Finished! Finally!

And this is the last post about the building of the chicken coop, I promise! A few hours this morning finished off the last of the chicken pen, and I now feel reasonably sure that they are secure in there. They seem to like it, aside from the fact that it does get quite hot in the middle of the day. I was worried that it would be too shady, as it's under a very large tree, but after working in that area for the last 3 days, it is barely shaded at all! As you can see, we've rigged up a lot of temporary shade, and in the next few weeks, when I recover from all we've done so far, I'll plant some citrus trees inside the coop that will hopefully give some better shade in a year or two. I'm also hoping that when the sun is a little higher in summer, it should be nice and shady under there.

And here is my spectacular door. Not bad for the first door I've ever designed is it? I'm pretty pleased with how it looks. It has a bolt half way up, as well as one down the bottom for added security. The hinges are supposed to be self closing, but they aren't really that successful unfortunately.

And here are our babies in their new home. We still had to put them to bed tonight, as they were all huddled up near the door. Hopefully they'll get the idea soon! From early guesses, I think we might have 2 roosters and 5 hens, but it's still a little early to really be sure. I will probably keep one rooster, and the other one, well, we'll have to see.

Empty Nest!

Well, we spent a lot of the day (interspersed with play with DD, a trip to the markets, and a trip to bunnings) finishing up the chicken coop, and they are out there. We worked until dark, and even a little by torchlight to finish up, and though it isn't quite finished, I think it is secure enough. There is a gap up near the roof at the back that needs an extra bit of wire added, and the door isn't attached properly, just wired on. Hopefully they'll be relatively quick jobs to finish off tomorrow. Sorry, no pictures, I was too busy trying to get it finished to take any.

They spent the day outside in the coop while we finished it off, using an old wooden crate across the doorway to keep them in. But they were still a little surprised not to be taken inside when it started to get dark, and cheeped quite pitifully when we left. We put a solar light inside their bed area, but they were still too stupid to go in, and when I went out to check on them before, they were all huddled against the fence. I moved them into the sheltered area, and will go out once more tonight to see if they stayed there. I'm sure they'll be happy in the morning though when they wake up and can just walk outside without having to wait for us to take them out, and we are certainly happy to not have the cheeping and the smell inside any more!

I asked DD, who had been complaining of not having enough time to play because we spent all day building the chicken coop what her favourite thing about the day was, and was most surprised that she said the chicken coop! She said she liked being able to see them, and go inside to play with them. Of course, when I asked her what was her least favourite thing about the day, she said building the chicken coop, and not having time to play! I guess that is a pretty normal expectation, we want to have the thing, but not do the work to get it.

Overall though, I've really enjoyed doing the building. It is very satisfying to see something take shape under your hands, and know that you designed and built it! This is one of our first large projects (other than our bathroom in the shed, I'll have to post pics of building that one day) that we have made with such success, and it really helps to feel that we are finally getting there.

Why Simple Living?

Rhonda Jean over at Down to Earth has asked everyone to post about their simple lives, so that we might learn and be inspired by each other's stories, so I thought now might be a good time to give a bit of an overview of what we are trying to do here.

I grew up with a simple life. When I was about 7, we moved from an apartment at Kedron, Brisbane, to a 24 acre property at Dakabin.

We had chooks and ducks everywhere, and even an incubator for a while. My sister and I ran and explored and climbed trees. Until the council resumed the property, put the council rubbish dump next to it, and turned it into the local pound. No, I'm not bitter, really.

We then moved to an even more remote place, 50 acres on the Burrum River, surrounded by national park, a 7km sandy 'fire break' track our only link to the outside world. Being so far from civilisation, my sister and I qualified for distance education (homeschooling). My mum, being a teacher, embraced the lifestyle with no qualms. You can see the giant mango trees in this picture, overshadowing the house.

My mother was a huge influence on my desire for simple living. She read Grass Roots, had a vegie garden, grew pot plants to sell at the local market, and convinced my dad that we should get goats. Dad was the one who built my dollhouse, helped make the pen for said goats, and helped make our old drawer goat cart, and took us down the river (about 20 metres from our front door!) to catch tiny fish, which he would grow and sell.

From there, we moved to the property where my parents still live. My mum still had her vegie gardens and our goats, until my sister and I went to an actual school in Hervey Bay nearby.

Eventually, I finished school, and moved to Brisbane to continue my education. It was in my third year of my Psychology degree that I met DH. We were friends for many years until we fell in love and were married on the beach at Broadbeach on the Gold Coast on the 11th of January 2001.

I guess DH and I were caught up in the consumerist culture. DH had a good wage, due to 24/7 shift work, and we bought all those things that society thinks you need. Big TV, nice car... well, that's about it actually. Our favourite entertainment was driving around at night, enjoying the music and lights of the city.

We lived in a couple of different apartments in Brisbane, until we finally bought the one we were living in when it came on the market just as our lease was up. Our daughter was born there 6 months later.

And I guess that is when I began the return to simple life. Both DH and I have allergies and asthma, so I knew that to avoid this for our daughter I was going to have to work at it. I have breastfed her long term, in fact she still breastfeeds to sleep at night. We introduced solids very slowly, especially given that DH had been diagnosed as gluten intolerant a year or so earlier. I had to learn to cook everything from scratch, as most of what we were used to eating had gluten in some form in. We used cloth nappies, as I never had liked the idea of disposables.

When DD was about 1 I started a vegie garden in our small courtyard. I was totally surprised to find that I loved it. Pottering around in the garden, seeing what had grown today, and planting new seeds brought me a satisfaction and joy I hadn't expected. DH and I began to think about a house and spent hours pouring over the real estate pages. But there was very little in our price range and due to several issues I don't want to rehash, selling our unit was difficult.

But I have to admit that though I'm not religious, I do believe that things happen for a reason. If we had sold when we had first tried, we probably would have bought some little house on the outskirts of the Brisbane, or even tried renting for a few years (which could have been disastrous given the current rental market here in Brisbane). Instead, by the time our unit finally did sell, we had settled on buying a block of land on the far north outskirts of Brisbane- we were lucky enough to find this block just as our unit sold.

So here we are. Every day is a learning experience, from building a chook yard, to growing a real sized vegie garden. DH, who was born and raised in the one house in the city, is surprised to find he is really enjoying this life, even with the hard work it involves. DD is flourishing in the outdoors and dirt, and showing no sign of the allergies and asthma that plague DH and I.

We read and hear about peak oil and though we don't follow it religiously we are aware that the resources on this planet are finite and one day, be it in our lifetime or that of our children or grandchildren, they will run out. Already we are starting to feel the pinch with rising petrol prices and, I believe, soon to follow rising food prices. Growing our own food, raising our own chickens for eggs, and learning to make many of our cleaning products, household items and clothing simply makes sense. Hopefully we will be able to use the money we save (once we stop having to spend so much of it on the initial setup costs!), to pay off our mortgage faster. Eventually, we hope that I will be able to make enough with my photography to support us (without a mortgage), so that DH will either be able to quit work, or at least find a job he enjoys, rather than one that just pays the bills.

I am loving getting into crafty things again. I have always sewn and made things, but once DH and I were together, and we had plenty of money, it seemed so pointless to make things, when I could buy them for the same price, often cheaper. It was only once I discovered some wonderful forums and blogs where people talked about doing these things for the good of the world, that I began to be interested in them again. I am very fortunate to have a background in these things, so that attempting this life isn't quite so scary as it might have been. Instead, I am loving every day, and have a To Do List a mile long, because there are so many things that I want to do.

More Progress on Chicken Coop

We started out this morning with a hunt for 2 inch black poly pipe. Finally tracked it down at a irrigation store, and bought 25 metres. The guy who helped DH carry it out to the car said in disbelief "You're putting it on that?" We just gleefully nodded, and proceeded to tie it to the removable roof racks. On our trip home, someone in the car behind us was taking pictures of it with his mobile phone. Does it really look that surprising?

We cut it into four 6.25m long pieces, and somehow we have heaps left over? I'm thinking that they gave us too much, because 4 x 6.25 is 25 isn't it? Anyway, then we put those over the ends of the pickets, and they fitted exactly. It took us a bit longer to work out how to make sure that the spans were equal, but DH finally suggested measuring the bits of picket that were left, and that worked well.

Then we dug a trench all the way around, lifting off just the top layer of grass.

Ending up with a wheelbarrow load of grass from just one 5m side.

Then we cut three 8.15m lengths of 1.8m wide wire, and joined them together, overlapping by about 10cm. We used these nifty wire squeezer things and pre-cut C shaped bits of wire. Saved a LOT of hassle of threading wire through to join them, and it should be nice and strong.

This made a HUGE 8m x 5.something metre bit of wire.

Then we pulled and dragged that over the poly pipe tunnel. Thankfully DH's dad was there to help us. It would have been a much harder job with only two of us.

We fastened the edges of the wire to the side of the shed with some corner metal bits from building this shed.

And the same with the roof. Hopefully that should keep any predators out.

DH has started fastening the wire to the poly pipe structure, but dinner and a grumpy child interrupted, and the rest is left for another day.

To Do List Progress

Much as the chickens are cute, it is time for them to be OUT of my living room! They actually don't try to jump out of the box, they just like to perch on the edge, but sometimes they do loose their balance.

So, soon this will be their new home. The green garden shed (3m x 3m) will eventually be theirs too, but right now it is full of all the stuff we can't fit into the living space here. Once the house is done, most of this will either be thrown out, or move into the garage.

So in the meantime, I built this little shelter for them from leftover materials from the building. The base is a pallet, just in case we have a lot of rain, as we get quite a bit of runoff on the block. That should be high enough to keep them out of any water. The bricks are just stacked, but I've put sticks and pipes down the holes in the middle to stabilise them. The roof is an old sheet of colourbond leftover from the shed, tied firmly to the pallet. The area is sheltered from most of the wind by the garden shed, but hopefully it's all tied down firmly enough to stop anything blowing away if we do get a big wind. The gaps at the back near the roof line I've stuffed with newspaper, so hopefully their won't be too many drafts.

And this will be their run. It's 4m x 5m, which I think should be big enough. Tomorrow we'll go out to get the rest of the materials, and hopefully do some more work on it. The sooner the chickens are out, the better!

In other To Do List news, I finished my string bag. This is crocheted, and was actually quite easy, if time consuming. I put the handles on wrong, so it isn't perfect, but it's now sitting in my handbag for the next time I'm out and need something to carry shopping in. Hopefully it will stop me dropping things on the ground on the way to the car like I did with the lovely glass orange juicer I found!

A Tree Stump

This tree stump has been sitting down the side of our house, where it was dumped after it was pulled out of our house foundation, and we have forgotten about it. Moving it didn't even make my To Do list, but we realised that with our second water tank due to arrive any day now (actually, it was supposed to arrive on Monday, but still isn't here!) that it had to come out now. When the water tank is in place, it will make accessing that side of the house much harder, and we needed good access to get this out.

We did try pulling it out with a rope, but it snapped immediately, so DH borrowed a heavy duty chain from our neighbours. I'm quite impressed that my little car managed to shift this, it's huge!

Once we had pulled it out of the heap of dirt it's been sitting in for the last 4 or 5 months, DH took to it with the chainsaw. We only use it infrequently, so we just have a little electric one, but it actually does a pretty decent job. Better, in fact, than the electric one we hired to try to take out this stump's predecessor.

Even after we cut a wheelbarrow load of firewood off it, it was still huge. But we didn't have any more time to devote to cutting it up, as we had other plans for the day (namely, a trip to the museum with DD.)

So we hooked it up to the car again, and dragged it up out of the way. Ripped up the lawn a bit, and yes, it probably wouldn't have if we'd dragged it on the flat bit, but it was too much effort to tip it over.

Here is DH standing on the stump in victory! Not quite sure what we're going to do with it now. Perhaps have a very big bonfire? Toast some marshmallows?

Low-tech Wednesday

Yes, I know, my camera isn't really low tech, but I had to get it out to get a pic of this little guy, then I thought I'd do a kind of 'my day in pictures' to show you what our low-tech Wednesdays are like. Enjoy.

We cooked our pancakes for lunch in our electric frypan (would you believe we don't have a normal one?), but instead of getting out the electric beaters to mix them, I pulled out these old ones. I used to make cakes, meringue, everything with these when I was a kid, but haven't used them since getting an electric set. DH was so impressed with how easy they were to use, he said he will probably use them in future instead of the effort of getting the electric one out and setting it up.

This was my project for the day. You'll get to see the finished thing in a few days (once it is, in fact, finished.)

Preparing for an early dinner.

DD found her own entertainment with the charcoal scraped out of the barbeque.

Dinner is served. We ate out under the gum tree, watching the sun go down, and waving at the neighbours as they drove out. What a perfect end to a lovely day.

9th May

Yes, that is the 'expected completion date' on our house! We are in the final stage now. It seems like the painting is holding things up, as so many things can't be done until after that. They don't put the security screens on, do the tiling, or put on the electrical switches until after the paint. Reasonable of course, because that way they can be sure they won't get paint on them.

So, any bets on whether the house will actually be finished by then or not? I think it's a reasonable estimate, but not holding my breath, as you never know what will come up between now and then!

Of course, even after handover, we won't be able to move in straight away, as we'll still have to arrange to have the floor laid (builder only did carpet, we'll be having laminate). I also want to wait a week or two to give the walls and floor a bit of a chance to off gas.

Some spinning

Well, the day after I posted my "To Do List", I actually sat down and read the spinning book which I borrowed from the library, and learnt a lot of valuable information. The most useful of which was that once you have spun your wool, you actually have to 'set the twist' before you knit it. So that is why I had so much trouble with my first spinning attempt!

So I sat down, and spun the second lot of very expensive wool from Spotlight (that I bought before I found my new wool stash). I think I did a lot better this time, the wool was much more even, even if it did keep breaking, which it didn't do the first time! It was still very curly when I wound it off the bobbin, but I now know this is how it is meant to be!

So carefully following the instructions in the book (which is "Hands on Spinning" by Lee Raven, don't know how it compares to other books, as it's the only one I've read so far), I let it slowly sink into some warm, soapy water, then rinsed it in some warm clean water.

Then I gently pulled the ends to straighten out the kinks. There are still a few, but on the whole, it is much straighter, and I'm sure will be MUCH easier to knit with!

While I was washing the wool, I thought I'd also wash the slipper I knitted with the last lot of wool, which is why I needed the second lot of wool. It's a bit softer now. I just have to knit the second one (hopefully I'll have enough wool, this one pushed the envelope a little), and then spin a little of my new wool to put a crocheted frill around the top, as the heal is a little short. Then to see if DD will actually wear them.

Edited to say, this is the first ever post I've written where the spellchecker has come up with NO errors! In fairness to me, sometimes the errors are just disagreements between me and the spellchecker.

A Busy Day

It seems like writing up my To Do List yesterday had the desired effect. Today has been a much more motivated and busy day than usual.

I decided to tackle sorting out my sewing/craft stuff, which has been a HUGE job. I have been collecting stuff since we got here (I'm a hopeless hoarder), and that, along with me pulling stuff at random out of my stash in the shed, has meant it has been strewn everywhere with no rhyme or reason. So here, finally, is all my material (bar the stuff still in the shed) in one place. The draws are from Ikea, and used to store all DD's clothes before we moved. Since then though, they've been sitting around filled with various homeless stuff that has, mostly, found new homes now.

This is my cotton interlock stash. Most of this is old t-shirts from the op-shops 'Fill a bag for $3' rack. There are a few bits, like the orange on the left and the duckies on the top right, that came from my existing stash. The large plain green and the larger amounts of pink and pink patterns in the middle of the bottom were a spotlight buy though.

The next drawer up is the woven cotton. (Can you tell I like cotton?) Again, mostly op-shop bargain racks, with some purchased stuff that I already own.

This is an example of a recent op-shop bargain, these three cotton nighties were on the bargain rack. Lots of large amounts of unseamed cotton! That pink floral one in the middle is just lovely, and I think I'll make a skirt for DD from it.

This drawer is all the poly/cotton and specialist materials. On the bottom left is all my PUL, a very useful breathable plastic style material used for making nappy covers (and quite hard to find in Australia, or it used to be anyway). While I won't be making any more nappies any time soon, it will have lots of other uses. I also have some hessian (orange and pink in the middle back) which I'll probably use for bag making, and some netting (top left) which will probably become vegetable bags (although I'm tossing up trying latch hook on the larger holed stuff, if only I could figure out a way to stabilise it.)

Then there's my wool/yarn. The bigger lots in bags up the back are acrylic, and most of the smaller balls down the front are cotton. The cotton is mostly op-shop buys, with a few lots from the bargain bin at Spotlight. Middle left is some string that I found at the op-shop, thinking of trying some macrame with it some time. (Yes, somewhere in all the spare time I have!)

This lot won't fit in the drawers, but deserves a mention. This is some of the fleece/wool I've acquired since getting my spinning wheel. I was very lucky, my mum rang a friend of hers who has sheep, and she was just about to have them shorn. Since she is unable to spin any more, she passed on a lot of her existing wool to me. The stuff in the bags is washed and carded, and the bit in the pillowcase is raw fleece straight from the sheep. Isn't the brown beautiful? The yellow stuff is actually white, that is all the lanolin in it making it that colour. And this is only a sample of the stuff my mum still has up at her place! I'm going to be one busy spinner!

I caught DD later on just running her hands across the material, feeling what it was like. Is this the beginnings of a crafty habit beginning? That is how it started for me. My mum made a lot of our clothes and toys when we were younger, and I still remember playing in the lounge room as she sewed. She had a foam broccoli box under the bed with her laces and ribbons on, all carefully wrapped around A4 sized bits of card, 3-4 different ones to a card. My sister and I used to love looking at them, and often asked for a piece of this or that. I only now realise how nice it was of my mum to give us bits. A collection like that takes a while to build up, and to give up pieces just to give a child the simple pleasure of playing with them, tying them in the hair of a doll, probably to end up trampled in the dirt at some later stage, is what real love is about.