November, and everything after...

Erm, happy new year! Chinese new year that is.... So yes, it's been a while and I still haven't sent out my Christmas epistle to all those who usually get it. I've been even more late than usual this season.

Why? Well basically November happened, and then December... For me, like most people I know, the major political event of November 2016 was pretty galling, but I was already in a state of altered reality and discombobulation. Nothing to do with Brexit (although that too has added to the general feeling that somehow we seem to be living in Discworld where parody has overtaken reality), but a day after her 90th birthday Phyllis took ill. Three days of scaring the living daylights out of me with her rapid decline led to hospitalization, treatment, further decline and the prospect of losing her loomed large.

Having reached the point where the Doctors were saying 'you do realize this is end of life care don't you, we're just making her comfortable for her last days, perhaps weeks' everyone started turning up to say goodbye to Grandma. She was ready to go, prayed to go in fact, but whoever was listening decided that there were other plans afoot and instead she started to get better.

It has been a slow, but steady improvement. And after a transfer back to the local hospital for rehab and now the local rest home for more of the same, she's literally back on her feet again if a tad unsteady at times. Not back to how she was (remarkably well for 90!), but there's time yet and currently the issue is reminding her how sick she was so don't over do things!

So I'm now rather well acquainted with the local hospital staff and routines, Joanne and I could probably get a pretty good reference if we wanted to be auxiliaries and we've learned more than we ever wanted to about a whole heap of things to do with the personal care of an incapacitated person. We've also learned how desperately understaffed our hospitals are and that the prospects are slim for anyone who needs that level of care who doesn't have family and friends to be at the bedside almost 24hrs a day coaxing food and drink down in minute but regular quantities, who help can adjust positioning the moment discomfort is felt, who can assist a nurse rather than them have to wait until two of them are free to change dressings and pads, toilet, shower etc.

Gradually life is now slipping into a 'new normal' and feels somewhat more connected to the outside world rather than being in some strange bubble. In fact I have been blogging for a couple of weeks, but that was setting up Marion's blog for her recipes etc. Basically she doesn't have time to get things publishable, so it's a team effort where she drafts stuff and I post it. After her and Mandy rescuing the gluten free and/or non-meat eating Summer Gatherers from the results of miscommunication and understandings and whipping up some fabulous food with the kitchen staff her recipes are in even more demand than ever! So now I just need to get my own blog back on track again, oh and get Docs in Advance ready for the printer, and the last bit of the new EcoCentre website drafted, and..... hmmm, anyone got a timeturner I could borrow?

to have and have not

A f/Friend shared this article on Facebook earlier this week. In it a piece written by a medical student who had experimented with living on $3.30 a day for 200 days is critiqued. His argument was that as he had thrived on this it shows how all the other factors of poverty must have a bigger effect on health outcomes than poor diet.

His argument sounds fairly reasonable until you factor in that he had weekends 'off', and stuck it out for 200 days out of +20yrs. Real poverty doesn't take weekends off, and the health impacts are generally due to accumulation over years not 200 days, unless one is only 200 days old. Anyway, the other article says lots of this better than I can.

I've lived on or below the official poverty line for a hefty chunk of my life. However I come from a middle class background where there has been enough money to house us well throughout my childhood no matter how low our family income might have been at times. Whenever I've found myself facing homelessness (3 times!) I've had friends with good incomes who have provided me with a home. I've lived off a very low disposable income since coming to Aotearoa NZ but there has always been someone else paying the bulk of the bills. Yes I have eating healthily off a low income down pat which proves it can be done, but I have the cashflow ability to buy in bulk, I never have to sacrifice buying food to replace a broken washing machine, buy school shoes, or fix a car. Also the only times in life that I've been turned down for jobs through prejudice has been when I was considered 'over qualified', rather than from having the wrong address, skin colour etc. Yes I know what it is like to have too much month at the end of the money, and have lived off frozen spinach, tinned tomatoes and bread from the half price bakery for several weeks waiting for the next grant cheque, but I've never actually gone hungry.

I think for some people doing the living off $3 a day or whatever experiment is quite an eye-opener and can teach them a very different perspective on life they might otherwise have been oblivious to. But they are usually still doing that in the comfort of their own home, with their bills paid, a job to go to etc etc etc. To really 'get it' you need to factor in more than just one aspect of your day. I'm always impressed though with the will power of those who've done the living off x amount a day, or refugee rations for a week/month in aid of Oxfam etc to raise awareness/funds. It's not something I ever intend to try given my health, and it would take a lot of planning not to end up with other food in the house/garden going to waste because you weren't eating anything but the rations etc, which does seem rather pointless. After all I'm pretty sure those for whom it is a daily reality wouldn't appreciate perfectly good food being wasted on their behalf. 

The difference between living in poverty and living below the poverty line can be huge and I am grateful for the skills I've learned as a result of the latter, and the fact that I've had the privilege in life not to fall into the former. Being part of inter-generational poverty, growing up with poor nutrition through lack of funds and/or education, living off cheap takeaways as there isn't enough money for power bills this month is the reality for some. Living in poverty is often more expensive than simply being poor, you can't take advantage of supermarket specials as you have no spare cash to buy anything not desperately needed this week, you end up paying far more for power etc to get the fixed installments so you can budget (or worse have to have pay a $500 bond to get those fixed installments! I was horrified to discover this when sorting out our neighbours affairs earlier this year) and so the list goes on. So yes providing good healthy food for the children of these families will go a long way to improving their outcome, no matter how cheaply someone else in better circumstances can feed themselves. There has recently been a swell of enthusiasm locally to get some fruit trees planted around town on public land and I really hope we can make it happen to improve access to free healthy kai here as there are plenty who need it. Now we just have to kick up a noisy fuss about the new food regulations which are making it difficult for small scale growers who sell off their surplus at the market to help make ends meet... there's always something to make life harder when you're struggling already.

Be careful what you wish for...

 ...it might just happen!

A saying that I've found there to be a lot of truth in over the years, and usually it presents something quite different to deal with than what was first envisioned.

I've joined a couple more Facebook groups recently partly for work, and partly for my own benefit, one of which is Zero Waste in NZ! Basically it's for folk who are on the same waste reduction, simpler living journey as myself. Although some would say it's a harder way making a lot of stuff yourself rather than simpler, but personally I'd rather spend an extra hour in the kitchen than trekking to and round the supermarket, not to mention walking home again laden down with stuff.

Recently someone posted a question about food storage that resulted in a flurry of photos of people's pantries full of jars, tins and baskets. It has to be said there was a lot of pantry envy going on in the group! I find it hard to envision what a pantry would look like with only my dietary requirements in it given that hasn't happened for over a decade, and I've gone gluten free since then, not to mention having relocated to the opposite side of the globe which does rather tend to redefine 'local products'. But I guess if 'my' stuff were all together in a cupboard rather than squeezed in and around everything else in our kitchen, it probably wouldn't look that different from those I was oohing and ahhing over. Anyway, I was particularly admiring some large glass jars someone had and I was thinking they would be great for my oats and my 'porridge' mix (which these days looks more like muesli, but it still gets soaked overnight and cooked up in the morning). But I'm trying to avoid buying anything brand new and large jars don't often show up at the market or in op/charity shops. Some re-jigging freed up a large tin to use for my mix, but not before I'd been eyeing up the jars I get my milk in as a possibility.

But the milk jars get cycled round between the farm, drop-off point and me so the only way they'd become available would be if I stopped getting the milk. Whilst I've been wondering for some months if I could manage without milk without reverting to buying imported tetrapacks of soy/rice/almond milk, I kept putting that decision in the too hard basket. But now the new dairy regs are about to kick in at the end of the month the farm milk is no longer available as the tests the Ministry requires are exorbitantly expensive. So, I now have two large jars! (the 3rd is still at the farm, some you win, some you lose). One is already full of rolled oats, the other is awaiting a decision as the tin is working out quite well.

So I got my large jars that I wanted, and I didn't have to buy them new, but now I have to figure out what to do about milk... I've enough milk either fresh or frozen to last a couple of weeks yet at least, so there's no rush. But I've got a bowl of almonds soaking which I'll then freeze so when I do run out I have no excuse and can whizz up some almond milk as and when I need it, as remembering to soak the almonds in advance has been my stumbling block in the past. And of course I can get Trade Aid organic coconut milk (which is rather nice) at the healthfood shop, but it's hardly local, and neither are the almonds, but I can buy organic almonds loose using my cloth produce bags rather than in plastic. It's all an ever changing juggling act of priorities....

I'm sure I can cope without yoghurt on my porridge, especially as I'm making sauerkraut again as our garden has gone into cabbage patch overdrive, so I can get a daily dose of probiotics at lunchtime instead. Although I could make yoghurt with coconut milk if I really wanted to. It probably means making more oatcakes or seed crackers and fewer pikelets again, but that's no big deal, and as Gill pointed out many moons ago you can make pikelets with water!

So after pondering what I should challenge myself to tackle next in terms of lowering my footprint on the earth it turns out the decision has been made for me. And I think that's probably enough to be getting my head round for now.

Plastic Free July and all that

Whoa, where did August get to? I started this at the beginning of the month and figured I'd best get it finished before September got here!

Whilst this is the 3rd year I've done the Plastic Free July challenge, it is the first time I've known others doing it. I put posters up about it at the EcoCentre last year, but whilst various folk commented on it to me and said it was a good idea no-one said they would give it a go. However it turns out that several of them did, and this year they were willing to push it further within our local community.

Three times in July we've had stalls at the market, along with a bottle buy-back scheme with a grant from the Far North District Council where folk could get 10c refund for every clean, lidless, number 1 plastic (PET) bottle they brought along. We had $500 to give away, but it has taken all three market days plus some additional time at the EcoCentre to work through less than half of it. It takes time to bring about a change in people's habits, and whilst every weekend in July would've been better in terms of promoting the scheme it would've been much harder on our volunteers, especially as the first Saturday in July was a very cold and frosty morning! (yes, frosty. In Kaitaia, the so-called 'Winterless North'!). Momentum is building for a national container deposit scheme like they have in South Australia, so there is hope of bringing about change and getting more plastic, glass and aluminium recycled. But it would be better still if we didn't use so much plastic in the first place. We've had another 'buy-back' earlier this month and have got one last push this Saturday where we hope to hand out the rest

I was working at the EcoCentre the other day when a woman came in assuming we were the i-Site (Tourist Information Centre), this is far from unusual as they used to be in the building we use, but shifted almost 4yrs ago into Te Ahu when it was opened. But rather than head straight back out when I pointed her in the right direction to find them (all of 100m away, if that) she asked So what is this place then? I saw your 'say no to single use plastic' sign, it's something I know I need to do more about, but don't know where to start. Well about half an hour later she headed off with lots to think about and some ideas to bring about change in the flat she shares in Auckland. Like many people she knows the theory of what to do, but gets stuck on the practice. Habits, as I said, take time to change. I have always found it easiest to change one thing at a time, and once it becomes normal practice and you don't have to think about it any more then add in something new.

For me a simple step was always carry around with me a cloth shopping bag. I've added to that more recently by also having a wee pouch with some cotton bags that I get flour, grains etc in from the bulk bins at the health food shop, and some net bags for produce, or larger bulk bin items like nuts that are big enough not to work their way out of the mesh. They are always there, like my purse, my keys and (usually!) my phone. That way I don't have to think about it when I go shopping, and if I want to impulse shop after (or even at) work I don't find myself caught short needing to use plastic bags.

One of the questions our visitor asked was about plastic bin liners, how do you manage without them? Well in our kitchen we do use a plastic carrier bag as a bin liner, but we empty that into the rubbish sack in the garage and re-use the bag until it gets too torn. It doesn't get very dirty as we rinse any food containers out before putting them in there, and we compost, and wash then recycle far more than we throw away. We could of course not use a liner and wash the bin out more often, or make newspaper liners, but that is a step yet to be taken in this household. I explained that I stopped having a bin in every room, if you have to walk to a different room to dispose of your rubbish it is mentally easier to ensure you put it in the recycling or compost rather than landfill. I was asked about sanitary towels etc, what did I do about those? Well having used a menstrual cup for years until no longer required that hadn't been problem for me, and I now use homemade washable pantiliners daily as what remains of my menstrual cycle is minimal but highly irregular. But between us we figured out that a pile of paper bags in the bathroom, or even old newspaper, would mean there was something to put sanitary towels in before taking them to a central bin.

Having someone else to problem-solve our dilemmas with is why forums such as the Plastic Free July Facebook page come in to their own, even better are local support groups. That is why we held a 'Plastic Free Lunch' at the end of July at the EcoCentre. Those who could/remembered brought along their 'dilemma bags' the single use plastic they hadn't managed to avoid and it was interesting even with a relatively small sample how much difference there was in content. Having a group together meant we solved a couple of 'where can you buy ...... in a non-plastic container?' queries, and we came up with a way to repurpose something which was actioned as soon as we tidied up. But the discussion, and my reflections on looking at what was in the JYF Camp 'dilemma bag', brought up the question as to when certain packaging had changed. Having swapped countries and moved from cities to a small town it's hard for me to say on some things, especially ones I don't generally shop for. In Wellington you could get loo roll wrapped in paper, but shipped over from Australia, whereas the Kiwi made stuff was in plastic..., up here I've generally not been the one shopping for it so couldn't say when paper wrapped loo roll ceased to be available. Same with cheese, I don't know when it ceased to be available cut off the block and only came shrink wrapped up here as it isn't something I eat let alone buy. I'm guessing thought that such availability locally predates my arrival in the country. Someone is going to ask our local butcher if they'll let them use their own containers for meat, not much help to me, but good for the community in general if they will. The lunch itself was delivered plastic free, the soup arrived in the pan it had been cooked in (and then reheated on our woodstove! Oh how wonderfully warm it gets in there now), the bread bought from the market came in a paper bag, and the home made flapjack arrived in a tin. It's making the small habitual steps like using a tin rather than a plate with clingfilm/glad wrap/saran wrap over it that can build up and shift your use of plastic without it being a major upheaval in life.

When I was at JYF Camp one of the other leaders said how he struggled to understand people getting rid of perfectly good plastic things that still had life in them, and he saw that as creating more waste not less and he couldn't see the point. Well yes if they are throwing those things out it is counterproductive, but mostly they get rehomed/recycled. I've been slowly swapping my assorted plastic kitchen containers for glass or ceramic ones, as I've found the less plastic I have the easier it is to be strong willed not to let new plastic in to the house. In clearing out a neighbour's kitchen recently I had the opportunity to have first pick of the stuff she had, and several things I put to one side only to return them to the 'getting rid of' boxes as they were plastic. They were all 'it would be nice to have...' items rather than essentials, so I could wait until I found a metal/glass/wooden one etc. There was of course also the 'yes it would be nice to have but where the heck would I put it?' factor. Whilst we've cleared a lot of stuff out over the years I've been living here there is still a distinct lack of spare space in the house, mainly due to having gained two part time residents!

So with July over for this year we're now starting to plan ahead at the EcoCentre for next year, where is our 'plastic free' campaign going to take us next? All kinds of ideas are buzzing around, but like with implementing change in our own homes we need to do this at an incremental level that is sustainable, we want to bring people with us on this journey, not scare them off.

exploring possibilities

When we were planning the programme for the Junior Young Friends Camp we found ourselves inundated with offers from Friends to lead sessions to the extent that we found ourselves turning down and restricting offers. That was certainly one of the plus points of planning a camp to overlap with Yearly Meeting, there were so many Friends on hand who wouldn't usually all be in the same locale. But we also had lots of interest and support from Friends on Waiheke Island where we were to spend the first 5 days and as it turns out we could probably have filled our programme with them alone, which is encouraging for future years planning!

At our Monthly Meeting Residential Gathering at the end of April I got a very enthusiastic invitation from Ian for the JYFs to visit the Eco Village on Waiheke where he lived and get a guided tour. Well I wasn't sure what the JYFs (aged 13-16) would think of the idea but I was certainly interested! And thankfully the rest of the planning team figured it was worth going too.

I must admit I was a little apprehensive as to how it would go. I hoped Ian's passion would be contagious and that the JYFs would at least humour someone old enough to be their granddad and wouldn't find it boooooooooring.... They were pretty quiet when those showing their homes and explaining how they were built etc asked them questions, so it was hard to know how much they were engaging with what they were seeing. But then around a corner they spotted the house built into the hillside, 'a hobbit house'! It was like opening the flood gates; they were a babbling brook of ideas and dreams cascading in all directions. By the time we got back to Friends House they had planned 'Quobbiton' where they'd all live together in a variety of earth houses all off grid, using electric vehicles, and bringing up their children in a rural idyll; which whilst owing a lot to Awaawaroa Village in design and setting would definitely have a decent internet connection and be within mobile phone signal! And I have to say I'm with them on that caveat. Also my personal vision of such a community would have it a lot closer to public transport, shops and services.

I was impressed, once again, with what is possible with earth houses. The possibilities for individual design and artistry combined with ages old techniques which have withstood the tests of time really appeals. There's a very homely feel to the spaces they enclose that must speak to some ancestral memory. I was horrified to learn though of the new building code restrictions which mean if building large enough to need planning permission you can no longer re-use old joinery such as window casements. Given the vast amount of such building material available for re-use in this country from Christchurch it seems a criminal waste of resources. But with a land built house of 10 square meters or less (ie not needing planning permission) the loo has to be in a separate building or accessed from outside if attached, and I have to say as a regular nocturnal visitor to the facilities that severely limits their appeal for me, but I guess I could get used to a night-time commode.

A question I would've loved to have asked but didn't being mindful of the fact that we were there for the JYFs benefit rather than the adults, was how did those living in that remote valley with a very labour intensive lifestyle plan to manage if life found them without the physical ability to cope with what was needful to keep everything running effectively let alone efficiently. As someone with varying health and ability to manage our 1/4 acre section I have found out more than once that weeds are no respecter of energy limitations, and cooking your food from scratch is all very well when fit and healthy, but it is quite another matter when you're only up to foraging for instant sustenance rather than starting from raw ingredients. They said themselves it isn't a lifestyle that often appeals to young adults, so can they find enough folk whose situation is perhaps like mine (minus their own chronic health issues!) who can be the live-in help? I'm figuring most conventional home helps would baulk at getting to some of the locations (even now travel time is paid) let alone dealing with composting toilets in outbuildings and working within the ecological footprint of their clients in a manner that sustains the buildings rather than destroys their wonderful finishes.

Maybe in another twenty years there'll be an accessible corner or Quobbiton where I can park up my tiny house; be surrounded by young families, with an earth-built community space where we can all get together. I'd get to allo(grand)parent the children and there'd be folk there to chop wood for me and help with the heavier gardening tasks. Sounds pretty good I reckon. Now if we can just find that miraculous middle-of-nowhere-yet-close-to-town site we'll be sweet...

Plastic Free July - round three....

Plastic Free July is well under way but time for blogging has been non-existent this month until now. For me PFJ started three years ago and the only thing different about the other months is I don't save the bits I can't avoid to keep track of them all, although I do try to notice the things that crop up most often in order to figure out a longer term plan to avoid them.

I'm better organised now for a, well I'd like to say plastic free lifestyle, but that still seems impossible, and not necessarily practical nor desirable given how much I rely on computers etc in my life. I've just got home from being the cook/camp parent at our Junior Young Friends Camp, and trying to carry the kaupapa of PFJ with me through that event was certainly a challenge. It meant that I travelled down to Waiheke Island with a LOT more stuff than I'd normally take. Partly this was due to having been clearing out a neighbour's house and thus kitchen cupboards after she went into hospital/care/funeral parlour in rapid succession (the main reason why everything non-essential went out the window this month). Unopened packets etc could go to the foodbank but not started ones, so I turned up at camp with some of the 'shopping' done already. I also turned up with an apron, waxed food wraps, various tubs (full of aforementioned 'shopping' for travel, but packed to use for leftovers/storage once there), fly nets to cast over prepared food sitting waiting, net bags for buying fruit & veg, a skooshy bottle for diy surface cleaner, a shopping trolley and several cloth shopping bags. Oh and an easy-yo maker! Yes buying packets of easy-yo means adding to the non-recyclable plastic rather than reducing it, but it also makes a big difference to the budget and you have to pick your battles...

Due to having to reorganize the timetable at short notice Peter and I whisked up a fill-in session one day where I explained to them the PFJ journey I was on, and then as I disappeared back into the kitchen to get lunch ready Peter got them thinking about how things were in their own homes/lives and what they might be able to change. How much that session will influence their thinking and actions over the coming years remains to be seen, given the amount of junk food they stocked up on for an all-nighter on the last night suggests that they aren't quite ready to embrace it fully yet, but I was asked for the flapjack recipe I'd used as apparently it tasted better than the bought bars and those were nearly all 'just air' in the packets anyway. Every step counts though, and I can hardly expect a bunch of teenagers to rush to embrace something that has taken me until my mid 40s to be proactive about!

One huge bonus of thinking in terms of PFJ when planning the menus and doing the shopping for JYF Camp was that I ended up feeding them for around $10 per day in the end (allowing for the free food that I took and was donated by local Friends), which was way under budget. I didn't take a photo of the non-recyclable plastic laid out, but this is the sum total of non-recyclable plastic created by the kitchen over 5 days of camp on Waiheke (the mug is there for scale!) Most of it is cheese wrappers and easy-yo packets...

....and there wasn't much to add to that from the couple of days we had at Mt Eden, leastways not from the food I provided - the sushi in plastic cartons with soy sauce sachets we got for lunch at St Cuthbert's when we joined Yearly Meeting was something of a fly in the ointment. Two f/Friends at YM also doing the PFJ challenge very diligently kept their cartons to take home for their dilemma bags, but I decided a mental note of it would suffice. Unfortunately unlike in Kaitaia plastic bags can't be recycled in Auckland, so the unused breadbags etc that I'd been saving for the packed lunches on the last day did make up a breadbags worth of additional landfill. I did consider bringing them home to recycle but my luggage was already stuffed full of leftover ingredients I bought off the Camp. By that point I was so tired I totally forgot to take a photo of the bag collection.

Like the fairly self-sufficient lifestyle we saw at the Eco Village of Awa Awa Roa, cooking almost everything from scratch is very labour intensive, but it is also very rewarding. It took me working full time in the kitchen plus several hours of help a day to keep an average of 22 people fed throughout the days we were on Waiheke. It's certainly not something I could do for longer stretches of time, and I did decided to pass when given the opportunity to do it all again next year. But I'm really glad I did it. Not only did I prove to myself that I could, in terms of energy as well as keeping the kaupapa going, but also providing food that was close enough to my usual diet not to matter in addition to keeping a bunch of hungry teens satisfied. Plus I proved that one can provide such food on a low budget. Admittedly using the local wholesalers for dried fruit, nusts/seeds and pulses made a big difference and buying in bulk is tricky for those on a limited income each week, but it isn't impossible.

biting off a bigger challenge

If you've been following my blog for a while you'll know I've done the Plastic Free July challenge for the last couple of years. This year will have an added twist as I'm catering for our Junior Young Friends Camp for Quaker teenagers for a week during the month.

Can I produce food that will satisfy over a dozen potentially picky eaters on budget without amassing a huge pile of non-recyclable plastic? What's more can I do it in a kitchen I've never been in before, in a place where I don't know the shops?! Thankfully I have a wonderful local ally who is doing some research for me, and has promised to ring me from the kitchen of Friends House Waiheke so I can ask 'is there a....' to make sure I can round up in advance all the dishes and utensils I'll need etc for cooking from scratch on a bulk scale.

I did the catering for JYF Camp in 2006, and still have some of my recipe sheets from then with bulk quantities for baking scones and biscuits already worked out which will save me some time and mental energy. That time we were in Totaranui, Abel Tasman with no easy access to shops to top up if we ran out of anything, thankfully I won't have that challenge, but I won't have a nice big commercial kitchen this time - some you win, some you lose! The menu will be vegetarian, and a lot of it will be vegan and gluten free so that I don't end up cooking multiple versions of things. My main motivation for saying I'd do the cooking is because I wanted to try to keep what I ate as close to what I would usually to improve my chances of getting through the gathering with my insides happy. The other challenge will be getting enough sleep, but that isn't something I can do much about in advance!

As the years pass by the impact of plastic on our environment is becoming more and more evident. And as with many development 'solutions' the solutions often cause more problems themselves. Who would've thought when they came out that using microfibre cloths for cleaning which can reduce the chemicals being flushed down our drains, and wearing fleecy clothing made from recycled bottles would end up simply shifting the environmental pollution rather than getting rid of it?

It is becoming increasingly apparent that there is no such place as 'away' to throw anything, and whilst we grapple with ways to deal with 70 year's worth of debris that isn't going to biodegrade the challenge is not to add to the problem. But you have to pick your battles, or your priorities, otherwise we'd all get completely bogged down trying to get through even a single day without some detrimental effect on our environment. Where we live and what we do in life changes what is possible and most effective. The trick is in supporting each other in whatever we can do rather than being critical for what 'others' don't do. There is no one size fits all solution, and if the 'solutions' simply end up shifting the problem then it is probably better that we don't all try to solve it in the same manner anyway.

So I'll be doing my bit to keep the amount of non-recyclable plastic to a minimum at a vegetarian gathering that will bring Friends together from one end of these islands to the other (Kaitaia and Dunedin!). The aim of the event is to inspire our young people and help instill in them some of our Quaker values, hopefully 'let us try what Love can do' coming through loud and clear. And to those who want all Friends to stay at home and not fly anywhere, fine, you stay home and make your point. We'll get on with doing our bit the best way we can, together.

re-purposed

I've done a lot of decluttering over the last year or so, so I'm getting to the trickier stage where all the easy stuff has gone. However I was really pleased with myself today. I've been trying to reduce the amount of plastic in my life (check out 'Plastic Free July') and had been thinking earlier today about what plastic was left that could still be replaced. I came up with the plastic scoops in various flour/grain crocks in the kitchen. 

Then I thought back to last month, and on the way home from having a shared meal and Meeting for Worship at Helen & Keith's, Nancy and I had called in to the Bush Fairy Dairy in Peria, which is something of a local icon. I'd been hearing about it since I first moved up here, but this was the first time I'd ever been! They have an assortment of old china cups in their bulk bins rather than scoops - great thought I, I could get some wee coffee cups at the op shop! Oh but I'm trying not to bring in more clutter.... Hmmm...... then lightbulb moment! When going through my blanket box when I retrieved it from Pukepoto I came across a dolls china tea set I'd had since childhood, and I'd failed yet again to add it to the 'get rid of pile' and had put it back in the blanket box thinking this is silly, but I really can't bear to part with it. 

But the cups have now been washed up, the +30yr old newspaper it was wrapped in added to the fire basket, and I now have beautiful china cups to use instead of plastic scoops - even if they don't hold quite as much (about 1/3 cup) it doesn't really matter. The scoops can go, and the cups will now get used regularly. So now I feel much better about them sitting in a box for decades and surviving several rounds of major decluttering over the years, not to mention a trip half way around the world and several years in paid for storage!

The teapot lost it's glaze inside years back having got left with water in when it must've been cracked (I used to use it top up the water in an essential oils diffuser), so that never made it to Aotearoa NZ. But I still have the milk jug and saucers.... now I just need to figure out how to use those too.

Living lightly

Last weekend I spent mostly in the company of folk who are involved with our local EcoCentre, and/or have an interest in sustainability as we had a 'Living Lightly ~ Sustainable Lifestyle safari' today, as well as the usual Saturday morning coffee group that meets up. We had a couple from Palmerston North with us, one of whom Corrina is a researcher at Massey University and she'd come up to do some interviews with some people who had completed a sustainability survey and other folk who fit the category she was looking for. As I was suggesting several names across the country to her on Saturday I was reminded of a comment Sandy had made at Summer Gathering; she said when she started working in environmental activism (she works for 350.org ) she started coming across Quakers at every turn, she'd no idea so many were that active in the field before! So small wonder that I'd met Corrina before as a result of her having a Young Friend as a research assistant a few years back who'd been asked to find focus groups up and down the country! Yet another example of the connectivity of Quakers and the few degrees of separation between us.

There were other links between those of us who gathered together on Sunday, other than the obvious interest in sustainable lifestyles. Only about a third of us were part of Kaitāia TimeBank and/or Transition Towns Kaitāia and already involved with the EcoCentre. But being a small town/rural community there were many and varied ways in which most of us knew some of the others, even if only by sight. (We did have one couple though who had come up from Whāngārei just for our safari so there was a bit of added pressure on those of us who had planned the event for it to live up to expectations!) Connections between us were things like friends, relatives, genealogy, golf, work, neighbours etc. But here we all were with a shared interest in living more sustainably, not an aspect of our lives we'd necessarily all known about each other before.

We car pooled for the event where we visited four very different properties and approaches to 'living lightly' in the world. This not only improved our collective environmental footprint, but made parking easier at each place and added to the networking opportunities the day presented. Future shortcuts to finding the person/information we need perhaps?!

Having been hearing about the rammed earth houses in Ahipara for some time now it was great to finally get to see one of them and hear from Heeni about how they came to be built. The feel of a rammed earth floor was amazing, especially when there was a concrete floor in the kitchen and bathroom to compare it to - like walking on hard sand at the beach compared to a hard pavement. And that was with floor coverings down too rather than bare earth (although we did get to lift the corner of the mats up and try that too!) I found myself dithering over my Tiny House dream - up until now I'd been convinced that one on a trailer was the way forward for me so I could move it as well as myself over the years. But that floor felt so good... also I loved Jen's kitchen in her ferro-concrete 'sculpture' house, but that would be far easier to replicate either on or off a trailer. Although I again felt torn between my wish for simplicity and an uncluttered life, and my lifelong love for something that looks like it comes out of a children's picture book! I think somewhere there must be a happy medium between minimalism and organized chaos that works for me.

The afternoon had fewer revelations for me, I'm already familiar with Lyn's 'Pigtits and parsley sauce' website/book/facebook page, although I did pick up a couple of tips I'd hitherto missed. And the final property was where I used to live, so the only surprise was how much different the bottom of the vineyard looks now William has taken the vines out between the olive trees (which have superceded the vines as the main crop). I have to say the grounds are doing well out of his retirement!

I can't see me ever reaching 80% food self-sufficiency as Jen has, not on my own that's for sure, but living as part of a community swapping food surpluses to meet the needs I can't supply myself etc is certainly something I'd like to be do better at. I need to improve my gardening skills though to have much to offer other than quinces and Golden Queen peaches which we generally tend to have a glut of regardless of my efforts! Although we did get to the point of giving away broad beans by the bagful this year. We've got an EcoCentre project we're planning that I'll blog about some other time to encourage local food sourcing which I'm quite excited about which will help keep food miles down and encourage collaboration. It was quite funny seeing how many of us related to Jen's inspiration of growing up watching The Good Life (available to watch on YouTube I have just discovered!) and pouring over John Seymour's Self-Sufficiency book!

The main aspect of the day was coming away inspired, and determined to do more with our garden. I really need to start putting a bit more effort in in terms of educating myself rather than relying on my usual haphazard Darwinian approach - only the fittest survives out there! Once in the ground plants get little in the way of specific help and I've not been very good at planning where they get put in the first place, although I do use the companion planting book we've got to try to avoid the worst combinations.

We're planning to do another similar safari day, perhaps later in the year. I wonder what changes I'll have implemented here by then, and what ideas I'll've been able to draw on. It's good to know that I've got a good bunch of folk around to support me on this journey and that I've added a few more names to that list after this weekend.

Plastic Free July 2015 +1

Okay, so it is September already... but as with last year I decided to keep two months worth of non-recyclable plastic so that there wasn't any temptation to put off finishing/opening a new packet until next week when the challenge was up etc.

Here is the sum total of July & August 2014...  and here is July & August 2015....

If anything there is more this year rather than less which is rather frustrating given that I feel as though this is something I have taken on fairly seriously over the last year and have been working towards a not so much plastic-free life as a much less plastic dependent one. However, there are many things in this year's pile that are the result of my downsizing; like a pile of Ara Reo dvds that weren't that great when I was studying it and I'm certainly not going to inflict them on anyone else, also the negative sleeves and slide box. There are the things from last month like my hairbrush etc that were the tail end of the replacement process and the things I just didn't even think about last year, like the clear plastic negative pockets on certain photograph print packets, and the clear plastic bit on the opening of a tissue box.

Actually I'm quite annoyed about the tissue box - I'd gone well over a year without buying any tissues at all as handkerchiefs had been sufficient now I wasn't getting endless snottery colds from the children at kindergarten. But then in the last week of me saving my plastic I caught the worst cold I've had in years and a whole box of tissues got used up in a matter of days (and I'm halfway through the next one!). Bah humbug. That also accounts for a sudden increase in the number of tablet strips which had been well down on last year.

But over all I'm hopeful that this time next year the pile will be smaller, or at least will be made up of mostly 'historical' stuff being cleared out rather than newly bought. In fact to make myself feel better about it all here is the stuff sorted into new stuff from July & August, and old stuff that got emptied/used up/chucked out. But whilst it might soothe my ego a bit, it doesn't take away from the fact that it is all still ending up in landfill, whether that is now rather than 15yrs ago or in two months time is neither here nor there (although I suppose literally it does change which side of the world the landfill is in some cases! Aroha mai, Aotearoa...)

What else to focus on reducing/eliminating next over the coming year though? That in many ways is the hardest challenge as I've changed all the easy things already! I'm sure I'll continue to get plenty of inspiration though via the Plastic Free July community and their Facebook page. It is good to be challenged as generally I've had a fairly easy run when it comes to keeping my carbon footprint lower than average. When you start it off as a life long vegetarian who doesn't drive/run a car and thus who uses a lot of public transport, lives in shared housing, likes to grow veggies, is used to frugal living and has been recycling for decades etc you get something of a head start over most folk! I don't feel like I've had to make many difficult changes at all. All those years of hearing 'Turn the lights off if you aren't using them. It's like Piccadilly Circus around here!' as a child/teenager obviously had some long term impact, if not quite the immediate one that was desired at the time!

filling in the gaps

Today I discovered why my filing of negatives had appeared to start at a really random point in time. It seems that it wasn't 15yrs ago when I started this mission, but more like 24! I'd started with the latest film and worked backwards. So when I picked up the gauntlet 11yrs later I'd simply carried on where I'd left off!

It made me laugh to discover this, it all makes perfect sense now. Of course I started a really detailed filing system when I was in the middle of writing my dissertation - you couldn't get much more worthy in terms of procrastination, and far more satisfying than housework. It is also typical of me that I shoved something in a cupboard for years and then started it up again. It was around that same time that I finally finished a patchwork project that I'd had since secondary school. That now forms part of a cushion on the previously mentioned captain's chair! Thankfully my patchworking has never since been consigned to the 'pending...' pile for years on end.

One of today's bonus discoveries was the negative of a photo I took of my Grandad a few months before he died. I haven't had a copy of it for many, many years having given it to someone (Mum? Granny?) thinking I'd get a reprint done and then of course not getting around to it before the negative got buried too deep in the box to easily find. So finally I can fill the gap in my photo album and Granny will no longer be on that page on her own! Another loose end tied up. Plus I've found the negatives of the elusive JYM '88 photos that I'm really hoping are in the blanket box...

I'm already one box down, admittedly it's the smallest one, but it feels like a good start. There's something very satisfying about finally seeing a project through to completion (albeit that happy state is still a long way off!). I'm quite enjoying the elements of detective work involved in reuniting strips that had been taken out of their packet to get reprints done, back with the rest of the set they belong with. It is something of an eye opener to contemplate how much money I have spent on film and processing over the years too! That's probably responsible for a hefty chunk of my student overdraft and visa card being maxed out by the time I graduated.Thankfully most of the travel expenses to the various Quaker gatherings many of the photos are of were covered, otherwise I would've been living off lentils and bread from the half price bakery around the corner... oh wait, I already did.

So, after more years than I'd been alive when I started this, I'm reconstructing about a 23yr section of my life, give or take a film reel or two. Trying to put things back into chronological order (if anyone has suggestions as to how to date several entire films worth of photos of the Edinburgh Botanical Gardens, with no recognizable people in to assist in this matter, they would be gratefully received!). You know life would be so much easier if I could settle for being either extremely organized or haphazard (but usually with a system of sorts - like a box, or four, with negatives in... in no particular order), but I never seem to be able to stick with just one. Not only is this project cataloging a substantial chunk of my life, but the entire endeavour reflects me in other ways too: as a person, a photographer, a documenter of events, and no doubt other things I'm too tired to think of right now. It does make me wonder if in years to come when someone comes across the end result (assuming I ever finish it!) what assumptions they would then make about me - I don't for a moment expect that to be accurate!

Plastic Free July, almost gone...

There are only a few hours left of July 2015 and I'm looking at my wee 'dilemma bag' and comparing it to the photo of this time last year.... So have I done any better? Well, yes and no! The amount of stuff looks much the same, but there are differences.

Last year the plastic windows in envelopes never even occurred to me as I wasn't tearing them out (which apparently improves the paper recycling process). I seem to get a ridiculous number of letters from WINZ etc and until my health improves to the point where I no longer need their financial assistance there isn't really a way around those.

I got a different flea treatment for the cat - more packaging at first glance but more months supply... the sort of thing that only evens up over a year rather than picking out a month or two.

Way fewer tablet packets etc. Yes!!! The plaster wrapper was annoying though.

The cassava crisps packet - yup, one last year, one this year! Hey ho... The green tea packet is one I bought a couple of years ago and has finally been finished. I'm trying now to keep tea one of the plastic free zones in my life, at least the teas I drink for pleasure anyway, there are medicinal ones I haven't found a way around as yet. I can get green tea in paper bags or tins and I grow most of my herbal teas now. The chocolate wrapper - that bar was a present and much enjoyed. But I don't buy the plastic wrapped ones for myself and am kicking myself for having bought a few to tuck into presents.

I still haven't solved the miso problem but have found some in a single plastic bag rather than double wrapped! The plastic tubs of it I've found have the recycling numbers on in Japanese so I've no idea whether they can be recycled here or not, so I've decided against buying them for now.

There are probably slightly fewer strips cut off the top of the giant snaplock bags the bulk foods come in from the wholesaler as I've been buying more things in the 3kg bags rather than 1kg. Every little helps and the costs are slightly lower per kg, although requiring a larger initial outlay. There are scraps of plastic bags that had been re-purposed into poi that I had made at Summer Gathering several years ago. As part of my decluttering mission I decided they'd hung around doing nothing for quite long enough and I've reclaimed the stuffing for future craft projects, however the outer layers were beyond being useful again. There is also a plastic cover that was around my latest photobook that I got done - again part of my decluttering!


Then there is the pile of stuff that whilst not single use can't be recycled, my hairbrush, travel toothbrush, an out of date Community Services card, a couple of dvds (again being disposed of as part of the declutter), a deodorant container and a tub I had reused but had then cracked and it isn't recyclable. The deodorant, hair and toothbrushes have all be replaced with non-plastic items. Well okay technically the bristles of both brushes are still plastic/nylon but the handles are bamboo and the bit holding the hair brush bristles is rubber.

This year I've been focusing more on getting rid of/using up things and replacing plastic items as there aren't that many single use plastic items that come in to my life on a regular basis that I can cut back on. I've noticed my shopping habits have really changed though over the last year, when in Wellington recently and going round shops with a far greater range of food than I can buy locally I found myself running my eyes over the shelves looking at first not so much as to what was in the packets etc but what they were made off, when I spotted something glass, paper or tin I then looked to see if it was anything I might need! When I was in our local butcher's shop yesterday with Jane I did the same looking over his shelves of Asian groceries and came away with a glass jar of pickled ginger. I'm a way off finishing the current jar (which is recyclable plastic) but I'd heard a rumour that John was moving down to Auckland and whilst hopefully another butcher will keep the shop open there is no guarantee they'd keep the Asian groceries side of things going. (I'm all for supporting local independent retailers selling local produce even if it is mostly stuff I don't eat myself!)

I'm slowly replacing plastic scoops and measuring spoons that I keep in various jars of dried goods that I use regularly by rummaging through the odds and ends boxes at op/charity shops. When in Auckland I managed to get a metal wide necked funnel for filling jars and a smaller one for bottles. I did also replace my potato shaped veg scrubbing brush, it is plastic but as the last one has lasted me over a decade I figured I could live with that! I've got to the point now where I only have 5 plastic storage tubs in the kitchen for flours and oats, everything else is in glass or ceramics. As they are BPA free, Kiwi made Sistema klip-it tubs they can stay, for now.

Out of curiosity I'll keep my 'dilemma bag' going through August as well as I did last year and see how the end results compare. But it won't stop there, I'll be working on this for the rest of the year that follows. It will be interesting to compare notes by the time July next year comes around and see what else has become 'the norm' and which are the new more challenging aspects. And by then there will no doubt be something else like the envelope windows that hadn't even dawned on me before! Maybe as well as my cloth bags for weighed goods at the healthfood shop I'll have finally got around to making some tulle bags for veggies as we've got a new greengrocers opening up in town tomorrow...

accountability

Earlier today I opened up my blog 'dashboard' amongst other internet tabs as a reminder that the month was slipping past and I really ought to write another post soon. Finishing one of the half written ones would be even better, but a new one would do should the inspiration come along.

It's getting towards the end of my day and I was starting to close down pages and winding things up for the night when I clicked on the blogger page and spotted that Charlotte had written a new post, so I read it, as one does, and realised that there was a certain synchronicity between what she'd written and what I'd been thinking about today. So in a 'think it, do it' burst of energy here's my tuppenceworth.

I'm sure I've mentioned before that for the last couple of years or so I've been aiming to write one blog post a week on average, something I've fallen woefully short of but on the other hand after a run of decidedly lean years my yearly total is better than it had been! Why blog? When I first started blogging I was in the process of emigrating and being Resident Friend in Wellington - both of which provided plenty of material to write about. Since then life has become far more everyday and the things that used to stand out as being new and different, ie Kiwi, are now very much the norm and I struggle to find examples now to explain how things are different from the UK because I've lost track of what isn't said/done there! Generally I'm reminded with a crash and a bang when I go back though.

But anyway, why blog? Part of it replaces the journals I used to write - stream of consciousness stuff that fills a stack of notebooks that at some point I probably ought to ceremoniously burn to protect the innocent. Yeah well not all of that sort of stuff ends up blogged by any means, after all there are libel laws, but aside from it being a way to update friends and family what is going on in my life blogging replaces the personal accountability side of the journalling. It used to feel like once I'd written an idea down it had to be followed through on, or at least attempted. It was a way of recording where my thinking was at on various issues, what progress I made, how many times I went around in circles on something etc. Like my commitment to blogging once a week on average - I'd set that challenge to myself, but once I'd mentioned it in a blog post I felt like I really had to try harder to stick to it!

Today has been a day of little tasks, small steps in various commitments that I've made to myself, some on here, some not yet. If all I manage each month is a record of some of those little steps then I'll feel more accountable for them, it adds an incentive to work at them. However I'm also aware that should I slip and not manage very much for a while (entirely possibly healthwise) it would be very easy to just not blog rather than face the fact that I've not achieved what I think I ought to be able to (and yes that is the subject of the half written blog post I haven't managed to finish yet!), so I have to be prepared to be honest and say I'm having a crap week, but that's okay, they happen. They happen to everyone, but most folk are better at not beating themselves up over it... for me that is work in progress, and hopefully I can record that progress when need be.

So today's small steps: I made some small cloth bags to use for bulk bin goods that I buy from the health food shop. I have some larger ones soaking in a bucket of oxygen whitener - they are old flour bags that are probably older than me! My plan is to give them a new lease of life, once they've been washed... This is all part of my ongoing process of removing unnecessary plastic from my life and gearing up towards this year's Plastic Free July.

I fixed the hem on a towel from the EcoCentre which had come undone in the wash - making things last, and it was repurposed in the first place, being quarter of the one large towel that there was there. Much better than buying new or using paper towels.

I did some work on my current quilting project - I've managed to make this one entirely from my existing stash of materials, part of my longer term plan to reduce the amount of stuff I have in my cupboard.

I sorted out some children's picture books to pass on to various f/Friends children when I see them later in the year. They are books I'd acquired when teaching but don't really need to keep, they have no particular sentimental value so will be much better off in a new home. Again part of my downsizing plans.

I scanned a load of photos - I've started on my project to turn a shelf full of photograph albums into photobooks which will take up far fewer shelf inches/feet. They are also photos that I'll put on Facebook once I've cleaned them up/rotated them etc as they are old YFCC ones - as Marion pointed out at YM I don't put many current photos on Facebook just ones that are 20yrs old to embarrass everyone! Not that I think they are embarrassing... but then not many of them are of me.

I made up a crock of GF flour mix - I have a couple of flour recipes I try to keep made up in bulk so I don't have to faff about with tablespoons of this that and the next thing when baking. I make the vast majority of my food from scratch rather than buy ready processed stuff. I have the time, and mostly the energy. Making a big casserole today was also part of that process - several days worth of meals made in one go. I just need to remember to put some aside in the freezer for a bad day rather than just eat my way through it all week, no matter how tempting that might be!

I also did some more work on getting the YM minutes ready for the printer, and did some Quaker networking, but the latter of those is probably another post in itself...

There were other things too, but pumpkin time is calling and I've an extra stint at the EcoCentre tomorrow as someone is away, so no chance of sloping off back to bed. Whilst not quite a record of creativity in the sense Charlotte was meaning this post has put out there some of what I'm working on in life at present - hopefully doing so will not only act as a record of where I'm at, but add an extra dose of accountability to myself more than anyone else, to keep track of progress and serve as a reminder in the not so good weeks that whilst I may not be able to do as much as I'd like in life still at least I can still do some things and change my life for the better.

ps sorry this is a bit rambling but if I start trying to edit it either I'll be late to bed or this won't get posted tonight, both of which I'm trying to avoid!

A&Q

For most Quakers A&Q stands for Advices & Queries. There are various versions around the world, often starting off quoting the advice from the elders of Balby:

Dearly beloved Friends, these things we do not lay upon you as a rule or form to walk by, but that all, with the measure of light which is pure and holy, may be guided; and so in the light walking and abiding, these may be fulfilled in the Spirit, not from the letter, for the letter killeth, but the Spirit giveth life. 
(Postscript to an epistle to ‘the brethren in the north’ issued by a meeting of elders at Balby, 1656)

But today for me A&Q took on a whole new meaning as I labelled up another tub of stewed Apple and Quince for the freezer on a label too small for whole words! Combining our own abundance of quinces with someone else's over-supply of apples has provided (along with the feijoas from over the fence, still no new neighbours...) an alternative for the year to come to the ridiculous amounts of stewed peaches from our own garden. Whilst it was lamented at the time that the plum tree didn't fruit much this year it is probably just as well as we've now reached the stage where we have to start eating the other things in the freezer on a regular basis in order to make room for more fruit. The rest of the household is gutted about having to eat up the ice cream as you can probably imagine, we also need the emptied ice cream tubs to put more fruit in so the pressure really is on!

The task and writing A&Q did bring some of our Advices & Queries to mind though:

C14: Even the mundane and the everyday can be performed as a form of worship

D14: Aim to live simply. A simple lifestyle freely chosen is a source of strength. Value beauty in all its forms. Share what you have.

D17: Certain times of life bring energy and activity; other times bring a need for rest and renewal. Do you respond to the rhythms of your life, accepting or declining commitments without an undue sense of pride or guilt?

D17 resonates particularly. There have been many tasks lately that have been a response of the rhythms of the seasons, yet I have to remind myself when feeling guilty about not taking on more that the rhythm of my own life means I still don't have as much energy as I'd like to. I need to remember the fact that I've managed to do as much as I have is a huge improvement on this time last year, but unless I factor in enough 'rest and renewal' there isn't going to be enough energy for more activity!

ps Could anyone use some quinces? We've given away as many as we can find homes for and still have plenty to spare!

processing food issues

I came across this article about what's in food these days that either doesn't appear on the label or is cunningly disguised as something far healthier and more natural than it is. It really is quite scary and certainly an incentive to keep away from processed foods. There aren't many in my diet these days anyway, but the article increased my determination to only buy locally grown fresh fruit and veg, preferably at the market, to avoid the chemicals used to prolong the supermarket shelf life of the same.

After Marion's comments about how little probiotics are actually in yoghurt I'd been thinking about trying fermented foods, especially as I kept seeing references to a Facebook group about it that a former colleague is in. Admittedly I was initially planning to buy some sauerkraut from the healthfood shop, but whenever I thought of it they were out of stock. Probably just as well as I then came across this article which explains how much better home made is. So I thought I'd have a go at making sauerkraut, from homegrown cabbages no less! Granted they were rather pathetic specimens, as brassicas and hot dry weather don't mix very well, but still homegrown none the less. A quick trawl of the local op/charity shops produced a suitable vessel (a re-purposed ceramic coffee crock!) as I couldn't find anything at home the right shape/size. As it has a lid it'd do fine to store the finished product in too. Unfortunately I hadn't taken into consideration just how hot it has been and didn't add enough extra brine over the top so it dried out and went icky, but lesson learned and at least it was with cabbages that would've probably ended up on the compost heap anyway! I'll definitely have another go although I'll wait for cooler weather.

Then in one of the urban homesteading email updates I get I spotted a mention of making apple cider vinegar and how easy it was. Given I use quite a bit of this I promptly googled to find a recipe and came across this one. As our apple trees have been busy shedding handfuls of squitty little apples that are way too small to normally be bothered with along with several half-pecked larger ones each day it seemed worth trying the scraps method as let's face it that's all you're left with once you've cut away the wormy/bruised bits. I'm planning to use the vinegar for the rosemary hair rinse I make, once I've got making it properly sussed hopefully I can bottle up enough to use in the kitchen too, but I might use more edible looking apples for human consumption! I started it off a couple of weeks ago and it has a very distinctive vinegary smell so fingers crossed.... I'm now hoarding more bits of apple in the freezer ready for the next batch!

I was hoping our tomato crop would increase now we seem to be regularly getting a bit more rain at last, they've been a bit slow this year, but it doesn't look promising. I want to get some frozen either whole/halved or as passata for use later in the year but so far we're eating them as fast as they ripen! I generally don't use tinned tomatoes when I'm cooking for just me & Phyllis, but when we've got Joanne & Oscar here too they get used fairly regularly. I should probably just buy some from the market to cook up then at least I know they are local.

We have (okay, Phyllis has...) spent the last few weeks peeling and chopping peaches by the basketful - my role in this is mostly collecting/picking them. Our trees really seem to have appreciated the pruning they got and have been absolutely laden. Many fall off already going brown and/or split, but they are so tasty they are worth cutting up for the good bits. The freezer is gradually being stocked up with a stack of 2ltr containers of stewed peaches plus we've bottled some. Joanne made a batch of chutney but it is a tad spicy for Phyllis so I made a milder second batch, once we'd scrounged some empty jars! We've given away several bucketloads, as well as a similar quantity of quinces. As the quinces are much harder to peel and cut that task falls to me.

The grapes have been prolific this year too - I've tried making some grape juice, but I'm not a big fruit juice drinker so there's little incentive to go into mass production! Joanne has made some grape jam, but I'd rather make something less sweet... Anyway there are plenty volunteers to take the fresh fruit off our hands, including the blackbirds!

It is good that we have a community of friends around us keen to share surplus garden produce. There is very little that gets wasted here. We have a regular supply of free free-range eggs coming in, and locally caught fish for Phyllis. Those we supply with fruit tend to bring us jars of whatever they've made with it in return. Home 'grown' honey, olive oil and firewood are supplied by family so we really are in the thick of an alternative economy here.

The EcoCentre, where our local TimeBank has a physical base along with several other community groups, now has a seed swap stand - bring along your surplus seeds you've collected and swap them for others, or put a koha in the box if you don't have anything to swap in. We've only had it going a couple of weeks and it is building up nicely. The great advantage of swapping seeds is you know they are plants that have obviously done reasonably well locally. We also have some plants for sale on the trading table, again ones that are surplus to requirements in one place ready to be re-homed.

Keeping things local and enabling locals to support each other towards a more regionally self-sufficient state is a big part of the kaupapa here. We're vulnerable in the Far North to being cut off from the rest of the country by flooding and regular landslips, and despite recent promises of upgrading bridges in the region (oh what it is to have a by-election that could change the balance of power in the government!), people are waking up to the fact that we need to be more self sufficient up here, more resilient. Being able to feed ourselves and each other regardless of whether the main highways are passable or not is a big part of this. We're resource rich really, we just need to be better organised at distributing what we have locally, and it not having to head down to Whāngārei or Auckland to come back again like the milk does!

Maybe the revolution is just a bag of groceries (rather than a t-shirt) away....

herbs and spices of life

I now have a jam jar full of coriander seeds stripped off plants from our garden and a handful thrown back on the ground in the hopes that some at least will elude the snails and grow. Just to be sure in the meantime though I have bought some seedlings from the market which have just got big enough to plant out. Snails seem to adore coriander, which is a shame as I do too and whilst I'm happy to share, the snails will just scoff the lot of the seedlings which seems a bit unfair if you ask me. I must remember to harvest plenty of leaves this next time around and freeze them to see me through the winter. Whilst I'm all for cooking with seasonal vegetables having coriander available for curries does improve what you can do with what is around!

We also have various basils, parsley, sage, rosemary, thyme, lemon thyme, marjoram, lemon balm, chives, garlic, bay, lemon verbena, a couple of varieties of mint, chillies, comfrey, chamomile, curry plant, calendular, lavender, feverfew and lemongrass which along with the kawakawa makes for a goodly selection for cooking, remedies and herbal teas etc. But what has got me excited lately is discovering I can grow turmeric and ginger here too, thus supplementing my home grown spices as well as herbs! I've planted some turmeric and am hoping it copes with the fact that I chose the hottest and driest part of the year in which to do so. The first shoot has broken through the soil so I'm keeping my fingers crossed. I'll wait for spring to try ginger as I've read up on the best growing conditions and figure under the quince tree is probably my best bet, a space currently covered in trailing pumpkin plants and generally needs a bit more work. Not to mention that falling quinces wouldn't be too kind to young plants! Our quince tree has the bonus of passionfruit vine growing through it this year from NorthTec's horticulture dept next door. A vast improvement on the convovulous that we still haven't quite managed to eradicate from the fenceline between us.

We've also got a stevia plant, which I've dried some leaves from. It can be used as a sweetener, but I've yet to remember to use it as I don't often cook in a way that calls for any these days. I might be best making some extract by infusing it in vodka and then straining it - you only use a few drops at a time, so the alcohol being added to the food is minimal. However I think I'll need more leaves before I can give that a go.

Apparently tea bushes will grow around here, well they do up at Jane's in Diggers Valley anyway. I'm really tempted to have a go at growing it here even though she has promised us a 'picking'. Unfortunately I don't think I'll ever be able to grow my own cacoa, but otherwise I'm getting close to being self sufficient for things to make hot drinks from.

It's really satisfying being able to grow so much in our own garden. I'm getting better at drying, freezing and infusing herbs in oil for use through the winter too. Remembering to do this at a time when I don't actually need to do it to use them is something of a challenge at times, I'm much better at processing stuff for immediate use! But then isn't that like anything in life, it is far easier to deal with immediate needs than plan ahead for the what ifs and maybes, and it is only experience that can teach you what you should've done sooner!

what canst thou say, and do?

Somehow I managed to find myself on an email list this week to whom a discussion document was circulated by the Futures Committee (a national Quaker committee looking at issues around global change etc and what we can do about it). It was addressing issues around climate change and what we as Quakers were called to do collectively and individually.

 "Can we work together to develop ways in which we can cope with this daunting challenge and bring it on board as a part of our everyday life? Can we develop ways of expression that makes the story accessible to our community, even to the extent of changing our priorities and world view? Can we develop ways of taking the message outside the Quaker community and help other organisations to “break the silence” in such a way that it enables them to address their challenges more effectively?"

And if Quakers can't stand up, speak out and take action on this who will???

So here's my tuppenceworth for now.... For many years I've been slowly chipping away at 'bad' habits, rethinking my consumption patterns, decluttering so I need less space, taking part in 'Plastic free July', weighing up the pros and cons of various travel options etc etc. It is, as the document says, a daunting challenge, as nothing is ever straightforward. We've reached the point now where the carbon footprint of keeping the internet functioning internationally is becoming significant, so skyping instead of flying somewhere isn't necessarily always the answer! This doesn't mean we shouldn't be trying to work towards zero carbon travel, or finding more sustainable means to keep the worlds' servers cool, or that we should all just jump on a plane anyway regardless. It's about weighing up the pros and cons and each doing the best we can. And that is where the importance of support comes in and sharing different ideas and experiences.

One of the choices I have control over again in my life is food shopping. For several years I wasn't the one doing the shopping so I had less say in the matter, but over the last four years that ball has been back in my court again. Eleanor's recent post covers some of the dilemmas and thought processes that I've worked through over the years. I have to say simply cutting out a lot of processed/pre-packaged food from my life makes supermarket shopping much quicker again! Luckily my life is such that I have the luxury of time to cook all my meals from scratch and I don't have to convince anyone else to change their habits to match.

A couple of years ago I switched to buying organic raw milk from Rainbow Falls Farm over near Kerikeri. It gets delivered to local drop off points, ours is the health food shop, in glass jars which are returned each week and reused. I could get non-organic raw milk more locally (fewer food miles) but I'd have to collect it from the farm which is way further than I could get to under my own steam, so I'd need a lift in someone's car... I decided to get raw milk as unlike pasteurised it doesn't make me sick (literally if I consume enough!), and it replaced the soy or rice milk I'd been buying. Pricewise it was comparable with what I was already paying per litre even though compared to ordinary milk it is more expensive. The soy/rice milk came from Australia (more food-miles) in tetrapaks (not recyclable locally). I had to balance that against the down sides of dairy farming, even organically, and the ethics around animal farming. Oh and the fact that medically adults simply don't need to consume the liquid intended for baby cows, and indeed there are plenty good reasons for not doing so! 

But, I like some yoghurt on my porridge, it is one of the few ways I consume probiotics (although Marion would argue that the quantity in yoghurt is negligible I reckon it is still better than none!), and the paneer I occasionally make tends to get used instead of tofu which whilst I can buy Kiwi made (and from a company that pays a Living Wage!), the beans still come from Australia.

One alternative is make my own almond milk which I have also done, especially over the winter when the cows are dried off, but generally almonds aren't grown commercially in this country so they too are shipped in from who knows where and I can't really afford large quantities of organic nuts, so who knows what nasties are involved in their growing?

Another alternative is use coconut cream, and water it down for using as milk. Yes I can get organic, but organic or not it is still in tins (recyclable at least) or in tetrapaks, still comes from the South Pacific if not further afield, and those food-miles have crept right back up again...

So, as with Penn and his sword, for now I'm sticking with my one litre of organic raw milk a week as long as I can! 

I came across another interesting dilemma recently, it was an infographic (which of course I now can't find, but this is similar) about the environmental cost of alternatives to plastic bags. Basically cane, and for us here harakeke (flax), baskets are best. If locally sourced, sustainably harvested, and handmade they come up trumps in terms of mileage, water usage, and production/wages/working conditions are hopefully at least liveable with, given that handcrafts are seldom lucrative sources of income! Cotton/calico bags often come at a higher ethical price than you'd expect - producing cotton involves a lot of water, and cotton often comes from factories paying very low wages and with poor working conditions etc...

That made me think about my main hobby of sewing, as I tend to use mostly cotton fabric. For a many years I've tried to use what I have rather than buy material specially for a project, but that has primarily been for financial and space reasons - I have a lot of material! It isn't that I buy a lot, it often gets given to me, plus there are old clothes, linens etc that can be re-purposed but meanwhile take up room in my cupboard/under the bed, which kind of goes against the whole not collecting 'stuff' idea! So when no matter how much I tried the different options on hand and there still really wasn't anything suitable in my stash for my current project, I headed to the market and bought a second hand duvet cover (for a whopping $3!) which I unpicked to use for the extra material I needed. Re-purposing something already out there rather than buying new. Another ongoing project is making a ragrug doormat out of old t-shirts, leggings etc and some long since inherited fabric of a similar ilk. My challenge for that is not to buy anything at all for it. I might need to start putting the word out though if I'm to find any brighter colours for it!

A lot of the changes I, and many others, are consciously making in our lives harkens back to the way our grandparents' generation lived. But for us it is through choice, rather than necessity. Sure I could buy imported fruit and vegetables to ensure I had the same variety available to me year round, but actually I'd rather just eat fresh tomatoes from our garden in the summer and autumn that taste like tomatoes than eat the watery alternatives the rest of the year. Here in the Far North the growing season is year round so I could have lettuce every day of the year (if we water it through the summer!) if I really wanted to, but we still have seasons where some stuff grows better than others and I like that changing variety. I'm sure I'll be sick of beans soon, but that's okay, I'll have plenty of months without them before long! Yes I could have half a dozen scooshy bottles of assorted cleaning fluids in the cupboard, but you know what? I'm discovering that there's precious little you can't get clean without some combination of white or cider vinegar, baking soda, washing soda, salt and lemon juice.

There are some good local websites for Kiwis also working towards a more sustainable life, whether for economic or sustainability reasons, a couple I keep track of are Wendyl Nissen's (whose book A Home Companion I really enjoyed and I use her recipes for cleaning/toiletries regularly) and Lyn Webster's 'Pig tits and parlsey sauce' - she's also written a similar book. Lyn moved up here not that long back, hopefully our paths will cross at some point!

None of us are wanting to sound sanctimonious or self-righteous about the changes we have made. As Ben Pink Dandelion said in his 2014 Swarthmore Lecture giving up the Bentley can be a challenge, especially these days when our lives are no longer under the scrutiny of Elders making sure we're being 'proper' Quakers living out our Testimonies! (He wasn't joking by the way, he really did have an old Bentley!). Both Britain YM and the YM of Aotearoa New Zealand have made a commitment of working towards sustainability and included it among out Testimonies. Australia YM calls it 'Earthcare'. Whatever we call it, it is becoming an increasingly important part of our Quaker journeys, and as with any other aspect of spiritual journeys they aren't all the same; they twist and turn around each other, often covering some of the same ground but in a different order (or direction!). Sharing our journeys towards a more sustainable life, as with sharing our understandings of god, the inner light, what we do in the silence of Meeting for Worship etc adds different perspectives, strengthens and enriches our collected witness; and helps us get to know each other better in that which is more mundane as well as eternal.

Our lives are all different and what might be easy for one can be a huge challenge for another. What is important is doing what we can in our own lives, making the changes and the commitment to keep that a process rather than just recycling the milk bottles and considering that's the end of it. There's always something more that can be done... by sharing our stories hopefully we'll inspire each other and provide some moral support along the way, especially when it all starts to look 'too hard' to make any further progress.