Simple life is usually about the little things - small steps, tracking small amounts of money spent during the day, taking time for yourself, cooking from scratch, cutting back, recycling instead of buying new, saying no to wasting time. It's all those small things adding up that will make or break you. So let's focus on small money matters today to help us with our budgeting and hopefully those small steps will add up to make a real difference in your life.

Most of us think budgeting is a real pain. I know I used to. A good way to get around that is to set some financial goals for yourself. Doing that will give you a real reason to cut back on your spending. It doesn't take the pain out of it but it will be the light at the end of the tunnel. So what is it you need to do? Will your goal be to pay off your mortgage faster that you initially agreed to? Do you want to pay off your credit cards? Does the thought of reducing your grocery/electricity/water bill in half appeal to you? Do you want to save an extra $200 a month to go into a vacation fund? You really want chooks, don't you? You'll need a couple of hundred dollars to build a coop and to buy your girls. Whatever it is, decide on a firm goal, write it down, think about it and then make a plan to change your spending habits to achieve your goal.

Here is a list of things that have worked well for us. See if you can use a few of these ideas, and read the comments on this post because I know the smart cookies who read this blog will have a lot of good ideas for you. Sharing our ideas not only affirms what we are doing it also shows others that they are not alone in this quest to reduce debt.

I've already mentioned money tracking. This is an amazingly helpful way of showing you just how much money you spend during the month. You may think you know what you spend but until you track your money, you're only guessing. I have written a post about how to track money here. It's a small thing and you'll be tracking small amounts, but all those small amounts add up and they may be what is pushing you outside your comfort zone when it comes to money.


Stockpiling. This is a great way to save money and time. Once you've built a stockpile cupboard you'll be able to 'shop' at your little convenience store, right there in your home, and most of your stock items will have been bought at a reduced price. My main posts on stockpiling are here and here.

Make the decision today to change the way you spend and teach yourself to save. I have written a post about that here.

Make your own cleaners, the recipes are here and they will cost you a lot less than the chemical bombs that are sold at the supermarket. You win on two levels here - you save money and you have fewer chemicals in your home.

If you have the space and a bit of time, start growing some of the vegetables you eat. Vegetable gardening is a really enriching pastime and it will help build your independence. If you have an excess, see if you can barter for some of your other needs with your neighbours - eggs for honey, tomatoes for cabbages, cheese for fresh organic bread etc. Click on the 'organic vegetables' button above to find information about how to.


Stop using disposables - invest in cloth nappies/diapers, menstrual pads or a cup. (Check my sponsor buttons for suppliers - a cloth nappy/diaper sponsor will be up next week) Don't buy water in plastic bottles, fill a bottle at home and take it with you. Refuse plastic shopping bags, make yourself some tote bags and take them with you when you go shopping. Make cloth napkins and knit some dishcloths. All these little actions will save you money, will reduce the amount of plastic you have around you and will help cut your carbon emissions. I have written a post about disposables here.

Write up a budget and stick to it. This is difficult to start with but when you settle into it, it gets easier. Stop spending on items not in your budget and get rid of a few things you want but don't need - like a cell phone, second car or cable TV. If you can stop buying a few things that you used to buy every month, you'll be on the road to good savings.

These are just a few things you could be doing to save money for your goal, there are many more. The most important thing for you to recognise is that unless you change your spending behaviour, you'll stay the same. I know we all work hard and often buy things to reward ourselves for that, but although you might deserve those little rewards along the way, I believe you deserve to live a life free of debt, or at the very least, debt that is reducing. The first step here might be difficult, recognising that you need to change will be hard too, but if you can change and make that first step, if you can reduce your spending and spend your hard earned money on needs instead of wants, you'll be on your way to a life that is less pressured, you will have more time to do what you want and you won't have to work your entire life to pay off debt.

I invite you to share how you budget and pay off your debts. I think these comments will be very interesting and helpful and I am looking forward to reading what you do - both your spending and your budgeting.

Hanno comes home today and I begin my short break from work. I'm taking three weeks off to concentrate on writing. But the big news is that Hanno will be home and both Alice and I are very pleased about that. Alice has stopped watching for him at the front door. She must think it's like when Rosie went away and didn't come back. She'll be so happy when she sees him, and so will I. I'm going to take Alice to the train station when I pick him up. She'll like that, so will he.

I'm so pleased Hanno could help my sister with her house. He did a lot of things that she's very grateful for and put her mind at rest that the insurance assessors and tradespeople are doing what they should. It is a wonderful thing to be married to a capable man and I am truly grateful that he is generous and kind, especially to my family.

So tomorrow I'll be back into the normal rhythm of my days. I've missed that this past week and have done my chores, and Hanno's, at all sorts of odd times; I've lived on eggs and toast and generally gone a bit wonky without him here. It's funny how the way you live on a day to day basis reflects who you live it with. Hanno and I have been together over 30 years, our 30th wedding anniversary is in September, and over that time, without either of us knowing it, we've become reliant on each other in so many ways. My weaknesses have become his strengths and I have become strong where he is weak. I guess it is obvious when you think about it, but until he went away, I hadn't.


I know he'll be tired when he comes home because he never sleeps well when he's away, but he'll be pleased at the job he's done and the help given to Tricia and that will see him through. He will have missed my cooking too, so I'll have a pot of food on the stove when he comes home, it will be after dark when I collect him, so he'll appreciate a hot meal.

Soon I'll have some breakfast - tea and cinnamon toast, then I'll make warm porridge for the chooks and let them out to free range for the day. It's been raining here the past few days and while I was at work, they were locked in the coop, which they complained loudly about whenever they saw me. I've been making Alice and Hettie a warm breakfast too, and as I walked away each morning I could hear Hettie purring until I got back inside. LOL I'll be planting some vegetable seeds in trays today, our garden is way behind this season and it needs a pick-me-up. Some new cabbages, tomatoes, leeks and lettuces will do the trick. There is bread to bake, maybe a cake too if I have time, and slowly, through the day, things will return to normal.

Answers to some questions: I used about 4 or 5 long cucumbers and a couple of smaller ones in the bread and butter pickles. Just use what you have and adjust the vinegar dressing to suit your amounts. If you have dressing left over, use it on your salads.

Karen, I'll be making lemon cordial and freezing lemon juice soon too. People are starting to bring their excess lemons into the Centre I work at. It's a great time of year.

Suzan, thanks again for your help. I really appreciate it. {hugs}

Jenn, I'll be doing sweet pickles in a couple of months when I have an excess of cauliflowers. I'll dig up a recipe soon.

Elaine, you could do peppers in the same way and I think they'd be very tasty. I always use sea salt. I don't like pouring salt.

Marg, I didn't see the program, I'll try and catch it on ABC2. Thanks.

I am really touched when people comment that they've read through all my posts. I have tried to do that on a couple of blogs but I always get distracted, so thank you to those who read everything here. I know it's quite a commitment.


And finally, I have some more good news. I was contacted by the wonderful team at Burke's Backyard recently, they found me through the blog, and I've agreed to write a monthly column in the Burke's Backyard magazine. For the overseas readers, Don Burke had the first lifestyle program on Australian TV about 25 years ago. He now produces other programs, has his magazine, he writes a variety of books, does a TV segment each week, as well as four hours of national radio on the weekends. I couldn't start as soon as they wanted because of the fast approaching wedding, but I'll be there in the Spring edition. I hope you enjoy it as much as I hope to.

We had an energy and water audit done a few weeks ago. These audits are subsidised by the Queensland Government to help us cut down on our energy and water consumption. It cost us $50 and was well worth every cent of that. If you're in Queensland and haven't had one done yet, ring up today and book, I promise you will not regret it. I was at work when our audit electrician inspected our home but from what Hanno told me, he looked at a wide range of things.

He checked that the fridge was running at the correct temperature - between 3* - 5* C and gave us a thermometer for future checks. He also checked our freezer - which needs to run between -15 and -18*C. This thermometer can also be used to test the temperature of the hot water system. If it's too high, the thermostat can be adjusted to a more conservative setting. All these checks will save money if you're running too high.

Another check he made was in the bathrooms. He checked the shower heads to make sure ours reduced the flow to save water, and the energy to heat it, but gave an adequate amount for showering. Both our shower heads were fine, and we have solar hot water, so we were looking good in the bathrooms. He would have given us new shower heads if we needed them. He checked all the light fittings and as we'd already switched to compact fluros bulbs a couple of years back, most of our lights were okay but our small lamps weren't. The last time we checked, probably two years ago, we couldn't find compact fluros for our bedside table lamps nor the lamp on my desk. He installed new little CFs in those lamps and gave us eight new CF globes for future use.

The best part of the entire audit though is the Wireless Energy Monitor (above), this was also given to us as part of the audit. The electrician installed it on our power board outside, then programed the monitor that sits in our kitchen. The monitor picks up wireless signals from our power board and updates constantly, telling us how much electricity is being consumed, if it is peak hour or not, the temperature in the house, the time and date and how much our electricity has cost us so far. The monitor can also be programed to ring an alarm if you go over a certain level. You can see in the photo soon after it was installed it was, now it's on $29.33. I watched a local TV program about these monitors last night and I was absolutely shocked to see their monitors showing in excess of $400, and one woman's electricity was around $750! Crikey, thankfully ours has never been that high. Ours is usually hovering between $100 and $200, per three months. According to the monitor, our bill this period will be around $180. Even so, now we're working to reduce that.

The way we're doing that is that we use the monitor to see how much it goes up or down according to what we're using. For instance, I now know that it costs much less to use our laptop than the desktop computer. We had not used our clothes dyer for years, but we had to use it the other day and now I know it costs around 30 cents an hour to run it. When we're operating at full capacity here at night, we're using around 70 cents an hour, most of the time our monitor sits between 5 - 9 cents. I will eventually get round to testing all our appliances to see which ones chew up the energy. If I can, I'll get rid of the energy gluttons.

The Climate Smart web site is here and there's quite a bit of good information there about cutting back on electricity and water. Apparently we will soon receive a customised Electricity and Water Efficiency Plan that was made up using the data the electrician collected while he did the audit. That may give us other ideas about cutting back even more.

Do these audits happen anywhere else? If not, why not? This service will help us cut our carbon emissions as well as save us money, it needs to be done all over Australia and in every country. If you don't have this service provided locally, email or phone your local state politician and ask WHY?

On the same day the auditor came, we had insulation installed - again subsidised by our government, this time the Federal government, as part of the economic stimulus. Since we had it done the temperature in the house has remained constant, around 20 - 22*C, with no heating or cooling needed. This will also save us money and carbon. I don't always have much that is good to say about our politicians but this time, they got it right.

PS: With Hanno away, and me working these two days, I'm running behind on a lot of things but I wanted to recognise the lovely comments this week. I will respond to them as soon as I can.

I am sure I have the most generous readers here. Thanks to all the experienced gardeners who have offered to mentor our inexperienced gardeners. Michelle, thanks for your comment. I'll partner you with Jules in Alabama. Jules would you contact Michelle please. I just have one more request for Nicci in Sydney who would like a permaculture mentor. If you can help, let me know. And that's it for the garden mentors for now. We might do it again later in the year but for now, the offer is closed.

It was a lonely old place here on the weekend. I took Alice for a walk, wrote a lot, made some pickled cucumbers, vacuumed the floors, did some washing and had a long talk on the phone with my good friend Diane, whose daughter Casey (my god daughter) is back in hospital after collapsing last week. Casey is in her early 20s and was hit by a drunk driver about two years ago. She still struggles to walk, her career in child care is over and at the very time she should be looking forward to a happy life, she's flat on her back in the spinal unit of a big city hospital. It's so sad.

Hanno renovated the benches he found on the side of the road last week. I have a series of photos of them as they progressed through his skilled hands.

Good morning everyone! It's a cool sunny morning here. I've just finished tending the animals and chooks and before I start on two loads of washing, I'm here to partner the gardening mentors with their novices. I have two novices I have no mentors for so if you are an experienced gardener in zones 8 or 9 in the USA or zones 3 - 4 in Australia, I'd love you to join us. I have two people very keen to pick your gardener's brain. Jules in Alabama and Sorcha in South Australia, I'll contact you as soon as I have your mentors.

The partners are:

Donetta (Arizona) will mentor The Singlutionary (Texas)
Cat (zone 7) will mentor Jaz (zone 5b)
Rois will mentor Allison (both zone 8)
Brown Thumb Mama (zone 9) will mentor Haus Frau (zone 8)
Cindy (Florida) will mentor Suburban Mom (Maryland)
Debbi (Pacific North West) will mentor Myrnie (zone 8 wet and cool)
Tracy (Tamworth) will mentor Stitching Mum
Stewart (Toowoomba will mentor Sorcha (Flinders Ranges, SA)

Would all the people listed above please comment here and exchange their email addresses. If I don't see that connection made by tomorrow, I'll try to link you up.

I also have a few answers from that post. Julia, I wrote about fungus-prone plants. Did you see it?

Donna, I apply potash when we plant a flowering plant - like pumpkin, tomatoes, cucumbers. After the first fruit appear, I apply again for a second crop. Apply according to the instructions on the package.

ithinkican, we have no problem with cats even though we have feral cats living along the creek bed. We make sure we lock the chooks in every night. They put themselves to bed when darkness is falling, all we do is lock the door behind them. I think cats don't bother the chooks because we have a dog and they can smell it. There are foxes here too but we don't see them. A dog, even a pet dog, earns it's keep by leaving its scent around to scare off smaller predators.

Norma, yes, mince is hamburger.

Jody, I use boiling water to get rid of ants. I pour it directly into the entrance to their next, if I can find it. Generally you can if you follow the ants for a while.

Donetta, diatomaceous earth must be food grade. Here is an info sheet for DE.

And lastly, I wanted to write something more about the search for perfection in the garden. No matter how hard you try, no matter how hard you work, when dealing with a natural process, you'll very rarely reach what you call perfection. You will get close to it constantly, you'll see it lurking behind the beans, but getting it to hold still, even for a minute, is difficult.

I believe the better way is to accept failure as part of the process. It's very difficult to learn, particularly if you're teaching yourself, if you expect perfection every time. Failure must be part of the process, failure will teach you the best lessons. Even though I'm still learning, I am confident that I can garden well enough now to do almost everything I want to do. The reason I am at that level is that I failed many times along the way. I took notice of my failures and I worked to put things right. So those of you who expect perfection, relax, just enjoy being out in the fresh air with your hands in the soil and when you fail, see it as part of the learning. Because I promise you this, if you let failure in and don't walk away when things aren't perfect, if you recognise where you went wrong and solve the problem, you will be rewarded. Your reward may not be perfect but it will be close to it. Perfection is impossible without failure.

I'm a solo homesteader at the moment. Hanno flew to Sydney yesterday to help my sister out with her house (a tree fell on it) so blogging might be a bit sporadic at the moment, but I'll do my best. When I got back from the airport and a visit to Shane and Sarndra in their new home, I took my camera into the backyard when I let the chooks out to free range. Naturally, I took photos of them scrambling for the bread I gave them, but I wanted to show you our fenced garden. I'm sure you often notice the fences in my photos but I rarely write about them, even though they a vital part of our backyard.


We have an acre of land here and it's fenced off into different sections according to its use and what we want to keep in or out. There is a fence around the entire acre that keeps the dog in and neighbourhood kids and dogs out. We have water in our garden so it's important to keep those children out of harm's way. Just outside the back door, we have our first fenced area - that is to keep the dog away from the free ranging chooks, and the chooks away from the back door. It's also very good when we eat outside to be able to put the dog on the other side of the fence. Right next to that area is our fenced vegetable garden, and next to that, the fenced chook pen. The chooks are let out into the main garden to free range and the fenced back yard stops them wandering into the front yard. The fences need to be about 155 cm or 5 feet in height. Chooks can fly, although the heavier breeds only attempt it when they're young of if they're being chased. We had to add a plastic top to our garden fence because when Shane's chooks came to live with us, they flew into the garden. Adding that extra 6 inches stopped them.

This photo shows the fenced areas - on the left is the chook pen, next to that the vegie garden, next to that, on the far right, the area outside the back door. (Click on the photos to enlarge them.)
So to answer Karyn's question from the First Vegetable Garden post, we only let the chooks in our vegetable garden when it's between seasons and we want them in there to help clean out the insects, bug eggs, weeds and seeds. When our chooks free range, they go into the main back yard where there are fruit trees and vines growing, but no vegetables. Chickens will scratch on any bare ground they find and if that bare ground is around plants, that's your problem, not theirs. Mulching won't stop them, the next best thing to scratching bare ground, its to scratch mulch out of the way. The problem with this is that it will damage the fragile roots of the vegetables and sometimes even uproot the plants. They will also peck on growing green leaves, tomatoes, strawberries and anything else you usually feed them.

The solution is to fence off the areas you don't want them in, or fence them in - with a chook tractor. When you set up your vegetable garden, you'll have to think carefully about how such a garden will work with what you already have. For instance, if you have cats, they will probably use the garden for a toilet - you'll either have to sit in the bushes with the hose and hose them every time they come near it, or you have to physically exclude them with a cage. Luckily our cat doesn't use our vegetable garden as her toilet but she does use the front yard. We had to modify gardens where we let the chooks free range. Hanno has placed chicken wire (there is a reason they name it chicken wire) over the top of the soil where the grapes are planted and where the luffas were. He's also put up wire barriers around the base of the bananas. You can't see them but they're there and that barrier enables us to continue growing bananas with chook free ranging near them. You can't expect your animals and chooks to think of a garden in the same way as we do, so before you put in a garden, think about your pets and small children, and you might have to put up fences to make the garden area work productively.


Jaz, I think your soil is over fertilised. Nitrogen in the soil in the form of manure, blood and bone, comfrey or any commercial fertiliser will help the green part of a plant to grow well and the root will just support the lush growth instead of developing. Radishes and carrots like a bit of compost in the soil, but nothing else. And don't give them any additional feeds like you would with cabbages, spinach or lettuce. You want the root to grow, not the greenery. When you plant your radishes again, mix them in with some carrot seeds and sand. Sprinkle them along the line and water in with a fine mist spray. The sand will show where you planted, the radishes will grow faster than the carrots, and closer to the top of the soil, so when you harvest the radishes, you'll free up space for the carrots. A few weeks later you'll have your carrots as a second crop from the one spot.

Julia, to answer your question about needing fungicides, it depends on where you live. If you're in a humid climate, like we are, you'll need to do some reading and your own research on fungicides. Fungus in a humid climate will kill your crops or stop them fruiting. We use them as a preventative here, and you might need to do the same. We use a small application of copper oxychloride on our avocado trees to help prevent Phytophthora. We apply Bordeaux mix to our pumpkins, squash and cucumbers to help prevent powdery mildew. It is impossible to grow pumpkins here without fungicide. A more gentle solution that may work for you, but didn't for us, is to spray a mix of one part milk to nine parts water on every surface of the problem plants, and repeat that every two weeks. It is good gardening practice to spray with seaweed concentrate every two weeks and to keep the garden clean, nipping off any diseased leaves; this will help with fungal and other diseases in the garden.


Here is a good chart about organic sprays and treatments and the Green Harvest page on all purpose sprays. We use Dipel, soap spray (made with my homemade soap), Bordeaux mix, wettable sulfur, Eco oil, tomato dust and copper oxychloride. They are all organic. Here is more information from Green Harvest about fungal diseases.

Growing your own vegetables is much more than just putting a plant into soil, there are a lot of other factors that come into it. To be a successful gardener you'll have to work with the conditions presented in your own backyard and with the children, pets, working animals and chickens you already have. Gardens, like every other living thing, will change as they grow and if you are to get the best from whatever space you have, you'll have to think about your unique circumstances and modify them to suit your needs.

PS: I'll team up the mentors with the garden novices over the weekend.

I am delighted there are so many new gardeners around now. Gardening is one of those things that creeps up on you and while you initially think it's just another simple activity, it becomes more than that very quickly. After the first season, you start thinking of the next, then reading more about techniques and the old ways of growing food, you start looking at other gardens as you walk around your neighbourhood, you jump at the chance to visit friends with vegetable gardens, and you remind yourself of your own mother when you take cuttings and seeds home bundled up like precious cargo. You might as well admit it - you're hooked! Another gardening convert joins our side.

Melanie asked if I would write about when I first started gardening and I would be happy to do that, if only I remembered when that was. I do remember helping my mum with the weeding, I remember my grandma's vegetable garden and chooks, but I don't recall when I dug my first garden. In the 60s and 70s, when I shared flats with others, I used to plant a couple of little tomato bushes in with the flowers out the front. In those days I didn't realise plants have different requirements and I probably didn't worry about not producing a lot of tomatoes. I remember we had a vegetable garden in the first home we bought because Shane fell over near the bean trellis one day and nearly took his eye out with a piece of wire poking out. He still bears that scar. But I guess the first garden I remember being serious about, making sure it was organic and mulched, was our garden up north. We also had chickens there and that was the first time I realised chooks were an important part of the natural system I was trying to set up. Now I know there are plenty of ways of combining different natural elements to produce vegetables, but then, 30 years ago, I was learning about keeping the chooks away from the garden and the damage the hot sun caused.


I'm still learning, gardeners never stop doing that. Just when you think your tomatoes or beans are the best, you see an old forgotten variety that looks better and you try it. Gardening helps you grow as a person because it teaches you to slow down, that nature will take her own time and no matter how fast you drive your car, or yourself, when it comes to your garden, although you are in the driver's seat, nothing will happen as fast as you want it to.

If you're a novice gardener, take it slow until you have worked out your climate, and how to get good results. I think a good way of starting would be to plant your favourite vegetable - like tomato, beans or strawberries - whatever it is that you REALLY want to grow at home, and then add a few small easy crops like silverbeet (Swiss chard), lettuce (if you're in a cool zone) and some of the Asian greens like bok choi (Chinese cabbage). Those small leafy vegetables are very easy and don't require much care, but while they're growing, you can tend your favourite and learn all you can about it. Read about vegetable gardening, look at gardens, talk to other gardeners.


The one thing that will make the most difference to your results will be to plant into good soil. Most soils need organic additives to produce good quality vegetables. If you don't add anything to your soil, you will grow your tomato or beans, but they may be plagued will insects and you'll get meagre crops. However, if you add old cow manure, compost that has been made with chook poo, and worm castings to your soil, you'll be amazed at the difference it makes - you'll have less pests and disease and you'll have better and more prolific crops. Soil makes the most difference. So dig your additives in and let the soil rest for a couple of weeks before you plant. If you do that, you'll have what the gardening books call "rich soil" or "soil rich in organic matter".


What you do next will depend on what type of vegetables you want to grow. If you're planting green leafy vegies, rich soil is enough. If you're planting fruiting vegetables, you need to add some sulphate of potash, which will encourage strong roots and more flowers. More flowers = more vegetables. I wouldn't worry about pH or minerals in the first year. See what your work produces. If you get what you hoped for, your soil is probably fine. If you don't get your desired results, take your problem plant to the local nursery, or to a neighbour gardener, and ask what the problem was. Gardeners are a remarkably generous bunch of people and they will share their knowledge with you. When you have a couple of years planting your favourites and a few easy crops, move on to the next level and try growing root vegetables, vines, herbs and fruit.

Just a word to the perfectionists, Sandra and Ellen, and others. I've been gardening for a long long time and I always have failures and there are always years when the unexpected and extremely irritating happens. It's part of the equation. I know that merely knowing that will not make a difference to you but I want you to know that it's okay to give up those ideas that "perfect" is the only option. Personally, I believe there is no such thing as "perfect" and gardening has taught me that, and many other things. Let go, be in the moment and be open to wherever your garden takes you. And Ellen, I think your idea is a very good one. We have knitting buddies here and I think gardening mentoring would work well. So, do we have any experienced gardeners who would be willing to mentor a novice? Please add your name to the comments or email me and I'll match you up according to your climates and zones. When you add your name - as either a mentor or a novice, please add as much detail about your climate and conditions as you can so we get a good match for you.

But no matter if you've been gardening for years or if this is your first season, the important thing is that you're doing it. We have given up so much of our collective heritage and the skills we all once took for granted, doing this, producing some of your own food is a huge step up to where we all should be. We need to be firmly rooted in our gardens, along with the plants. Happy gardening, everyone, and if this is your first year, welcome to the wonderful world of worms. LOL!

The past few days have been incredibly busy for me. I had a 12 hours day at the Centre yesterday and go back again today. Hanno is going down to Sydney for a few days to help my sister who had a tree fall on her house during the wild weather a few days ago. I've received a few things in the mail and have not yet responded to the lovely people who sent them but never fear, I'll get to it, hopefully tomorrow. Despite the busyness of my days, I'm still smiling, still enjoying my work and still taking time out for talking to friends and for cuppas. My priorities remain the same even when the workload increases.


Hanno has done today's post and I've included a few photos of his work areas around our home. If truth be told, he would have liked to tidy up these areas before my camera recorded how they look during the course of a normal day but you don't want picture perfect photos - here we specialise in authenticity, so they come to you, from Hanno, in their raw state.


Your garden tools don't have to be the best or most expensive, often you can buy very good quality old tools at garage sales and markets. Buying good quality old tools is a better investment than buying cheap Chinese imports. Keep your tools in good working order by giving them a little time and effort after you've used them and they'll last a lifetime.

Lawnmower

• After using your lawn mower, check the oil level. If it is low and has not been changed for a while, now is the time to do it while the engine is still warm.
• While checking the oil, look for wear and tear on the cutting blades, if they need replacing, do that straight away.
• A small amount of dirt and grass buildup is fine because it helps protect the housing but if there is an excess, use your common sense and clean it out.
• Clean the air filter.
• Make sure the catcher is empty as it will smell if you store it with clippings still in it.
• Give the mower a quick wipe over with a clean cloth before you store it away in a protected area.

Edge trimmer

• When you finish your work, clean the unit with a clean rag. Remove any dirt or plant material.
• Check the oil level (ours has a four stroke engine) so the trimmer will be ready for work the next time.
• Store it in a protected area.
  

Garden rake, shovel, spades etc.

• Clean dirt off your tools after you finish using them.
• Don't leave your tools out in the rain or exposed to the sun for too long.
• If the metal is showing signs of deterioration, clean it well and apply a rust preventative.
  
• Every so often, check the wooden handles for splinters and roughness. If the handle starts to split, smooth it over with emery or sand paper and then apply a mix of turpentine and linseed oil. Leave it overnight to sink in and dry, then smooth over again with emery paper and finish off with a light sanding with steel wool.
• Store your tools in a dry place.
  

Lettuce, bok choi and cabbages.

One of my fantasies when I was younger was to wander off into the bush and live off the land. In the 1970s, many young people thought that was an attractive proposition and while some did it, my life lead in a different direction. I guess the phrase ‘living off the land’ has a romantic ring to it but I had no doubt how much energy it would take and how difficult it would be; even so, I probably underestimated it by a long shot.

A lot of time has passed since then and many of the things I once thought of as great ideas now leave me underwhelmed and with a wry smile. But not that notion – living off the land, I still look back to a life when I would have, could have and maybe, should have. I’ve kept chooks and a vegetable garden for many years now, not in the wild and crazy way I once wanted to do it - living in the bush and foraging for food, but the more sensible and productive option of growing conventional fruit, nuts and vegetables, and that, combined with chooks, suits me just fine. Now, instead of it being a crazy way to live, my understanding of living off the land is more holistic, now it really fits into my life.


I have no doubt that if we wanted to put more time and energy into our garden, if we dug up more lawn to double the size of it, we could live off our backyard produce all year long. But we are getting older and the time and energy we wish to give the garden is what we give it – and that results in us producing about half the vegetables we eat and about one tenth the fruit. Many fruits and nuts take a lot longer to produce than vegetables. Bananas, for instance, take about 18 months to produce a good sized bunch here, and then that part of the banana has to be cut down to allow others to produce. Unlike oranges, they don’t produce for many years on the same tree. Our pecan tree took 12 years before it gave us the first nuts. We have an excellent Eureka lemon tree that has been a prolific producer almost year round for the past ten years. When it comes to choosing fruit and nut types, make sure your choice is the right one for your area because you will either hit the jackpot or be wondering when and if that tree will ever bear the fruit and nuts you bought it for.


But I know now that living off the land in our own backyard is possible for us and it's also possible in varying degrees for many people. If you list what vegetables you usually buy and work out a plan to grow those vegetables right there in your back yard, not only will it give you inexpensive organic vegetables, it will teach you the many skills you need to be successful at it and give you the independence and freedom of being able to feed yourself. If you live in a warm climate, you’ll probably have at least six months of growing time, if you’re in a colder place, maybe four or five months That is ample time to get in a few decent crops and to freeze or preserve/can your excess – spreading that backyard cheer over a longer period.


The other day I read that in the UK, USA and Australia, vegetable gardening has recently increased 30 percent in popularity. While I would love to think that all those people new to the vegie patch were doing it because they have changed the way they live, I think it is the result of the global economical crisis. But for what ever reason you’ve taken to growing food in your backyard, it is a good one because I think it will teach you a lot more than you think it will. All of our ancestors survived because they had the ability to produce or gather their own food. It is a powerful and significant skill. Our survival doesn't depend on it now but the feeling you get when you pull those early carrots, dig your first potatoes or freeze an abundance of beans will be very close to self respect.


When we decided to live a more simple life, I wanted to use every asset we had to produce what we needed to live - our land was one of our major assets. So when it came down to it, I did live off the land and it makes me proud to know I can because learning to grow food also teaches you a lot about the natural world we live in, and that is always a good thing.

Have you started a garden this year?