In Love With Old.

The buying ban is going well. It has been a lot of fun, actually. Apart from my regular hankering for a Thermomix, I haven't yet missed anything. All our needs have thus far been met, and we are enjoying being creative in sourcing things. If we can't find something, we don't buy it.

We have broken the buying ban once. We moved our chicken pen to the back of our block, and discovered that our backyard hose was not long enough to reach the new pen. We bought a hose connector to join our two hoses up so we could still replenish the duck pond and chicken drinking water. We bought a metal one, on the premise that it will last longer, and is less likely to break and become landfill.

I have developed a slight eBay addiction hobby. In fact, I have mastered the art of 'snipering' and have developed a failsafe strategy for keeping the bids low whilst still ensuring the kill win purchase.

So, here are some of my favourite purchases this year.... some of these have come from local Facebook secondhand selling sites, some from Gumtree and of course, some from eBay.

 I actually haven't decided whether this enamel milk jug and cream container will be purely decorative or not.... but I just love them!

 

 I gave my old plastic washing basket to my mum when I found this gorgeous sturdy wicker one. Wicker baskets make me feel like more of a wife and homemaker. I can't explain it, they are just magic like that.

 Nath cracked my old (cheap) mortar and pestle and for the first time during the buying ban I was worried as I wasn't sure I would find a decent one secondhand - its not the kind of thing people generally get rid of. However, I was lucky enough to find this beauty on gumtree for $40, and, even better, it had only ever been used for decorative purposes! These usually sell for $70 - $80 new.

The sifter was something I bought after cleaning out my overflowing Tupperware cupboard. Over the years, I have bought so much Tupperware that I literally had to open the door to the cupboard, throw things in and shut the door quickly so nothing fell out. I did a huge cleanout, partially to empty my cupboard and partially to rid our kitchen of unneccessary plastic. I grew up with a sifter like this (although my mum has since 'upgraded'!) and was thrilled to find this one cheap on eBay.

 I bought Nath this didgeridoo as a gift from someone locally who was selling things in preparation to move. Nath first started dreaming of owning a didgeridoo over five years ago when we were travelling. I remember him looking at some at the markets in Broome. At the time, all of our money was going towards caravan park fees, fuel to get to the next place and food. Finally, I am able to treat him to one. This one is made from Northern Territory Blackbutt wood.

I remember a set of these lined up on my grandmother's benchtop when I was a little girl. This was a purely nostalgic purchase, and well worth it for the looks on my own girls' faces when they saw them - they love the shiny, bright colours (and the sound the lids make when clanged together).

These purchases have weaved their way into the texture of our home and make our spaces feel like they have a bit of story to them. I am loving my home these days, it is so rewarding to create a beautiful, restoring place for our family, and for my children to be able to grow up with some of the memories of special things, similar to the ones that I have from my childhood in my mother's kitchen and laundry, as well as my grandmother's.

Food In The Belly, Food For The Soul

I write about food a lot. Food is something I devote much of my time to, as well as a significant part of our income. Food excites me, challenges me and inspires me (and sometimes defeats me). Much of our weekends are taken up with the growth, preparation, cooking and celebration of food (and by that I mean eating).

Every society has a food culture of some sort. Countries are known for their cuisine; the particular ingredients and cooking methods they employ, the rhythms and routines around meal preparation, the colour and bustle of marketplaces around the world. Early trade was centred around foods, and what was commonplace for some cultures was exotic and sought after to others. Nomadic communities based their movement around the availability of particular seasonal foods.

I believe that, by and large, Western society has lost its food culture. And we miss it, by god, do we miss it. We spend millions annually on the business of food; fine dining restaurants, specialty food stores, cooking schools, food festivals. I believe that, as we have evolved, this disconnection from food and its production that we have created has left our society feeling somewhat... hollow. We make up for it by spending more millions traveling to other cultures to experience their food culture... and when we try to recreate it with our Western tastes, we adulterate and compromise the essence of the food. Food culture is, and should be, entrenched in the soils it was raised up from.

Anyway, I was determined to write a lighter post than the last two, so I wanted to share with you some of ways we try to recreate a connection with the earth and its edible gifts in our space. These are photos from this weekend, a lovely, productive two days of pottering around the house and garden, feeding our bellies and feeding our souls.

Breakfast: fruit and honey damper with the last of my apricot sauce

Our harvest on Saturday

More bottled tomatoes - a pantry staple

Our little garden gnome, Eden

The bed we planted this weekend - tomatoes and rhubarb

Orange and date chutney simmering away - a sweet, spicy smell

Finished product - three more jars for the pantry

The beginnings of beer bottling

A clean, mucked out chook pen - and our reward!

The Story of Stuff

I wonder about the TRUE COST of a $6.84 camping chair.

I went to a shopping centre today. One of those huge ones that sprawl across a suburb and contain hundreds of little shops, each with hundreds - thousands - of products, all loudly proclaiming their justified place in our lives.

I used to love shopping. It was therapy, entertainment and ritual. I could (and did!) spend whole days trawling massive centres, dragging my kids in and out of every little shop, budgeting and re-budgeting in my head as every absolutely necessary purchase drained my finances further. I would return home with aching feet, a busy mind, an empty purse and two very tired, very overstimulated toddlers who had seriously compromised the 'relaxing' aspect of my beloved shopping trip.

Then I watched 'The Story Of Stuff' online. This twenty minute film absolutely revolutionised the way I see shopping centres and challenged me to my core about my shopping habits. It was a huge factor in us deciding to spend a year buying only secondhand.

Obviously now, because of this pledge, I don't spend a lot of time inside shopping centres. Today we needed puncture repair kits so we could repair our bicycle and pram tyres. We felt this was a far better compromise than buying new tubes, and we scoured the shelves to find the kit with the least 'bits' in it. As soon as we walked into the centre, we were bombarded with subliminal messages telling us how we absolutely must buy Product X, and my, my, weren't we terrible parents if we didn't rush to the checkout with Product Y, and look how much easier life would be with plastic-fantastic Product Z. I am no longer sucked into these messages, I have completed my detox, and Nath and I walked through the shop with wide eyes and pounding heads, wryly laughing at the sheer obviousness of some of the marketing tactics employed by the major centres who spend billions of dollars finding better ways of fooling us.

I implore you to click on the link below and watch 'The Story Of Stuff'. It's twenty minutes long, and narrated by an American woman (if you are like me, and find the accent somewhat... overwhelming, persevere, it is definitely worth it.) If you are inspired, their website also contains short films about the manufacture of cosmetics, electronics and bottled water. (And for the record, we left the shop with only a tyre repair kit. And avoided being mistaken for terrorists taking photographs of busy shopping centres.)

My Shopping Trolley.

I love shopping day. I get so swept up in the colour and flavour of fresh fruits and vegetables, which make up the bulk of what I buy these days, and love the challenge of shopping more consciously every fortnight. I get asked a lot about the cost of buying organically, and whether my food bill has sky-rocketed.

Well, here's the deal. My food bill is 75% of what it was before I started on my journey of local/organic/close to the source eating. It is true that often, organic products cost more than non-organic. This is not always the case, though. Also, when you eat natural foods that have not been processed and over-packaged, you are not paying for the processing and packaging. My food bill has gone down largely because my trolley does not contain pre-prepared, convenient foods. You pay for convenience. This includes jams, sauces, snacks, breads, yoghurts - things you can make at home, but that people often don't. As a society, we are time poor, this is true. We are also nutrient poor.

Here is a photo of what I would put into my trolley for a standard-ish fortnight. There are some things here, such as vinegars and bread mix, that would bump up my bill, but that would last me a good month to six weeks. The contents of this photo cost me $300. A more 'standard' fortnight, without these bigger items, would probably cost about $250 for the fortnight. We used to spend $400. Much of the fruit and vegetables is organic. It is ALL Western Australian grown. Most of it comes from within 200-odd kilometres. The flour is local, biodynamically grown. The meat is local, organic and free ranged. (Actually, the meat was bloody expensive. That bumped my bill up somewhat. I can't wait to be up North and shooting my own meat again.)

There are a lot of arguments against buying organic foods. The cost is the most common I come across - I shop for a family of four on a single social worker's income... this argument doesn't wash with me. Another is the science behind organics - this is a whole other post, but to my mind, it comes down to what we are prepared to put into our bodies. I would rather my children eat fruit that has not been sprayed with pesticides, or meat that has not been pumped with preservatives. I would rather know exactly what is going into their bodies - real, wholesome food, not a bundle of numbers on an ingredient list that reads like an algebra exam.

This is why I shop the way I shop.

Our Buying Ban: An Update

Our buying ban is in full swing, having commenced on the 1st of January. We were away camping as we welcomed the New Year, and the buying ban didn't cause even the slightest ripple to our holiday plans. I visited the local markets and bought something locally handmade (which is within the rules) and aside from that felt no need to purchase anything.

We have been away once more since then, on our holiday to Margaret River, and Nath and I both felt that the buying ban enhanced, rather than detracted from, our time away. We bought many local foods and wines, and aside from this only entered two shops - a secondhand clothing store and a secondhand bookshop. We didn't waste endless hours trawling shops looking for things we don't need, and could probably buy closer to home even if we did need them.

Ebay is becoming my friend. I realised I would need to purchase shoes for winter for Miya as she has gone up a shoe size since last winter. I bought four pairs of winter shoes for her for $13 - including postage. I have also picked up, from local garage sales, a few winter jackets for both girls for 50 cents each - all in immaculate condition.

So far, the buying ban has not impacted us negatively in the slightest. I am sure that as the year progresses we will face times where I will desire nothing more strongly than to spend all of our savings in a massive shopping spree! Until then, though, I am content with never needing to enter the large department stores and suburban shopping centres. At least, not for the next twelve months!

A Day In Photos.

Nathan is on holidays. He has a month off work, and we have been looking forward to this break for so long. Aside from a short camping trip over New Year, we do not intend going away. We plan instead to spend some long, slow, quiet days as a family in and around our home, finishing projects, starting new ones, tending the garden, playing together, reading, cooking and relaxing.

Although this 'holiday' has been much anticipated on my part, I must admit I have struggled to slow my rhythm down and just enjoy being. I'm not used to having less time pressure and not having our weeks revolve, even grudgingly, around work days.

Today we did nothing. And it was glorious.

 

 
While I slept this morning, Nath took the girls on a nature hunt and they made these beautiful leaf/feather/stick collages. Miya particularly was so engaged by this.

I went on a op shop treasure hunt this afternoon and found these beautiful, large, festive fabrics for $1 each (each piece is about 4 metres in length) that I plan to cut and hem to use as an alternative to wrapping paper. We do have some gifts wrapped in recycled paper under the tree but I would love to replace the need for further wrapping paper, that will undoubtedly be torn off in a frenzy of gift giving and end up in our recycling bins, with reusable, material wrapping.

I also found some fantastic patterns for dresses, shirts and skirts in vintage style, which is making a return to fashion, for 50 cents apiece, as well as bags of unused wool which I picked up for my mother in law, who lives overseas and finds it difficult to find wool to sustain her knitting hobby.

But by far the best find of the day on my op shopping adventure this afternoon would have to be.....

..... an old style Soda Stream complete with the original glass bottles. This will come in very handy as I struggle through giving up my addiction to Coke Zero. The best bit, though, was the price tag....

Armed with my goodies, I came home to tuck a last few items into a Christmas Hamper to be sent overseas to Nathan's parents. Nathan's mum has a great appreciation for treasure hunting in opshops, living frugally and reducing waste, so I know she will be thrilled with their Christmas gifts this year, which, aside from a couple of iconic Australian food items, are entirely handmade or thrifted. Including the box they are being sent in.

Dinner was Nathan's creation tonight - homemade chicken burgers on damper rolls. There is something so satisfying about eating meals that have been made entirely from scratch - that is, entirely from natural, rather than processed, ingredients. We are not yet at the point where we are producing 100% of our own produce, and won't be until we either own our own home or are settled long term into a rental property, but we grow or barter or receive from the gardens of friends and family roughly half of our fruit and veg, and make almost everything from ingredients in their most natural or unprocessed form.

Slow days at home - what a blessing!

A Buying 'Ban'

I decided a couple of weeks ago, inspired by EcoMILF's pledge, I decided to take up the challenge of buying nothing new for 365 days. I will begin this challenge on January 1st 2011, and end it on December 31st 2011. Nathan has agreed to join me on this journey (and, no, he was not coerced!) so as a family we hope to achieve a few goals:

• Reduce our environmental impact by keeping things out of landfill, reducing the amount of packaging we bring into our home, and placing our purchasing power behind more sustainable ways of living.
• Reduce our addiction to consumption and the pull of marketing.
• Learn new ways of providing... such as sewing, mending and repairing and sourcing things second hand.
• Save some money - now that we will be on one income, it is important that we readjust our spending patterns so that we can live within our means.

So what's off the list?

New clothes, shoes, accessories

New craft supplies, kitchenware or kitchen appliances

Home decorating items, including linen, photo frames etc

New furniture 

New CDs, DVDs or books (yes, this may be my undoing!)

toys, gifts, stationery

Items from party plan demonstrations (eg Tupperware) - sorry friends!

Gardening supplies

So what are the exceptions?

Underwear, makeup (although as I finish items from my makeup bag I will be replacing them with 'greener' brands)

New items made entirely from recycled materials

Local handcrafted items

Pre-loved items from ebay, opshops and markets

Food and drink

Toiletries

A laptop - I may not fit this into this year's budget and as I need to relinquish my work laptop when I complete my employment, I am in the market for a new one. I looked at the ecological benefits of buying a refurbished laptop vs a new one from a company that is working to improve its environmental policies and features, and it seems that in this case, new is the way to go.

Gifts from other people - we realise that this is our journey and no-one else's and do not wish to offend anyone or cause discomfort, so on gift-giving occasions we will be thrilled to receive any gift that has been chosen by our loved ones.

So join me on what I am sure will be a challenging journey. Those of you who know me well will realise that this is a rather large step for me! Wish me luck!