked into the freezer for later use and dehydrated to make garlic salt, a favourite on homemade chips.

The quinces are the last to be picked and I personally just love having them in a beautiful fruit bowl on the bench to have their aroma scent the house. But my other pleasure with quinces is the beautiful paste that I make with them, a lovey accompaniment to cheese platers alongside my bread and butter pickles that I made earlier when the cucumbers were in full production.

I have to admit I do use my thermomix to make my quince paste as I usually make about four or five batches as my children love taking it in their lunch box to school with some cheese and crackers.

Quince Paste

Ingredients

1.5 kilograms quinces

Roughly 800 grams sugar

Method

1. Wash the quinces, then peel and core them, reserving both. Place the peel and cores in the mixing bowl and chop 10 sec/speed 5. Scrape down sides of mixing bowl with spatula.

2. Cut the quince flesh into chunks and place in the Varoma. Add 600 grams water to the mixing bowl, place the Varoma in position, and steam 25 min/Varoma/speed 1.

3. Remove the Varoma and set aside. Over a separate bowl, strain the peel and core mixture (you can use the steamer basket to do this). Dispose of the pulp, clean the mixing bowl and weigh the liquid and pieces of quince in the mixing bowl make a Note of the weight. Blend 10 sec/speed 5.

4. Add three-quarters of the weight noted of in sugar to the mixing bowl.

Mix 15 sec/speed 5. Cook 50 min/Varoma/speed 5, MC off, with steamer basket resting on mixing bowl lid.

5. Once cooked pour into sterilised jars.

At Home

Daylight savings comes to an end, and the evenings draw in a little earlier each day.

April this year, has been shaped by school holidays, with Easter and the end of Term 1 falling together.  I've always loved school holidays.  Slower mornings, no rush to meet the bus, no late afternoons spent ferrying children to and from sport.  A chance for the days to unfold more freely, for the children to simply be.

These holidays felt different though.  My two older boys flew to Queensland to spend time with my sister and my parents, and the house was noticeably quiet with just the younger two at home.  I found myself missing them more than I expected, their noise, their presence, the way they fill the spaces so effortlessly.  It's a gentle reminder of how quickly these years pass, and I quietly wonder how I will go when they eventually leave home.

April is also a month that asks something deeper of me.  

This year marked ten years since our daughter, Poppy Grace was born sleeping.  It's a day I turn inward, holding space to grieve, to feel the weight of her absence, and to honour her in my own quiet way.  Over time, I've learned to meet the day with softness, allowing both sadness and gratitude to sit side by side.  Gratitude for the four beautiful, healthy children I get to hold close, and for the life we've built together.  

As the season shifts, so too does the feeling within the home.

Blankets return to the ends of beds, electric blankets are switched on, and on cooler evenings the wood fire is lit, bringing a gentle warmth through the house.  Lamps are turned on earlier now, casting a soft, golden light that makes everything feel a little slower, a little calmer. 

The flowers indoors begin to change as well, looser arrangements, gathered with branches and autumn foliage, reflecting the landscape outside.

Home begins to feel more sheltered.

A place to retreat, to gather close, and to carry both the light and the quiet of the season.

Field Notes

There is something deeply reassuring about preparing for a season not yet arrived.

A quiet trust in what lies dormant.

 

Until next month,

From The Posy Paddock.