Little eco footprints

Slow Living Diary {January 2012}

The sort of information I share in this blog is different to what I might share if I was chatting to a friend over a cuppa. I’d probably tell them about the delicious batch of lemon balm tea I made and how I had to throw it out because it went mouldy, or the crazy challenge I’ve signed up for.

Reading some of the entries in Christine’s monthly diary ‘Slow Living Month by Month’, I got the sense that the information being shared was cuppa fodder. I couldn’t help but join in.

So grab a cuppa and real along. This is my January in a nut shell.

{Nourish}

It’s been a busy month so I’ve resorted to regular favourite meals, including lentil loaf, dahl, and brown rice vege bake (shown above). To save on cooking time I’ve been cooking in bulk and we eat the same meal for few a days, varying the vegetable side dish. It's boring but reduces cooking and washing up time.

{Prepare}

I’ve enjoyed preserving plenty of free and frugal fruit this month. There were the free foraged apples and last week I turned a $1 box of tomato ‘seconds’ into five bottles of tomato sauce.

Our lemon balm bush needed pruning so I made a jar of lemon balm tea. I stripped off the leaves, washed them, dried them in the dehydrator, and chopped them in a food processor. It was absolutely delicious and I was feeling rather pleased with myself, until a few days ago when I discovered the jar of tea was full of mould. Looks like I didn't dry the leaves enough.

{Reduce}

I was thrilled to receive this old fowlers unit from Kate in a LETS trade. Up until now I’ve done my bottling in a pot of boiling water on the stove. I’m looking forward to being able to process more bottles at once.

Working from home has reduced the amount of driving I do. I'm working from home three days a week, but I have been a little too easily distracted, so I have been trialling the pomodorro technique.

{Green}

After a few months of wondering whether to let my hair grey naturally, I decided to continue dying my hair with henna. On a recent visit to a local Indian grocery store (super cheap source of spices and pulses) I was thrilled to discover Henna for only $4 a packet instead of the $24 I usually pay when buying it at the organic food store.

{Grow}

Very little has been happening in our garden. There’s always rhubarb and a few herbs, but that’s about it at the moment.

My garden has been neglected for almost two years since we discovered the lead contamination. Making the garden lead safe is going to take some effort, so I've been delaying until I have the time to plan the garden carefully. That ‘time’ is not far away because I’ve enrolled in a Permaculture Design Certificate course. I can’t wait!

{Create}

I enjoy making birthday gifts. This month my mum got a new bag for her dancing shoes and one of Little Eco's friends got a headband made from vintage sheets using this easy tutorial.

Little Eco and I also enjoyed making frugal and fun playdough as birthday gifts.

I was thrilled to have my first magazine article published. It was an article in Peppermint Magazine on ethical and sustainable places to eat, shop and play in Newcastle. I've started to really enjoy writing so was excited about the opportunity. I also enjoyed writing this months post over at Childhood 101. It was on a personal topic, enriching the life of an only child, and it was a pleasure to read some of the comments from Mothers in a similar situation.

{Discover}

I recently discovered that the 22nd of April is International Mother Earth Day. That is one day I will definitely be celebrating!

{Enhance}

In a moment of insanity I registered for WildEndurance and managed to convince six friends to join me. We'll be walking 100km in less than 36 hours to raise funds for the Wilderness Society. I thought it would be a fun way to spend my 40th birthday.

{Enjoy}

We celebrated my Mums 60th birthday, which turned into a surprise engagement party. I was thrilled to see my mum share this wonderful surprise with many of her friends and family. My Mums long-term partner had planned, and kept secret, the engagement for months and even had a ring custom made. The ring was made by re-using gold and stones from sentimental family jewellery.

So what would you share with me if we were chatting over a cuppa? How was your January on the simple living front?

Stop buying stuff and donate instead: Charity Christmas gifts

We're giving charity gifts this Christmas.

I love that by giving charity Christmas gifts we're distancing ourselves from the commercialisation of Christmas. I also love that charity giving is super green, because the resources involved include little more than some paper, printing and postage.

And let's not forget that charity Christmas gifts are tax deductible.

I hope that giving charity gifts becomes a new Christmas tradition for our family. It's not like anyone in our family truly needs anything.

I finished our Christmas shopping only moments ago and have a lovely warm and fuzzy feel-good feeling. I don't recall shopping ever making me feel this good.

I didn't have to fight the Christmas crowds. Instead I sat at my computer and a few hours later had bought 15 Christmas presents.

Each recipient will receive a card that reveals the charity gift we purchased on their behalf. We're having the cards sent here so that we can write in the cards ourselves and wrap them in some of Little Eco's artwork.

Spoiler alert. If you're family, please stop reading now, because I don't want you guessing which gift is yours...

I mean it!...That means you too mum ;-)

There are literally hundreds of different charity gifts available, making it easy to individualise gifts. We had fun choosing gifts based on the recipients interests, personality, or sense of humour.

We tried to spread our love around as much as possible by purchasing from a range of charities. I was having trouble deciding between all the great charity gifts available so I also bought gifts for Daddy Eco, Little Eco and myself, despite not intending to.

Through the gifts we bought we supported:

• the Wesley Mission by buying a haircut and shave for a homeless man;
• Care Australia by sponsoring school for a year for a girl;
• the Smith Family, by contributing towards the student2student program and also by buying a gift pack of toys and books for a disadvantaged child to open on Christmas day;
• WWF’s conservation programs to protect threatened species and their habitats by adopting a Rock Wallaby;
• The Fred Hollows Foundation through a Gift of sight card;
• Unicef by buying a Football for children in refugee camps or other neglected corners of the world;
• Greenpeace's work in protecting threatened species habitat;
• the World Society for the Protection of Animals in their quest to end animal cruelty by feeding a dog for a month; and
• Oxfam by contributing towards the establishment of female support services for Aboriginal women in rural Australia. We also bought a fishing net for a Katkari tribe in India and a pile of poo for a family in Sri Lanka so that they can grow their crops without the need for chemical fertiliser;

After all that shopping I felt like we still had a little more love to share, so supported World Vision by gifting Little Eco's childcare centre and pre-school a duck for a poor family and support for early learning for indigenous children. Saves me baking the biscuits I'd initially planned as teacher gifts.

Have you given or received charity Christmas gifts? Would receiving a charity gift make you feel robbed of a gift?

The pictures accompanying this post are of Little Eco creating our leaf advent calendar and decorating our free foraged natural Christmas tree. 

Upcycling old woollen jumpers into felt stash boxes {crafternoon blog party}

Little Eco and I enjoy upcycling old materials into something new. I often struggle to come up with quick and easy projects that we can complete in an hour or two, so we've been enjoying the inspiring project ideas in Kathreen's two latest Kids Crafternoon books: Kids' Crafternoon Felting and Kids' Crafternoon beading.

Like the previous two crafternoon books, each book is filled with practical and creative projects that can be easily completed by beginner crafters in an afternoon. Little Eco and I choose to start by making a couple of the Zakka Stash Boxes (contributed by Suzie Fry) to organise her hairbrush and elastics.

We used felt i'd created by felting a couple of old woolen jumpers.

My approach to felting is pretty simple. I throw the woolen jumpers I want to felt into a pillow slip. They need to be greater than 30% wool and 100% wool is the best. I then simply toss the pillow slip into the washing machine and wash on hot (with whatever clothes I think would benefit from a hot wash given that I usually wash in cold water).

Kids Crafternoon Felting includes instructions on how to felt and 'take apart' woolen jumpers, along with instructions for all sorts of other cool stuff like wet felting, needle felting, and basic hand sewing stitches.

The Zakka Stash Boxes were super easy to make. I'd cut the felt and sewn the boxes together in under an hour and then Little Eco helped me decorate them with hand stitching.

Little Eco and the girls from up the road have already put in requests to make around a dozen projects from each of the books. High on the list are the Zombie Critter Charms, a felt wallet, and beaded badges and critters.

Want to find out more about these books? You can visit the rest of the crafternoon blog tour at following sites:

{The Red Thread}  {Soosz}  {mmmcrafts}  {Between the Lines} {Christine Chitnis} {Chez Beeper Bebe} {The Happy Zombie} {Go Make Me} {Love in the Mommyhood} {JCasa Handmade}  {Picklebums}   {Modern Parents Messy Kids}   {Simple Kids}   {li'l magoolie}   {Sadie and Lance} and tomorrow over at {Poppytalk}

Both books are available from Booktopia.

A simple quick and easy natural advent calendar

I'm aiming for a simple Christmas this year. I'm refusing to get caught up in all the business that usually comes with Christmas and instead am aiming to slow down.

I'm doing this by being ruthless with the tasks I decide to take on.

I'm starting with our advent calendar. Last years leaf advent calender was super quick and easy, so we'll make one the same this year. But last year, I complicated our life by making it an activity-orientated calendar, identifying a different nature play or eco craft activity for each day. It was fun, but really, I was simply adding more tasks to our already busy schedule. Little Eco was more excited about the calender and being able to remove a leaf each day than the activities. 

So this year there will be no activities or gifts associated with each day. We'll simply remove a leaf each day and focus on counting down till Christmas. Based on Little Eco's excitement for the calendar last year I know this will be more than enough.

Speaking of 'more than enough', I wrote about our 'less is more' approach to Christmas over at Childhood 101 today.

Are you already overwhelmed by the business of Christmas? Do you have a super long 'to do' list? Perhaps you could also be a little more ruthless with the tasks you decide to take on?

Don't forget the Planet Boab giveaway.

More kids dress-up wings made from recycled t-shirts

Megan from The Byron Life recently featured the dress-up wings I made for Little Eco from old t-shirts (using this tutorial).

She's motivated me to share some pictures of the wings I've subsequently made for birthday gifts.....

{image by Madeline}

There were three more sets, all for boys. In black & red, browns and blues. But I made these three the night before they all needed to gifted (on the same day!) so I barely finished them let alone had time to take a photo. I haven't been able to motivate myself to make a pair since that epic night.

I've managed to get my creating time down to an hour and a half by making the feathers wider so that I need less, and by not being too concerned with the 'rustic' look.

In contrast, the pair I made for Little Eco took hours and hours because it had so many feathers.

I think an hour and a half to make a birthday gift isn't too bad. It can sometimes take that long to simply go shopping for a gift.

I mostly buy my second-hand t-shirts for  $1 each or $5 a bag, so each set of wings cost less than $3. I also save time and money by not buying wrapping paper or a card. We simply wrap gifts in one of Little Eco's old artworks and write on the paper itself, or make a quick gift tag from an old card.

These wings are definitely my favourite handmade frugal gift for kids. Do you have a favourite handmade or frugal gift?