The next blog

So as 2014 starts I am officially ending this blog and starting a new journey and new blog on my year's quest to reduce the plastic from our home's waste.  If you fancy joining me, you can read all about it here: http://reducingplastic.blogspot.co.uk/

Happy New Year. Enjoy the journey and live life to the full, the way it is intended.

Clare

Homemade gifts from the past couple of months

A couple of ideas from my creative exploits in the last few weeks.  Always so much easier to be creative in daylight...bring on more light evenings, as child free time often helps too ;-)



Kester's 2nd Birthday cake, and for those who don't recognise it...he's the Ravenous Beast!  A strange creature, that eats literally everthing...or should I say everyone!  (Yes, an odd book for a 2 year old to love ;-)

P.S.  This is really simple to do.  Just print off a picture of whatever you want to put on the cake.  Cut it up into the main elements.  Roll out some icing, colour appropriately.  Put the paper templates on the icing, cut out, and position correctly on the cake.  Hey presto!

This is possibly from Feb actually, but a very simple to make 'Coriander Spice Rub', and in lovely, simple spice jars from IKEA.

And my favourite recent project, was an elephant, who I packaged up in the theme of the 'Dear Zoo' book, and gave to a little 2 year old girl.  The elephant was made from charity shop wool, the stuffing from a local craft shop.  And the box, was a covered cereal packet, decorated with my kids felt tips. (Hoping to do more like this in future, but probably once the next batch of winter nights set in.) 

The ribbon was meant to go round it's neck, but was somewhat obscured by its trunk, so ended up on it's bottom!

The Herbs Progress!

This morning I spent a couple of child-free hours in the garden...amazing what can be achieved without little ones wanting to help!

The bokashi compost was put to good use for the first time (quite an aroma, but full of worms, so hope it works).  Some herbs potted up and put in the front yard, and seeds planted for more herbs to emerge shortly.

Last week the kids and I also planted some sunflower seeds for 'International Sunflower Guerilla Gardening Day' on the 1st May, and plan to plant and nurture them in the local park and around the new tree that's been planted on our street corner.  The packaging from the easter eggs earlier this month has made great little incubators, and within a week we've got new growth...I'm as excited as the kids!!

A use for Easter Egg packaging!

Possible to live without a car?

©Mr Green

For ages I've said that when our car dies, we'll try and not get a 'new' one...well the reality of that is now looming!  The verdict of the garage isn't positive, and so I'm trying to do some speedy research on alteratives.


We don't use our car on a daily basis, as I work from home and cycle with the kids in the area (the joy of living in a dense city is that everything literally is on our doorstep...well, except the woods).  Andy gets the train to Bristol for work and cycles there.  So we truly are infrequent car users.  It can sit in our street for a couple of weeks without being started and has definitely enjoyed it's retirement, since it's long IBM communting to Bedfont days.  However, we do need one for visiting relatives and going on holiday, and in fact need one for 2 weeks in the not too distant future.

For the odd short requirement, we have great local friends that will lend us their cars, although I do need to look into the reality of whether this still works if I don't have my own car insurance.  But asking someone to borrow their car for 2 weeks, is a bit more of a challenge.

So I'm looking into local car clubs (existing and possible to set up), car hire, permanent car sharing, and alternative transport such as trains (although not really workable with a tent and camping gear in tow!).  One of the challenging factors of car clubs, is where the car is based.  There is one that has cars based at the Civic Offices.  But with two small children in tow, and their two car seats, plus whatever else we need for the trip, it's an enourmous effort just to get to the car!

Ironically it might end up cheaper to buy another car, although there is then obviously the unknown factor of future repairs, as we certainly wouldn't be getting anything new.  But I really don't want to end up doing that.  This seems a great opportunity to try and do something good for the environment, and also to share resources with others.  So more homework required!

General Update

In addition to the car issue, the past two months have brought up several unexpected expenses, and yet talking with others and asking around have brought some great alternatives to cash being spent!  

The blinds in our living room have been on their last legs for a while, but now each morning that I open them, I pray that they will actually open and not disintegrate in my hands.  When I was talking about it with a friend, she mentioned that she had some curtains in her loft that we could use as a short term measure.  And my mother-in-law found her old curtains from two houses ago, and although they're too short, is happy for me to recycle them and make a long term solution.  (Just need to find some clear time to find some co-ordinating fabric, and get unpicking and then sewing.)


Kester was at the perfect moment to leave his cot and move into a bed, as he's so tired at bedtime, having dropped his daytime sleep, that he isn't worried about getting out of bed, and he also really wants to be like his big sister ;-)  A friend was letting us have her son's bed, once they'd got a new one for him off eBay.  M will have that one, and K would have hers.  And in the meantime we managed to borrow a toddler bed from another friend's loft for K, so he could make the transition.  This weekend the other friend got her son's new bed, so we got their old cabin bed.  Yesterday, was the big move day, and last night, M slept up high in her 'new' bed, and K slept in his big sister's old bed.  Lots of great recycling, and the only expense was a new mattress for M!

'I never want to sleep anywhere else, Mummy!'

We also got a bonus 3 months of membership at the local acquarium this week!  For the past 3 months they've been promising us our membership card, and keep mislaying it.  On about the 7th time of asking they decided to ask me to fill in all the forms again, and then said they'd start the year from that date.  Bonus!

And at last the front yard/community herb garden is starting to show signs of development!  Yesterday, Southsea Greenhouse (check out their community garden launch day below) came and dug up the large plant, and is going to rehouse it at the Pyramids (Mariella is very happy that we can go and see it when we have a swim there ;-)  The other main plant was taken last weekend.  A couple were passing on Mother's Day, when I was at the front door, and asked what the plant was called.  They'd admired it previously and tried to discover what it was, but to no avail.  I had no idea, but said they were really welcome to it, as I might need to move it for the herb garden anyway.  They were rather taken aback, but after further convincing, agreed to take it as long as they could bring me some herbs in exchange, and invite us to their open garden later in the year.  (A great deal!)  And so now that the winter appears to letting up, at last, I need to get some pots round the front, collect all the promised-to-me herbs and start growing.  Exciting!!!

http://southseagreenhouse.co.uk/events-and-news/

 

Women's Day in the Wimbledon Park Patch

So for anyone that couldn't make it, and also to provide some links for those that did, here are my 5 top tips from the International Women's Day Oxfam Get Together evening that we had at my place on Friday 8th March.  The 5 tips were from my year of 'Finding Richness in Less'.

1. How to make your own cards
http://findingrichnessinless.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/origins-of-motherhood.html 

2. How to make your own gift bags
http://howaboutorange.blogspot.co.uk/2010/07/how-to-make-gift-bags-from-newspaper.html

3. Join Streetbank
http://www.streetbank.com/  a website which shows you the skills or things your neighbours are willing to share, loan or give away. You’ll be able to see everything in your square mile that your neighbours are offering. You’ll be helping to build the community, save money and help the environment all in one.

4. Share ideas - plagerism is the highest form of flattery, and why reinvent the wheel when someone else has already done the hard work?  It's brilliant to share ideas, so get chatting, blogging, posting, whatever takes your fancy, but share your ideas, skills, mistakes and enjoy being creative

5. Don't buy herbs - create a herb network.  Find out what herbs your neighbours grow, and offer to share cuttings from yours, in exchange for cuttings from theirs, when you need them as ingredients for recipes.  And if you live close to me, keep an eye on our front yard...it's soon going to all be herbs, and you're welcome to come and help yourself.






And for anyone who took away some Herman German Friendship Cake starter, here are some ideas of recipes: http://www.hermanthegermanfriendshipcake.com/herman-recipe-ideas/

Thanks to everyone who gave money for Oxfam and donated items for me to sell on eBay (all proceeds going to Oxfam to make a difference to lives around the world.  I'll update on funds raised when the items have been sold.  And if you fancy doing something next year, check out:   (I'm wondering about doing something with our local girls next year....plenty of time to germinate ideas.)

UPDATE: We're almost up to £200...just waiting for a couple of items to sell.

Origins of Motherhood

Here's a quick and easy card idea for Mother's Day, although I'm equally wondering about doing it for mums when their eldest becomes a teenager or reaches 10, as a congratulations on getting them so far, type thing.

One of my favourites at the moment, and a way to recycle old maps, car atlases etc.

The map section used on each of these is where my Mum and mother-in-law gave birth to their firstborn (lets hope they don't read this blog post before turning up here for lunch later today ;-)

Do not adjust your set

So I've decided to carry on blogging, as I've kind of got into the habit of it (if not rather sporadically recently), and find it a really useful tool in seeing where my journey is taking me.  (Some others appear to enjoy reading it too...mad fools ;-)

So with a slight rejig to the title, and a change of background image (I embrace change!), I carry on typing.

So much has been happening recently, and I think I'll keep blogging about:

• the local community and germinating plans
• the latest attempts at craft that I inflict on everyone for their gifts
• and probably anything else random that escapes my head.

So on the community front, I'm currently starting with four things for the lovely 'Wimbledon Park Patch' (having just typed 'four' I already know there's more than that...biting off too much?):

Oxfam Get Together to celebrate International Women's Day on 8th March - I'm inviting friends and neighbours round for an evening to raise money and give them five tips from my year of 'finding richness in less'...should be fun! 

Easter Egg Hunt & Scavenger Hunt on 30th March in the local park - the local community wardens, police and fire service are coming along.  And I'm hoping to get lots of kids having fun and eating chocolate (fingers crossed for a donation from Waitrose), and get everyone to answer some questions about what they'd like to see in the park in months and years to come, to get some ideas started on our great local community space (with local public funds decreasing, if we don't take ownership of such spaces, who knows what will be left...just this year they've decreased money for planting, maintenance of the grounds and the children's park facilities (if play equipment gets dangerous it's now unlikely to be repaired or replaced, but more likely to be removed :-(

Streetbank promotion - a community online space that lets you see all the things your neighbours are happy for you to borrow, things they're giving away & skills they're willing to share with you. It's like a giant shared attic and garden shed for you and anyone living within a mile of your home.  I've already trialed a bokashi from someone, and have someone designing a logo for the Wimbledon Park Patch...all for free! 
 
Sharing for the new garden waste collection scheme in the city - the council are introducing new garden waste bins that you can pay to have and are collected every fortnight.  We'd need to drive to the tip whenever we do large back yard foliage clearance, as we'd never fill a bin more than three times a year...however, the idea is to have it on our front yard, we're sharing it with neighbours so that we can all use it, but split the cost.

Community herb garden - the front yard is about to be transformed into a community herb garden (anyone's welcome to stop and take cuttings for their recipes).  The main plant in the space currently is about to go to Southsea Greenhouse for rehousing at the Pyramids or a care home in Fratton, and lots of people are collecting herb seedlings for me (even the local community wardens).  Hopefully the whole thing is going to be done for free, and with everyone pitching in, it feels like a great start to something that is meant to be about 'everyone'. 

And finally I'm starting work on the summer community picnic in the park and a facebook group to start connecting those who are online. 

Not bad for the first 9 weeks of the year!

And as to crafting...perhaps some seperate posts on that to come, but I've had another go at marmalade (not my biggest success, but edible), and lots of homemade gifts including a great coriander spice rub for meat, knitted animals and my latest joy, puppet theatres made from old sheets and scraps of fabric, which you hang between door frames.  Every child's home should have one...so I'll definitely do a detailed post on that, as it's amazingly simple!