What i’ve read, April 2011

  The Transition Handbook, Rob Hopkins-To say my spare time has been consumed by Transition would be an understatement. I fell in love with the concept about two years back when I first read it, and now i’m involved in starting a Transition Initiative i’m rather excited. You should get excited too, it’s an awesome, fun way to design your community’s descent from fossil fuel dependency and inspire relocalisation. Read more here. And here!

  Listening to Country, Ros Moriarty-Autobiographical, about the author’s involvement with her husband’s Indigenous family. Admittedly, I grew up in a (typical?) family where racism was fairly standard and it wasn’t until my early twenties that I realised that they were completely wrong. I’ve made more of an effort since them to educate myself and this is a fine book for it-it’s the only thing i’ve read that’s written on a personal level, rather than at arms-length. The loss of culture and knowledge is so incredibly tragic and irreversible-hopefully the efforts to preserve what remains are successful.

  Mind Maps for Kids, Tony Buzan-More for me, as I have so many balls in the air at the moment anything that will help keep them up is welcome. Just mind-maps, not massively exciting.

  Mama Mia, Mia Freedman-Autobiography. I read this in an evening and actually really enjoyed it-possibly because the lifestyle she lead/s is so different to mine! Funny because I remember reading a lot of the Cosmos that are mentioned in there as a teen (I had Brad Pitt naked :P) with some tearjerking parts. Which is life for everyone, really.

  Anastasia, Vladimir Megre-This series has come highly recommended to me by a few people. While i’ve liked reading the first two, i’ll reserve judgement until i’ve finished the series. It’s the first book i’ve read that suggests existence of a Creator that I haven’t thought was total bullshit, so I suppose it’s already achieved a massive victory (i’ll keep my sceptic hat firmly on though, thanks).

  The Ringing Cedars of Russia, Vladimir Megre-As above.

  Earth Garden #154-Missed this one somehow. Made me want to go travelling.

  Home Farmer V1, Earth Garden Publications-Missed this one somehow too. Made me want to start a farm in the backyard-don’t think landlord would approve. Already pushing it with more chickens than legally allowed and mini oat field.

  Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, Barbara Kingsolver-I adore this book, it’s the third time i’ve read it. I scored it at the op-shop so if any locals want it drop around. It’s her family’s story of their local eating for a year, from a production point of view. It’s written in a very thoughtful, humorous way and is immensely readable. Puts forward lots of very persuasive arguments for locavory, as well as dealing with many ethical issues in a totally non-confrontational way. If you need inspiration to garden, read this-it makes me want to run outside and start digging.

Winter pants, part 1

One nice pair of pants each to wear over this winter is the goal-made so I can let them down next year to wear again, as with our short, mild winters they have no chance of getting worn out.

  First up, Shorty, as he didn’t have a single pair of going-out pants. He asked for blue and red, and I stuck to plain for a change. I kind of wish i’d done something more exciting now! These were made to vintage pattern Simplicity 5395, with added pockets, and have been named his Disco Stu pants because he looks very ‘70s in them.

  Next, Oods, who also had nothing her ankles didn’t hang out of. As always, she wanted over-the-top, and this is the result of me toning down her ideas (purely so I can do them in a reasonable amount of time). They’re made to the Dortje pattern from Sewing Clothes Kids Love, with the waist taken in. The extremely curved seams gave me some grief, but now I have another skill to add to the list. The brown is reclaimed from a pair of womens pants the op-shop were giving away (they had tonnes of free stuff earlier this year, so I stocked up), the red dotty cotton is the scraps from the Christmas skirts, and the floral drill i’ve had for years and was desperate to get rid of.

  

  I’d place the rear pockets higher next time and make the legs slightly narrower, but apart from that it’s a good, if rather time-consuming pattern.

  Third up Frosty-just because i’ve been wanting to make rainbow striped pants for ages. They worked! All fabrics are from the cupboard, all except the orange was op-shopped.
 

The twins have picked their fabrics out, so hopefully they’ll be outfitted within the fortnight. And probably for under $15 total in materials, for all five kids. I went to the shops last week to have a look at how much kids pants are-over $20 a pair! And they’re UGLY! It makes me very thankful for my sewing obsession.

Ditching deodorant

That’s right, I haven’t used deodorant in months. I’m a stinky feral hippy-don’t come too near because I may just raise my arms and you’ll pass out from the fumes.

  Actually, not. Sorry to disappoint. After not being able to find a non-toxic deodorant that actually worked without thrice-daily application, it was time to DIY. First up we tried diluted tea-tree oil. It was passable, it worked as well as the commercial eco variety. But it was impossible to carry around in my handbag for midday reapplication.

  At one such midday reapplication (think market stall, stinking hot, insane humidity) I was afraid the first paragraph was coming true so pulled out the eco roll-on, whinging about it’s crapness. And a friend said ‘Why don’t you just use bicarb? I do’. So I tried it and haven’t looked back. Man, the stuff is awesome. Dust some on in the morning and you’re fine all day. The husband has made me sniff his armpits after mowing the lawn in 30 degree heat and he doesn’t smell. Anyone who lives with a male of our species knows that that is a truly fantastic accomplishment, yet to be achieved by Lynx/Adidas/Rexona and company. All from bicarb.

  I have read you can mix bicarb and arrowroot 50/50, and you can chop herbs and put them in the jar to infuse the powder with scent, but i’m pretty happy with plain bicarb in an old pasta sauce jar. Fashionable, my bathroom is not. We use our fingertips to dust it on, and are on the look out for an older style shaving cream brush or similar to use instead.

  And that is as easy as it is. Really truly.

MORE babies ?!?!

  It’s like a maternity ward around here sometimes-thankfully, it’s not me anymore! Three babies were born to our single mum guinea pig last week (dad was murdered by the cat a couple of weeks back. Oh the drama. The cat has been rehomed.)

  And I must say, I have ceased whinging about birthing my big-headed lastborn. Guinea pig babies are massive! I honestly don’t understand how they got out of her. I did wonder if maybe we’d somehow not realised she’d given birth for a couple of weeks, but that’s impossible given how much she’s handled.

  The kids have $$ signs in their eyes, plotting the money they’ll hopefully have in six weeks and what other animals they’ll buy with it, eagerly awaiting the next local trader book to see just what’s up for grabs…………

Reducing the waist size in a skirt

   I have abnormally skinny girls. No, really-my seven year old, while being average height, has the waist measurement of a 3 year old and weighs 18kgs. It’s just their natural shape, which makes sense when you have two small parents.

  But it makes buying clothes for them a nightmare, which is why I make most of them (which can also be a nightmare if you can’t alter commercial patterns or draft your own). I recently came up with this method to reduce the waist in skirts, after having to pass up so many gorgeous skirts at the Salvation Army op-shop. They sell skirts there for $1, which is how much the one below cost me. If you have a chart-matching child it’s still worth doing this for too-large sizes, as it gives you the ability to choose from so many more clothes.

  This skirt is a girls size 12, so truly huge. I wasn’t a big fan but my girls adored it (it’s an ‘olden days skirt’), and for $1 they get to have their way. Any lightweight skirt with a zipper opening and fitted waist will work-heavyweight fabrics will most likely get too bulky, and ditto to skirts already elasticised-but you can shorten the elastic in them if it’s cased.

You’ll need elastic, tightly woven ribbon or bias tape to match the waist measurement of the skirt +2cm and wider than the elastic. I used 6mm elastic and 1 inch ribbon.

*Note on elastic length-Because you have a zip to work around your elastic will be smaller than their waist measurement. How much smaller depends on a number of factors-i’ll tell you when to cut it accurately.

Start next to the zip. Fold the end of your ribbon/tape under, then stitch along the top edge, under the seam on the skirt, all the way along.

Do the same for the bottom edge. See how the bottom edge doesn’t sit next to the zipper like the top does? That’s to allow for the curve of the waistline as my ribbon is non-stretch.

  Insert elastic, using a safety pin or bodkin. Leave the elastic just poking out……

…..and stitch it down firmly. Pin your elastic down at the other end, try on the child, and adjust accordingly. When you’re happy with the fit, stitch it down the same way as the first end.

Nicely gathered waistline………

…….now fitting skinny child.

Try to photograph said child twirling, and fail fairly spectacularly.

Tie-dyeing for little ones

While I let my kids tie-dye with real dyes occasionally, it’s a bit of a nightmare. This is much easier, and a good activity for a group of young kids.

Needed-food dyes and paper towel. You can get recycled, biodegradable paper towel now, which can be composted when you’re done with it.

Mix up the food dyes with water in bowls. Make the colours fairly strong, you want them to pop.

Give the kids a sheet of towel and explain that how you fold the paper affects the pattern of the dye. Suggest they try squares, triangles, crumpled balls and any other origami they can think of. When they’re happy with their fold get them to dip one corner/edge in their chosen colour-it will wick up the paper towel reasonably fast, so emphasise that they’ll only need to hold it there for a few seconds. Then remove, shake, and put another corner/edge in a different colour, as many times as you can-usually only three.

Unfold and see what pattern has appeared! Repeat until you run out of towel, most likely. Once dry use for other crafts and play-wrapping small presents, cutting and pasting shapes, mosaics, over-drawing pictures based on dye shapes etc etc.

 

You can also try ‘dyeing’ paper. This is blank newsprint our neighbour gave us, and the result of using straws to add then blow the dye around. It was used as wrapping paper for birthday presents.

  

Best of all? It all washes off straightaway. No blue cheek like my Frosty has at present.

Making a worm farm from a bathtub

Yes, I love bathtubs. Here’s how to make a worm farm that actually works* from one. Total cost for us-$10.60 ($10 for bathtub, $0.60 for bucket. Bricks free, tin free, timber free (from pallets)-even the nails are reclaimed. Allow more if you’re not a freegan.

 

Find yourself a bathtub, from the tip shop etc. Any pipe fitting is fine-we’ve even made one from a tub that had the entire plug area cut out. You need to find a place to position in where it’s sheltered from the weather-no rain, and very little to no direct sunlight. If you’re in a colder area you may want to position it so it gets some winter sunlight, as this will keep the worms more active. If it snows where you are…….well, thankfully I have no experience with that, but you might want to look it up!

Upend the tub and block the escape route-double-layered flyscreen and a couple of rubber bands does the trick nicely if you have a pipe or plug hole. If not, use liquid nails or similar to glue the screen on.

Prepare your stand. Concrete blocks or bricks work well-you want enough height to sit a bucket under the plughole to collect your liquid gold. The plank is to tilt it slightly to aid drainage-obviously, the non-plug end will sit here. Excuse the wet and dirty ground-the landlord doesn’t seem to think that water running from broken gutters and making a stream under his house is a problem worth fixing.

Sit your bathtub on top, making sure it’s steady. It should be nice and clean and shiny, worms are rather sensitive (so only use water and elbow grease to clean it out).

Add a 10cm layer of mulch to assist with drainage-this is good for the initial settling-in period, especially if you’re an over-enthusiastic beginner. It’s also good if you’re the type to forget about them-they will eat it eventually.

Throw in your workers! If you’ve bought a kilo of worms put them in a clump at one end. DON’T buy worms from Bunnings, they’re a major rip-off. Try to find someone local, and if you can’t look at Kookaburra Worm Farms, they do mail order. If your garden soil is clean and organic add some of that. Don’t buy bagged organic garden soil because that’s stupid. Yes, I have strong prejudices. Coir blocks also bulk them out nicely-right now you want them to have a bit of extra space to cushion them from temperature and moisture changes, so they don’t all die in shock.

Ours is from splitting an existing tub full, hence so much.

Put on a lid, place a bucket under the plug opening and you’re done! I know others recommend simply using paper or shadecloth as a covering, but you’ll be putting food in there so without a proper cover you’ll get lots of pests-rodents, cockroaches etc. Corrugated iron cut to the correct size works OK if you’re not handy, especially with a brick on top (anyone can use a pair of tinsnips, right?) But a timber lid, like the one in the first photo of this post, is ideal. Ours is made from old pallets. It will then also double as a seat-I have visions of an outdoor area where I can eat, then dump my scraps under my chair. Brilliant.

Corrugated iron version

When I get around to it, i’ll post about how to look after your worms and harvest the castings.

*Unlike other commercial ones I have tried, which are too small/too fiddly/too unnecessarily complicated. And WAY too expensive.