It's the Little Things

Some days, I feel like I'm not making much progress towards where I want to be. It's too hot to garden, too hard to cook. I'm sure we all have days like that. On these days, I find it important to remember that the steps towards simplicity and sustainability aren't always large. Sometimes, doing something small, can make a big difference.

This week, I knitted a small soap saver. DH likes something to scrub with in the shower, and when his last plastic scrubber wore out, I wasn't inclined to replace it with another plastic item. This simple knitted bag does the job, and hopefully means we can use the soap up to the last bit, meaning it will last longer, and we will waste less.


Speaking of soap, I also made a new batch of soap this week. Why is it that I always wait until we're using the last bar to make a new batch, even though this will take at least another week to cure? I wasn't sure how this lot would turn out, in fact I thought I had wrecked it at one point, but it looks like it will work after all. I used the same recipe as last time, only I added some honey as well. I'm not sure if it was the honey, or the fact that I oiled the moulds (the bottom of empty 3L milk bottles) with olive oil, but this soap is far more oily than the last lot. However, so long as it sets, and isn't caustic, we'll use it anyway! The extra oil will just help the soap be a little moisturising! It's all a learning experience.

Feburary - In the Garden

February, like December and January, has mostly just been too hot for gardening! The rain we've had in the last few weeks has meant that it's cooled down enough to get out there a little in the morning and evening, and most of that time has been spent pulling out the weeds that have been growing like, well, weeds. Luckily some of the plants have been growing likewise, without any attention from me. In fact, I'm surprised that we're actually starting to get a decent amount of food out of the block to supplement our diets. The chickens are back to laying 2-3 eggs a day, which is just enough for us for now. Hopefully there will be even more as the weather cools down though. Still, it has meant that we haven't had to buy a single egg since they started laying! That's been five months now!

The front garden has been taken over by volunteer pumpkin vines that I somehow missed pulling out. They sprout themselves from seeds in the compost, and being a small area, I tried to pull them out, but these took hold after it was too hot to do much. They've covered pretty much the entire area, smothering even the watermelons. They haven't been too good since the first half dozen though, either too ripe, not ripe enough or not enough water. We're still getting a few though, and being fresh and organic, I'd still rather eat them than store bought ones. Again, we haven't bought a watermelon since we harvested our first one!

My guess is that there are at least 20 or more JAP (short for Just A Pumpkin) pumpkins, some bigger than my head!

There's even some hanging from the vines that have climbed up the front fence! Looks like we will have heaps of pumpkins this year too. And they are so sweet! We've had two so far, and looking forward to lots more. Apparently JAP pumpkins only keep for 4-5 months, as they have a thinner skin than other varieties, but I'm sure these will be long gone by then! I'm hoping to keep them on the vines until they die off, as apparently they will keep longer this way. The vines are showing no signs of dying off yet though, still producing little pumpkins, so we'll have to see how that goes. It will be time to get the autumn/winter planting in the ground soon!

I cooked up the last of the frozen strawberries from our garden a week or so ago. Made a mere 4 bottles of jam! I also found several bags of cut up mango from a tray I bought last year, and since they still seemed good, I cooked them up for some mango jam/butter. Mmm, delicious! So sweet I can't eat more than a bite, but very very nice.

Hopefully the jam will see us through until the first harvest of rosella's, which shouldn't' be long now. These bushes down the side of the house are doing far better than the scraggly ones I had up the back last year. Should get lots of jam out of them! Best of all, DD will actually eat it (she normally only eats strawberry), because it is pink! You can see our small bamboo plant in this picture too, it's on the left, being smothered by the rosella's! But growing none the less. I wish I could say the same about the potatoes, that were in between these straw bales. I have no idea if it was the weather or what, but they just didn't do well. Still, I did get one meal out of one plot, so hopefully I'll get some more once I get to the rest of them. I have some of our own tiny potatoes that have sprouted now, so they'll be going in the ground (in a different area) soon. Hopefully they'll do better than this lot.

My latest planting of cotton is getting flowers and bolls. It's down the side of the house, just to the left of the bamboo and rosella's. Unfortunately, the neighbour's horses took a liking to some weeds growing there, and lent over the fence and ate them, along with some of the cotton plants! Not sure if I will be able to salvage much or not. The plants up in the garden that I planted last year have cotton bursting out of them, but since it has gotten wet, it's not very usable. (And I can't really get to it because of the weeds, oops.)

My passionfruit vine is finally taking off, and we're getting about half a dozen lovely yellow passionfruit a week. They are so sweet, not sour at all, unlike most of the passionfruit you buy. I was really surprised to find that these were the yellow passionfruit, as I thought the plant taking over the trellis was the purple one. (I planted one of each.) Hoping we get some purple ones eventually too.

Sadly, I was too busy with other things to harvest most of the corn that I went to such an effort to save after a nasty storm, but I left the plants standing, and a couple of days ago picked off all the ears and shucked the seeds off them. There were only about 5, so I was really surprised to get this many seeds! Plenty to plant next year! (And if I have leftovers, I'm sure the chickens would love them!

Hopefully there will be lots more garden posts coming up soon now that the weather is starting to cool. Getting all this produce from very little effort has really made me want to get out into the garden and get it producing again!

I will also have to post pics of my orchard, just as soon as we mow it. It's kind of hard to see the tress for the grass right now. Oops. But hopefully soon we might have a ride-on mower, which will make the job a LOT easier!

New Routines

Well, as a follow on from my Low-Tech Wednesday post yesterday, we've been slowly settling into a new routine. The house is slowly getting more organised, and thus quicker to clean (decluttering through one area at a time, currently working on the kitchen), so morning cleanup goes quite quickly. Then we intersperse the morning with schoolwork, more focused cleaning (like the decluttering), and, of course, playing. After lunch (usually either fresh cooked bread, or sandwiches/toast from yesterday's bread), DD will often settle in for an hour or two's TV or computer games, while I find a little time for catching up with my online communities or writing. Then depending on our mood, we play a little more, do some craft/sewing, or go out somewhere.

Yesterday, we made a simple fishing game. DD drew several fish on blank pieces of paper, and we cut them out and slid a paperclip onto the spot where their mouth would be.

Then with an old magnet off the fridge, we went 'fishing' for a while. DD loved it! She's always wanting to buy these sort of fishing games at the stores, but I think our home made one is much better! (Plus it gave her some drawing and cutting practice!) Once she tires of the plain fishing game, I'll write some numbers on each fish, and we can see who gets the highest score. (Great for maths practice, adding numbers.)

DD was watching a birthday party on one of her TV shows, so once it was over, she decided to wrap up some 'presents' for me. Lovely job I think. Especially the bow, perfect finishing touch.

And, of course, what rainy week is complete without an indoor cubby? DD did nearly all of this herself while I was in the other room hanging washing on the indoor line. She did call me out to help with a couple of pegs, but overall, I think it's a pretty spectacular construction.

And while I was in the kitchen cooking, DD decided to write out her own recipe. I helped her with spelling, and working out what the ingredients were, but all the writing is all hers. She did ask how to write a couple of letters, so I demonstrated on a separate piece of paper.

I'm starting to feel like we really are homeschooling, with all these activities going on. DD is learning things so quickly, and her attention is far more sustained than it was even a few weeks ago. I'm looking forward to more homeschooling posts as we slowly find our way into a routine that works for us.

Lessons Learned from Low-Tech Wednesday

Yes, I know it has been a couple of days, but things have been happening here. And it all started with Low-Tech Wednesday. Now as far as low-tech goes, it was a bit of a failure. It did make me realise though, all of the wonderful tech that I just don't want to live without. (I don't say can't live without, as I have done so quite successfully in my childhood!) I mean, hot and cold running water! Flushing toilets! (I just have to put those two first, because I am NEVER going back to not having them, LOL.) But we also continued to use our refrigerator, freezer, lights, car (to go the playgroup and ferry DH to and from the train station), washing machine, stove top, oven and the dishwasher. That is a LOT of technology, just in one day. It is amazing how reliant we become on it.

When we were in the shed, it was slightly easier to do without some of these things. For a start, we didn't have a dishwasher! On previous low-tech days, I've avoided putting on loads of washing, or using the oven, and we've done our dinner cooking outdoors on the barbeque, but given our household's tiredness (I'm pretty sure even DD is a little sleep deprived right now, or maybe she's just having one of those growth spurts), we went the easy route. The only things we turned off for the day, were the computers/TV.

But none the less, it made a HUGE impact on our day. I've never been one of those people who insisted that the TV was bad, and we should do without it. However, low-tech Wednesday made me realise that we've been coming to rely on the TV and computers just a little too much for our entertainment, and we were all suffering for it. DD has been much calmer, and much more likely to find games to entertain herself, with her TV time limited to about an hour a day.

I'll be back to post tomorrow about some of the fun things we've been doing!

Low-tech Wednesday Revived

Yes, it's been a long time since we've had a low-tech Wednesday, but given the amount of stress and tiredness in our house right now, I think it's time to revive this habit. We've been watching far too much TV, and spending far too much time on the internet, so I think a regular day without would not only give us some time away from these distractions, but get us back into the habit of considering alternatives to our electronic entertainers.

And before you point out that I'm here posting this online, I'm actually writing it on Tuesday, but scheduling it to post on Wednesday! Clever huh? I'll be back on Thursday to let you know how the day went!

Simple, whole foods

A lot of posts about simple living focus on food. How to grow it, how to prepare it. I mean, it's one of the most basic necessities, and one that I think has been most interfered with. Just about every product you look at on the supermarket shelves has been modified in some way, usually by the addition of many synthetic chemicals. Although probably many of these do no real harm, I don't think that the continued consumption of these can have any long term benifits.

I'm still working on the food around here. I have a house full of very picky eaters (me included!), and DH's gluten intolerance to take into consideration, so finding things that everyone will eat and enjoy is a challenge. We generally stick to very bland, plain meals, making it very easy to try to keep to whole, unprocessed foods.

This is how I started my day at 7:30am this morning. DD had a similar, but smaller plate. All of it fresh, from the markets, with the passionfruit being picked from our own vine yesterday afternoon. I went a bit overboard here, and wasn't sure if I could eat it all, but in the end I did. I find that getting this fruit in early in the day is the easiest way for me. I used to eat a lot of fruit, but since DD was born, I've found myself eating less and less, while encouraging her to eat more! Far better to practice what I preach, and eat it myself. However, I often find I'm too busy to stop and eat much during the day. Doing it first thing means that I don't forget.

Of course, while fruit is full off all those great vitamins and minearls, I find that even after a huge plate like that, I'm hungry again by about 9 or 10 (10 in this case!), so that's when I have some nice, hot, filling poridge, covered in wheat germ and brown sugar. (I do need to cut down on the sugar a little, I admit, I'm working on it.) That lasts me a lot of the rest of te day, and the chickens love eating the leftovers (because I always make too much, these days on purpose!)

So there you have it, a nice healthy breakfast, and delicious as well!

Financial Goals

Lately DH and I have been giving quite a lot of thought to our financial situation. I've written previously that our goal is for DH to be able to work part time, and hopefully retire very early, but so far aside from dreaming, we've made very little effort to achieve this goal.

I've been reading many blogs lately about people who have begun to make moves towards changing their situation. People who are working to pay off their mortgages, and live life the way they want to instead of being ruled by their debts, and they are inspiring. I think we can do it too. No, it won't happen tomorrow. In fact, it will be years away. But we certainly can't start any sooner.

Our first goal is to finish paying off our credit card. We hope to have this done by the end of March. Until it's paid off, we're going to continue with our Nothing New policy as much as we are able to. I'm mending our sheets yet again because I don't want to have to buy a new set. (And I refuse to buy cheap ones, I have a particular set in mind, and am waiting until we have the SPARE cash to afford them.) We're attempting to intersperse our normally meat heavy meals with cheaper ones, like the scrambled eggs we had tonight, (Can't get any cheaper than that, eggs laid by our own chooks, on toast cooked here at home), fried rice, and pasta. The increasing amount of produce we're getting from our own garden, as well as making everything we can at home (from materials we already have where possible!), helps as well. Really, there is very little we will need to buy over the next few months. (Except the previously mentioned bookshelves and new lounge if they are available, though in reality they aren't needs, but wants.)

Once the credit card is paid off, our next step is to build up an emergency fund of $1000. As any budgeting gurus will tell you, if you lack an emergency fund, you will simply rack up your credit card again when the unexpected happens. We now have a second mortgage offset account (off our construction loan), where the emergency fund will be separate from our day to day money, while still offsetting the interest on our mortgage. We hope to have this done by the end of June.

After the initial emergency fund is secure, we will increase our payments on the home loan by $100 a fortnight. Not much, and should be easy to do without many changes to our current budget, but from the few calculations I've done, it should reduce the repayments on our home loan nearly in half, and save us scads of interest! While we're doing this, we will continue to add any extra money, bonus payments etc, into the emergency fund until it's at about $5000. Hopefully we should achieve this by the end of the year.

Then, all going well, any extra money we get will go straight into the home loan. If we can pay off this one loan (the smaller, and at a higher interest rate), it will halve our repayments, and would allow DH to work part time if he chooses, or allow us to pay off the second loan (on the land) in half the time.

In order to help us keep track of our goals and progress, I've set up a budget in Microsoft Money (which we already had!) We've used this with great success previously, only falling behind when DD was little, and we couldn't find the time to keep it updated. Hopefully it will work just as well for us this time!

We're Rich!

No, we haven't won the lotto, or found some hidden pirate treasure. In fact, we have exactly the same amount of money that we had yesterday. It's just that I stopped, for a moment, thinking of all the things we can't afford, and realised what we can.

We have the money to pay for DD's unexpected dental costs without a struggle.

We have enough to buy food, petrol and other necessities without having to count pennies.

We have enough for luxury items, like a nice TV, nice furniture, and new items to replace those that break.

We have enough to buy nice material for clothes.

We have enough to spend the odd $100 at Spotlight on purely decorator items, without feeling (too) guilty.

We have more than enough to buy most things we want, comfortably, and most importantly, without going into debt. (Though we're still paying off the debt from the days before we realised this, nearly there now.) Sure, there are things we would like that we can't afford. But show me a person, no matter how well off they are, that doesn't? (OK, maybe Bill Gates doesn't have to consider the bank balance, but otherwise...) Yes, the cost of the 'wants but can't affords' goes up, but they are still there, no matter how much money you make.

The trick is to realise when you have 'enough', and be happy with it.

Junk Mail and Wardrobe Planning

You may be wondering what I'm doing posting about these two topics together on a blog that is supposedly about simple living. I mean, isn't the aim to buy less and make your own rather than getting drawn into all the advertising and sales?

Well, of course it is. And the truth is, I can't see me buying children's clothes (or adults clothes for the most part) in stores again. But I do like to look through the catalogues to be inspired and come up with ideas for what I can make at home. Most of the pretty outfits you see in the catalogues are just variations on a basic pattern. They might add a few frills in different places, some embroidery, or use a particular material, but there is very little in the stores that can't easily be replicated by the home dressmaker.

So each week when the catalogues come in (and I really should get a "No Junk Mail" sign for the letterbox and just check them out online), I look through them, and if there is anything that I like the look of, I cut it out, and stick it into my inspiration scrapbook. I noticed this week that we've moved away from the summer clothes, and into the autumn/winter stuff. Probably a good reminder that I need to get onto planning DD's wardrobe. Making it yourself takes a little more time, but it is SO satisfying to dress DD each day, and know that I made nearly everything she's wearing! Hopefully, this winter, her entire wardrobe will be homemade!

From the Garden

Tonight's Dinner

Despite the lack of care in the last few months, the garden is still quietly producing away. I ducked out to pick these to add to tonight's dinner. The pumpkin is self sowed up near the fruit trees, the corn has been looking after itself since it was planted (probably not going to get much out of it, but looks like we should get at least a little), and the zucchini plants are taking over the front garden (along with the watermelons and more self-sowed pumpkins).

I'm trying to develop a liking for zucchini, but so far it's not going well. They don't taste exactly bad, but I can't find anything to actually like about them yet, so I'm making do with hiding them under other vegies (mashed potato works well) or in other things, like the delicious pasta sauce below. Because no matter how bland they taste, there is one thing I can say about zucchini's, they sure are easy to grow in large numbers!

This is the pasta sauce I made yesterday completely from our home grown tomatoes. Actually, this is the leftover sauce that I put into the freezer after using the rest of it to cook up enough mince and sauce to do 3 meals, plus leftovers! Tomatoes, like zucchini's, are something we can easily grow plenty of. In fact, I really must go out and pick the next lot to add to the freezer tomorrow morning!

This afternoon I went out and picked a bunch of cow peas. I planted these on the side of the chook run back in the beginning of summer, and have looked at them drying the last few weeks, wondering if they were edible (I bought them mainly for the chooks), and after a bit of research today, it seems like they are. I picked all these in only a few minutes, and there are probably about this many again on the vines.

Shelling them left me with quite a bowl full of dried cow peas (which I'm pretty sure are actually a bean, not a pea!) Not sure exactly what I'll do with them yet, probably add them to a soup, stew or mince dish, but it's kind of cool to have all these when I hadn't really expected it. They are quite prolific (I only planted about 20 or so plants), way more so than other types of beans, and on top of that they are doing a great job shading my chook pen!

New Routines

Well, after feeling inspired by my own post last night, we got out this morning and tackled about half the mowing (with FIL's help), planted out those three trees that desperately needed it (another Valencia orange, navel orange, and pink lady apple to add to my collection), and cleaned out the chook run. Unfortunately the mites are back again, just when we thought we had them beat. Have to be more vigilant this time. I also bought a few kg's of apricots at the markets this morning for $3.50 a kilo, and they're drying in the dehydrator as we speak.

While all these things are good to get done, we're also busy working on making sure our lives are more organised to achieve things on a regular basis, not just in fits and starts like so often happens. I've been a fan of Flylady's methods since I first discovered her website several years ago, and have gone through stages of 'Flying' with her on and off. I don't have time right now for the e-mail lists, but I do think that her methods can, and have, worked well for our family. So yesterday I wrote up a new morning and evening routine. I've had routines for quite a while, but unfortunately they grew so much that I was too daunted to start them! And routines can't really help you if you don't do them! So DH and I wrote up some new ones together, limiting ourselves to three things in the morning, and three things in the evening. We could, of course, have put down many more things, but really wanted to stick to the essentials, and not overwhelm ourselves.

Morning Routine:

• Unload Dishwasher
• Make Beds
• 5 minute hotspot* rescue

*hotspots are those places where clutter builds up, in our case the computer table, the kitchen bench, around the TV etc.

Evening Routine:

• Load Dishwasher
• Take out Compost
• 5 minute room rescue on Lounge room

I'm pleased to report that even after only doing these routines for 2 days, we can see the difference. You might think that doing three such small things would be a drop in the ocean, but it's surprising how much of a difference it makes. No doubt in time we'll add to these routines, but for now we're just going to practice these until they're automatic.

New Year, New Enthusiasm.

Regular readers may have noticed that this blog has been rather quiet through November/December. In part, this was due to the fact that these have been very busy months for our family. November was taken up with writing, December with frantic Christmas preparations. On top of that, the weather has been hot, hot and more hot, with lots of rain thrown into the mix. Very little chance for gardening, for even if we braved the heat to plant, what is going to grow in this weather? (Other than the watermelons, which are doing great!)

And now, here we are in 2009, wondering what we are going to do this year. Well, we are hoping for some lifestyle changes, mainly in the form of a new job for DH. Closer to home would be great, but is unlikely due to the lack of jobs in his field nearby. Mainly though, we are hoping for some more regular hours, less stress, and hopefully a bit more flexibility.

DH and I have been talking too, and are looking at ways to further reduce our expenses on the basis that saving $100 is worth more than making an extra $100. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, think on it. For starters, of the $100 extra you make, a large percentage is immediately gone in tax. Not to mention the GST you're not paying simply by not buying something.

With this in mind, it will be back to making, mending and growing this year. I'm itching for the weather to cool down enough to plant something, but think I'll realistically have to wait until mid February at least. In the meantime though, there are some fruit trees that still need to be planted out (from before November!), mowing to do, fruit trees to mulch etc etc, so plenty to keep me busy. On the sewing front, I'm finally getting around to finishing those t-shirts for DD, making more shopping bags (and I've just had the brainwave to recycle my old green bags, which are more than a little the worse for wear, into stiffening in various projects), some swimming togs for DD (from second hand swimming tops), and no doubt many other things. I need to get back into preserving, before all this wonderful summer fruit is done for the year, including cooking up all the tomatoes that are languishing in my freezer (cooked up one lot last night though, and they were delish!). I need to cook more from scratch, and start figuring out how to use all this garden produce. I also have lots and lots of wool that needs to be spun ready for the winter knitting frenzy.

On the financial front, hopefully we'll have more no-spend months, do some budgeting maybe, and hopefully, 2009 will be the year that we pay off the credit card for good. We've paid it off before, but it is only this time, through dint of paying it off bit by bit the slow hard way, that we have actually changed our spending habits enough to know we are not going to run it straight back up again. Then we can work on saving, and beginning paying extra on the home loan. Exciting stuff.

I also need to get working on organising the house, decluttering, making curtains for the windows, rugs for the floors, that sort of thing.

And last, but not least, I have to get a plan in place for DD's first official year of homeschooling. She is due to start prep this year, which is not compulsory in Queensland, so we will be running our own program (at this stage), including lots of getting out and joining groups, excursions, and other fun stuff.

So stay tuned for a hopefully action packed 2009!

Present Pictures

And here are the promised princess tent pictures. It really was a nightmare to make. Cutting out the windows let the walls stretch out of shape, the wire around each piece buckled, and you don't want to know the gymnastics it took to get those pieces under the food of the sewing machine. I did hand sew some of it, but I would never have gotten it finished if I had tried to hand sew all of it.

DD loves it though, and has played with it every day since Christmas. She doesn't see any of the crooked stitches, the seams that show, the walls that aren't the right shape, or the roof that sags. And in the end, that is what I was aiming for, something that made DD happy, so I'm trying very hard to overlook all those imperfections myself.

I'm much much happier with how this doll turned out, although she does seem to have rather a lot of hair...

DD of course, seems less keen. She's far happier dressing up Big Bird or Simba. The fairy dress (made after Christmas to match DD's) has helped though, and today she has been asking to have her hair in pigtails like dolly, so I guess there is hope.

For anyone who is interested in trying their hand at making one, I bought my pattern for download from Dancing Rain Dolls. It was a really easy to follow and comprehensive pattern, and I definitely think I'll be purchasing some more of her patterns in the future.

Growing so quicky

I did take pictures of DD's tent and doll today with the intention of posting them, but then DD spilt water on the mouse on DH's computer, so I can't use it to download the photos. So instead you'll have to make do with this closeup of our local wild duck family. They're growing so fast!

Tomorrow I'll post the pics, I promise.

Our Christmas

Since DH was working Christmas day, DD and I spent the day at my sisters. We had an absolutely lovely day, decorating her apartment and playing with her baby.

And now, since all the present giving is done, I can finally post some pics of my latest round of crafting. I don't have good pictures yet of DD's presents, though you can see the princess/fairy dress I made her in the above picture. I'll try to get some pictures of the fairy tent and Waldorf doll in the next few days.

This bag and cushion went to DH's mum and dad. DD drew the pictures with special fabric crayons, then I used them to make these. I think they went down rather well.

These went to my sister and her husband (I'm sure you can guess which is whose.) They picked out the materials, and I sewed them up. I think the colour combinations worked really well, even though the camo and orange isn't quite what I would have chosen!

The handmade gifts has been a great experience this year, and I've really enjoyed making them, and thinking of ideas for each person, though next year I think I should start the sewing a little earlier! I felt a little unsure on Christmas morning, when DD only had 6 presents to unwrap, and when we were wrapping them, I felt this urge to go straight out and buy more, but overall I think the smaller number was better. Yes, she was still looking for presents at the end of them, but then, aren't kids always looking for more presents? On the plus side, she actually looked at each of the presents as she was unwrapping them, stopping to put on the dress, and play in the tent before grabbing the next present, something that I DON'T think happens when there are large numbers of presents. I certainly don't think she was disappointed, and we could see from the expression on her face that she was thrilled with her princess tent. She also didn't become overwhelmed and overexcited as she seems to when there are large numbers of presents to open.

Hopefully we'll be strong enough to stick to a similar low key present opening next year.

Local Wildlife

One of the greatest things about rural living is the amazing wildlife we get to see on a regular basis. We have a family of magpies that live in our area, as well as many little mickeys, some plovers, and pigeon dove birds. These we all see nearly ever day, but with spring in the air, there have been some new and exciting visitors to our backyard.

We first saw this family of wood ducks, with their 9-11 ducklings (hard to count them, they keep moving so fast) on the side of the road one morning. They visit our backyard every couple of days, and we regularly see them in neighbouring yards as well. Aren't they adorable?

These brightly coloured rainbow lorikeets visited a few days ago, along with these little green parrots. I'm not sure exactly what they are, but they were beautifully colourful.

Then this morning we heard a very strange noise, almost like a child screaming. After looking around, we found these two koalas up a tree on the other side of the road, fighting! They screamed at each other, growled, then the lower one left the tree.

I wonder what tomorrow will bring?

Watching and Waiting...

Remember the raised garden bed where I planted 9 watermelon seeds? Well, there is no sign of the raised bed itself now, and it's starting to send out feelers into the bed next to it!

There are two big watermelons, about 20+ cm long now, and dozens of smaller ones. They're growing so fast with all this rain we're having (thunderstorms 3 times a week or so I'd say), that they almost seem to double overnight. I'm hoping these big ones will be ready in time for Christmas, but they might not make it.

I think next year though, I'll plant the watermelons up the back, they are really a little too big for the area at the front. We're constantly stepping over watermelon vines. But then again, who cares if it means they get to eat yummy, juicy watermelons?

We do have another problem though. Our Biolytix wastewater treatment system is in the corner, right near these vines, and we had our first service a couple of weeks ago. Unfortunately there is storm water getting into the tank, and the solution is to dig it up, and concrete it in. I'm hoping there will be some way for them to get to it that doesn't involve running a large piece of machinery over my watermelons (and the rest of the garden). Either that, or they don't get around to it until after we've eaten them all!

Nothing New November - Conclusions

Well, November was certainly a hectic month. I probably could have chosen a better time for my Nothing New challenge, seeing as I was completing NaNoWriMo at the same time, but then again, perhaps the lack of trips to the shops helped in that regard too!

So, I guess what everyone is wondering is, how did we go? Did we manage to get through the whole month without buying (or swapping or accepting) anything new? The answer, of course, is no, but I still feel that we've done pretty well. So onto the exceptions first, then I'll summarise what I feel we learnt from this challenge.

Well, I don't really count this one as an exception, since we had booked it before November, had the money put aside for it, and it was a non-negotiable essential given how badly our gutters overflow every time it rains, but we had someone come out and install gutter guard in November. It's brilliant. No more climbing up on the roof to clean out the gutters every week, or having water going everywhere because they're overflowing. And the roof looks heaps better because all the leaves/sticks are washing right off rather than gathering in the guttering and looking untidy.

And this one, I make no excuses for what so ever. I was at the markets getting our weekly fruit, and saw a stall with lots of old kitchenware, and thought "they wouldn't have....?" and they did, so I couldn't leave it there, even though it was $12! It's a very old bread knife like the ones we had when I was growing up. They just don't make ones like these, or anything like them anymore, and I know, because I have looked. See the metal out the side? That's the cutting guide, which allows you to cut an even and thin slice of bread. I was nearly ready to give up on home made bread simply because I couldn't cut it thin enough to wrap around a sausage, but not anymore. Now I can cut it perfect, every time. Well worth $12. When I mentioned it to my sister, she wanted to know if they had another one!

And finally, one of DH's workmates was wanting to get rid of this guitar, so DH bought it off him for $10. A bargain we couldn't pass up. DD loves it, and I think it's pretty cool too. I've always wanted to learn to play the guitar.

I'm afraid that I also fell down on my decuttering challenge of getting rid of 100 things in the month. I mean, in terms of actual individual items, which was my original challenge, I probably managed over 100. I've decluttered about half a dozen boxes of toys from DD's playroom, several bags of unwanted clothes, and much more from the rest of the house, but there is still so much to go yet. But I'm still pretty happy with how it went in the scheme of things. I think that trying to do two challenges in one month (three if you count NaNo as well!) was just a little too much!

So that's it. In the month of November we bought only three things other than food or medications. Not bad I don't think. We saved over $500 that we have paid off the credit card, $500 that probably would have otherwise been spent on things that we obviously didn't really need. We didn't feel deprived, didn't even really feel annoyed that we couldn't spend the money. In fact, in some ways it was liberating. No looking carefully through the catalogues that arrive in the mail each week, we just threw them out. No stopping to window shop somewhere, and no deliberating over whether we really wanted something or not. We just avoiding all that hassle.

Sadly, I don't think a month is really long enough to do this sort of challenge properly. There were many things that though we didn't go out and buy, we simply put aside to be bought at the end of the challenge. Like needles for my overlocker. The ones I have aren't ball points (required for sewing stretch, or the material gets damaged), so I couldn't finish sewing the t-shirts I am making for DD. I could, of course, have sewn them on my sewing machine (which has ball point needles, just not the right size for the overlocker), but I was too lazy. So in terms of changing our consumer habits, it wasn't a huge success (although I suspect we will be evaluating things a little more carefully in future), but in terms of saving money, it was definitely good. And for that alone, we'll probably try it again, though not this month!

Gluten Free Cooking

I know I know, I said I wouldn't be around much, but what can I say, I just can't stay away! Still haven't caught up in NaNo, but DH is reading DD a bedtime story, so I have a spare few minutes.

We found out that DH was gluten intolerant about 6 or 7 years ago, after seeing the doctor because he was tired all the time. Finding out he couldn't eat gluten, which is in wheat, barley, rye and oats (although oats is disputed, mainly the problems there are caused by cross contamination) was quite a shock, as at the time most of our food was based on convenience foods. Once we got hold of a booklet from the Coeliac society showing what contained gluten and what didn't, and started reading the labels, we found out that wheat was in just about everything! At the time, there were very few gluten free foods available, and most of what was was pretty horrible. So we had to learn to make our own. We had quite a few adventures with trying to make our own gluten free spaghetti (thankfully there is now a decent commercial brand!), and eventually pretty much gave up on gluten free bread. I scored a couple of gluten free cookbooks from a very nice lady on a forum, who had been sent them by mistake from Amazons, which helped immensely, although since they were American, many of the ingredients were hard to find here in Australia.

It was a very stressful time, meaning we had to change our whole way of eating, and several times (when DD was first born being a notable one) we gave up all together for a time, but overall I think the advantages we've had have far outweighed the disadvantages. It was, in some ways, one of the starting points for our simple living journey. We learned about reading labels carefully, we learnt how to cook many things from scratch, and I'm sure we began eating healthier. Our household is about 80% gluten free these days. Almost all of my baking is gluten free, the only exceptions are bread that DD and I eat, and porridge (with wheat germ) that I have for breakfast each morning. DD also eats dry weet-bix for breakfast most days.

Thankfully there are far more products for gluten free diets these days. We buy a very nice gluten free pasta, and rice crumbs taste almost identical to breadcrumbs, if 3 times the price! We still make most of our foods from scratch, including biscuits and cakes, and in most cases these are pretty similar to their gluten containing counterparts. In fact, I find that I prefer the gluten free varieties. I taste regular cupcakes, and they just taste wrong to me! Our taste buds have actually changed to suit our new diet. The old adage of you like what you eat rather than eating what you like rings pretty true.

We are on a campaign to have some snack foods on hand for DH to take for work so that he can avoid the temptation of chocolate and soft-drink. We've finally found a gluten free bread DH likes, although I think that's mainly because it's been so long since he's tasted wheat bread he can't remember what it tastes like, but it's best eaten toasted, which DH can't do at work since all the toasters have had wheat bread in them. So recently I tried this cheese and bacon roll variation, which is a big hit. We made a dozen today for DH to take to work next week, only somehow there are only 6 left! Even I enjoy them.

Gluten free bread is actually easier to make than normal bread, as it only needs to rise once, and there is no kneeding. Following the hints on the packet, I set the bread to rise over a sink full of hot water, which works beautifully.

We use the Laucke bread mix, which is mixed by hand really easily. So to make these I just followed the directions on the packet to mix up the dough (which is more like a runny cake mix, and can easily be mixed with a normal electric mixer). I then spooned half of the mix into a greased muffin tin, put some bacon (still frozen) and cheese in, spooned the other half on top, then added more bacon and cheese. Yummy! I'm going to try some cinnamon fruit rolls next, as soon as I buy some cinnamon.

Things are Growing

Well, the front garden transformation is moving along slowly. We've gone from this, to the photo above (which I will point out is taken from the other end of the garden), in less than two months. I posted my plan here, in case you want to have a look, although I have made a few modifications, which I shall comment on throughout this post.

Firstly though, here are the tiny corn seedlings I planted a month ago, haven't they grown? I really really need to plant the next lot, don't I? The bush off to the left is a golden nugget pumpkin, can't wait to get some of those coming along. My mum has one that's already fruiting (do vegetables fruit?), and it certainly has an overload of pumpkins, although they're not quite as flavourful as the old Jap's that I usually plant. They are, however, decidedly smaller!

Beside that garden I've prepared two more no dig beds so far. There is room for one more that I still need to build. Basically, for these, I've put down a layer of lucerne mulch (about half a bale), covered it in some freshly cut green grass, covered that in a variety of manures/bought compost (I just can't produce my own fast enough!), then another layer of lucerne (other half of the bale) over the top. I'm giving these a few weeks (or until I get around to planting them) for the initial breakdown to start, then I'll be planting them out, probably with some more corn!

I've also managed to fit in (and find bales for) two raised strawbale beds rather than just one. The second one is filled with everything I could find, from lucerne, manure, compost, grass clippings etc etc. It's full right to the top now, but I expect it will settle quite a bit over the next few weeks. Not sure exactly what I'm going to plant here yet, but I'm sure it will be something good!

The watermelons planted in the first strawbale bed are certainly doing great! They're growing pretty fast, and starting to try to escape from the bed. Looking forward to getting some watermelons from these, yum!

While I'm waiting for the new beds to settle, I've been planting out some seeds into old punnets I had lying around. The ones on the right are rosella's, ready to go into one of the beds along the fence (which all need serious work!), the top middle are cotton plants, for down the side fence, and the one on the left is a pigeon pea. I haven't had much success so far with the pigeon peas, although I have to admit that some of the seeds I was using were older. Will have to give it another go as soon as I get organised, because they will hopefully form the bulk of our hedging at the front and sides. I really should try to get these planted out soon.

The carrot seeds I planted in the planter box next to the raspberries were a dismal failure. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't get them to come up, so instead I planted out that whole side with beans. I haven't had much success with beans here, despite them usually being one of the easiest plants to grow. I suspect that the soil is lacking in something, so I'm trying it to see if they do better here, where it is all compost and bought soil. So far they seem to be.

The potatoes in the strawbale potato cages are still growing like wildfire. You can see from the link how much they have grown in just a week! However, I discovered 3 of the dreaded 28 spot ladybeetle, the enemy of all attempted potato growers, and war had to be declared before this crop was curtailed as the last lots were.

Hopefully that should do the trick! Note, nothing new was bought to do this. The netting is from the mosquito nets that hung over our bed in the shed (that we no longer need now that we have screens on the windows), held up with some garden stakes I had lying around from my last lot of tomatoes.

As I write, there is a nice steady drizzle outside. It's been going on all day. Great for the garden, waters far better than I can ever manage with the hose. Hopefully it will soak right into the ground, and get those no dig beds really breaking down. If it lets up for a bit tomorrow, I might go out and poke some seeds in somewhere, best seed sprouting weather around.

For now, though, I still have 500 words to write before I go to bed.