Sustainable Living in August - Natural Cleaners at Home

A realization long overdue - lots of things bought in the store out of habit and tradition can be made at home, from scratch - from pancakes, to cosmetics and cleaning products. The benefits? Better quality, fresher product, control over the ingredients and, to some degree, over their manufacturing process, reduced costs, reduced ecological footprint (less transportation, less packaging, less dependency on someone else for basics) - and the intangible joys of participation in your own life, more fully. The last one, of course is something very subjective, after all we all derive joys from very different things, and give Meaning on very different activities as well.

Sustainable Living in July - Laundry Goes Outdoors

 

A recycled double sink, an old outdoor-appropriate shelf, a nice location in shade of an olive tree, a drain to the garden - and voila, a garden laundromat is borne! The decision to wash by hand at least some portion of our clothes came when our three year old son developed a fondness for mud and water play. There is no way his clothes could go inside of the house, much less directly into the washing machine! At the same time it became abundantly clear that most of this clothes (and some of ours) don't really need any kind of vigorous, best-performed-by-highly-specialized-and-very-professional washing machine wash. A good number of things needs simple refreshing or spot cleaning.

Eating from the Garden

Part of growing a good garden, naturally, is harvest - at time of strangest things, or things that sound good in theory but may be a bit hard to fit in an established routine of cooking and consuming familiar dishes. Cooking from a garden is a subject of its own, with lamb's quarters, garlic scapes, beet greens, cilantro flowers, Jerusalem artichoke roots, zucchini flowers, purslane, dandelion leaves, parsnip roots, day lily flowers and much more to please the palate and to challenge our under-developed capacity to eat new foods. Of course new foods don't stay new for long and soon become as familiar as a store-bought carrot.

Sustainable Living in June - Drying Herbs for Tea

Quite a famous plant, the Stinging Nettle, known for its wonderful medicinal properties, for its strong sting, and invasive behavior in gardens. It is indeed quite a plant to have around! It thrives in dry hot weather just as much as it does in cool shady setting, and its sting seems to be heightened as temperatures climb.

Sustainable Living in May - Gardening

A small addition to the table - young beets planted in February in a protected spot

So much in permaculture is about growing food, working with the land, that it is frequently confused with some type of gardening technique. Naturally, permaculture has lots to offer in that aspect, in addition to such subjects like green building, water harvesting, community building, restoration of diminished landscapes and more. In the month of May, so lovely with its display of life and blossom, our lives revolve around gardening no matter where we live - either though active work with the land, or through passive enjoyment of greenery for those not engaged in planting and yard work. 

Greens on the Windowsill

A lovely gardening season warm-up for all level gardeners - sprouting green onions on your windowsill. You have noticed perhaps that your onions have sensed spring long before our own senses deliver the merry news to us - the life force is rising, the pull of the sun is felt across the living world and the awakening is starting.

Day One: Fun and games finding pretty water jars + adding onions

Candlemas, Imbolc - Life Force is Rising! (Making Beeswax Candles)

Hard to believe on this -18F (-27C) night that transition from winter to spring has begun. We have to trust our ancestors, who saw the signs much more clearly than we can, with our senses protected and dulled by running hot water, central heating systems, space-age fabrics and such. Because our ancestors saw that on this day, February 2nd, a struggle between winter and spring, old and new, death and life took a definite turn towards rebirth and restoration of life force.