down to earth

I finally put up our little cotton Christmas decorations and found two red candles. I'm ready.

The brandy has been poured over the Christmas cake for the last time and today we pick up all the food for the Christmas breakfast. However, there has been a glitch.

Hanno has been laid up with gout for the past three days and can barely walk. He's only walking, very slowly, with the help of a walking stick.

I considered asking a couple of the committee members to do all my chores today but as they know nothing about what I've ordered, I had to find another way. While laying on the couch all day, Hanno was insisting he was fine. He didn't want me to ask anyone else to do this, he wants us to do it. He sees it as an important gift to the community and while I agree with him, it's difficult to do what we have to do when he can't stand up. So what do I do when I have a work-related problem?

I rang Bernadette.

Bernadette is the woman I work with most days at the Centre. We are an excellent team, together we can do anything. I put Hanno's proposal to her: she and I do all the running around while Hanno directs us from the car. LOL!! Now how could a plan like that go wrong. Well, we will soon see. This is what is planned.

I drive Hanno and I to pick up Bernadette, we all go to the showground to pick up the mobile coldroom they are lending us. With Hanno directing, Bernadette and I hook up the coldroom trailer to our car and drive to Bernadette's house where we unhook the trailer and plug in the coldroom.

Bernadette makes us all a cuppa.

At 11am, we drive into town and try to find a parking spot near the shops. No doubt Hanno will be directing this too but I doubt I'll be listening. ; ) We leave Hanno in the parked car and Bernadette and I pick up all the bread and bread rolls from IGA, two donated cheese platters from the fine food shop, donated watermelons, rockmelons, oranges, mangoes and a box of tomatoes from the green grocer, 10 kg bacon (donated) from one butcher, then drive to another location and pick up 5 kg bacon, 33 dozen eggs (donated) and 400 sausages from another butcher. I also have to collect my ham from him. He sells antibiotic-free and free range meat, so I ordered a small ham for our Christmas lunch. Drive to Bernadette's and pack all this into the coldroom.

Bernadette makes us all a cuppa.

Drive out to the dairy to pick up donated yoghurt and milk, both cow and goat's milk. We bought the soy milk already from the IGA. We will probably have a few vegans and vegetarians call in for breakfast. The dairy also offered to lend us their refrigerated ute, Tinkerbelle. I did say we'd take it but with Hanno unable to drive, I'll just pick up the donation and leave Tinkerbelle to rest with the cows over the holidays. Drive back to Bernadette's and pack it into the cold room. I'll leave Hanno at Bernadettes when I do this, it will be easier.

It will then probably be around 2pm, so Hanno and I will drive back down the mountain and go home. I'll check the chickens - Mary is still sitting on her eggs, feed the dogs, cat and fish, have a shower and we'll go to my step son's and DIL's for Christmas eve dinner.

Tomorrow we'll be up early to set up for the breakfast. It goes from 7am till 11am. We have about 15 people to help with setting up, cooking, serving and cleaning up, but on the day people generally volunteer to work as well. Shane is bringing two of his friends to help us so I'll invite them and Bernadette to come home with us for lunch. After that, I reckon I'll collapse.

This is the last post I'll do for a little while as I plan on resting for a few days over the holidays. I want to thank you all for making my first few months of blogging so enjoyable. We have built up a lovely little community here and it has given me a lot of pleasure to write for you all. I hope you all enjoy the holidays and are able to spend it with those you love. If you're alone, I hope you have a good book. Stay safe everyone.

I will leave you with these few interesting links:

Christmas poem at the wonderful Duck Herder blog.

Small Town Living magazine which is put together by garden goose. You can read a lot of good articles here.

Check out what Melinda is doing over Christmas at Elements in Time.

David Holmgren's very interesting article on Retrofitting the Suburbs.

Yesterday I received a catalogue Kathleen posted from a Margaret Olley exhibition being held in Brisbane. Margaret Olley is one of our greatest artists. She’s 84 now but still lives in her amazing home in Sydney's Paddington. It used to be a hat factory but Margaret has lived and worked there for more years than I can remember. Unfortunately the exhibition ends today.

I love Margaret’s paintings. She usually paints interiors, often with a window looking outside. I have a print of one of her paintings in the room I’m sitting in right now. It’s of cornflowers, tea cups, fruit, and, of course, a window with a view beyond. I fell in love with this print the second I saw it and bought the framed print about 11 years ago.

Looking through the catalogue at the 40 paintings made me realise that Margaret and I have more than our love of polka dots in common. If you took a cursory glance at the catalogue you would think that these painting are all of the same, or similar things. They’re mostly interiors with baskets or vases of flowers set on tables, with the common implements of everyday life near them. There is an apple with a knife on a plate, tea cups, jugs of flowers - all but one with the handle on the right, a lemon juicer, an empty glass, a peeled mandarin. There are several tea pots, all but one of them have woven cane handles. But I think there is more; a deeper meaning.

It has been written of her: “The art of Margaret Olley is the art of deliberate choices. The same could be said of Olley herself, who dispels all theories of Australia's isolation, repression of women and fashion following. (…)she persists in painting that which is around her; one reason for this is loathing of pretence, of adopting ways of thinking that are not true to the reality of self.”

I think Margaret is doing what we all do. She is showing us her world – the everyday common world of her home. She is telling us: this is the most important thing to me, this is what I experience every day and this is what I'll paint. Much like we do when we’re blogging. We identify what is important to us, we take photos of the rooms in our homes, we scatter about the implements of our homemaking, we show our kitchens and sitting rooms and we record them with our cameras and explain it with our words.

This representation of our common day-to-day world is seen as art when its on canvass but when it’s via a computer screen, diluted many millions of times over, it’s called blogging. I like to think Margaret would fit in well here.

I love the authenticity of Margaret’s art. I love that the ordinary interior of a home is a valid subject for “high art” and is hung in galleries around the world. I doubt Margaret uses a computer but I’m sure she’d love blogs because many of us are doing what she does. I’m interpreting my world, my home, the things I use every day, the food I cook, our drinks, the ways I make my home comfortable, the hows and whys of the way we live, and presenting it to the world. Showing the daily harvest one day and how to make soap the next, is essentially my art. I formulate an idea, think about how I can present it so that it’s understood, and I take my photos. The words and photos are the simple bits and pieces of my life. It’s not pretence. Much like Margaret, I have a horror of presenting what I do here with frills and ribbons. I want you all to see the bare bones of it, I want you to associate with what I do and to understand that this is basic living. It’s tough sometimes, it’s hard work, sometimes it’s mundane, but it’s real life, and it’s not being disguised by brand names or hidden by the sad and hollow yearning for more.

Our lives, as we live them and present them on our blogs each day, are our works in progress. Each day a different scene is presented and over time you build up an idea of what that life is like. Eventually you see a work of art emerge. And here that's nothing fancy, no pretence, we are just living what we hope is a decent life, with all the pitfalls, dents and scratches that time and life afford. And the true beauty of it is not just in the living of it, but also in the bare bones sharing of it.

I've made two batches of white wine vinegar this year and both were a great success. Vinegar is easy to make and, like just about every other thing made with care at home, it tastes better than store bought vinegar.

To make vinegar you need a crock, mother of vinegar and wine.

Christmas is a good time to start making vinegar because you'll probably have left over wine, or your friends will. Instead of throwing it out, or leaving it to sour in the fridge or cupboard, why not make some vinegar!

This is mother of vinegar made in cheap white vine vinegar I bought about 18 months ago.

First you'll have to go looking for mother. No, not your mother, mother of vinegar. That is what the slimy disc of bacteria is called that sometimes forms on store bought vinegar. Pick up the bottles in the store and look to see if there's a floating disc of slime on the top. Strange but true, this is what you want! I first found mother of vinegar in a bottle of unpasteurized apple cider vinegar I bought at my local IGA. I thought the mother had formed because the vinegar was unpasteurised but since then I've had mother form in the cheaper vinegar I bought at a supermarket. Both of these are fine for making vinegar.

It looks pretty ghastly but this is the mother sliding out of the bottle it formed in.

You'll need a glass or pottery crock. I use the crock I used make my ginger beer in. I have a bigger crock for the ginger beer now. It has a little spigot that allows me to easily syphon off the vinegar. You'll also need a cotton or linen cloth to cover the crock so bugs and vinegar flies don't get in. You need air to enter but you don't want it to become contaminated with anything else.

The only other thing you'll need is wine - this can be any quality. If you want red wine vinegar, you use red wine, or white wine if you want white wine vinegar. Don't mix the two. I'm making white wine vinegar.

Just add the mother of vinegar to some wine. If you have a full bottle, pour the lot in, if not, start with a glass or two and add more wine as it becomes available. That's why I said Christmas is a good time to make vinegar - you can ask your friends to save any left over wine they have at parties. It's okay to add different kinds of white wine to the one bottle, ditto with the red wine, but don't mix red and white white together.

The mother of vinegar and white wine in the crock. That's it. Once it's mixed together you just cover it and wait.

Like sourdough starter, home made vinegar improves with age. You don't empty the crock, you always keep some of the old mix to blend with the new additions of wine. Your matured vinegar will infuse the new wine with its flavour. Each time you make vinegar with some of your old vinegar added, it will have a greater depth of flavour.

The best way to tell if your vinegar is ready is to taste it. It will probably take between two and four months to mature, if the temp in your home is around 25 - 30 C degrees (around 80F). It will take more time in colder temperatures.

This is another of those old skills that is worthwhile taking some time with. You'll get good vinegar along with the satisfaction of knowing it's yet another thing you can make at home. Don't forget to save any good bottles and corks for storing your vinegar once it's matured.

FURTHER READING:

How to make vinegar - some photos
Very good information about vinegar
The virtues of homemade vinegar
Types of vinegar

While pre-Christmas is usually a very busy time I've been slowly ambling along with day to day chores and the cricket. Yesterday I had the match on TV all day so I could listen as I worked and every so often, I went in and sat watching and knitting. It wasn't a great match, we beat New Zealand hands down, but it's not the result I'm keen on. It's the general summer feeling that while the world turns in increasingly turbulent times, and as mad shoppers rush here and there, the tradition of cricket is continuing in the bright light of the Australian summer sun. How many other games have a break for tea! You could love it just for that alone.

Here is Mary on the nest being visited by her sister Molly.

Mary is still sitting on her eggs and while she is quite focused on it, a couple of times yesterday she was wandering around with her sisters. !! We encouraged her to sit on the nest again but I'm not confident about the eggs now. Yesterday afternoon they weren't warm at all. I candled them again and found dark shadows and air sacs in all except one. I cracked that one open and suffered the smell of that for quite some time. LOL I won't do that again in a hurry. Anyhow, tomorrow is THE day and if chicks hatch, I'll be on the spot, with my trusty camera.

It's been a quite mild summer so far. By now it's usually around 38C (100F) with high humidity, but this year it's 28C (82F) and very pleasant. The garden is a mass of tomato bushes and as we've had little time to tend it in the past couple of weeks, it's starting to look untidy and a bit like a jungle. No matter. It's still producing enough food for us, so I'm not worried about its aesthetic appeal.

I saw this flash of red in the garden yesterday so grabbed my camera and went outside. A king parrot was grazing on the small Tommy Toe tomatoes. I love these birds and have no problem sharing what we grow with them. Although they did wipe out a crop of sunflowers I grew last year and I hasn't very pleased about that. But that was all forgotten when I saw this lovely bird happily eating some green tomatoes.

They're quite timid birds and often fly in groups of three of four, but this little fellow was alone. As soon as I moved closer, he flew to the bean trellis to eat his tomato.

These are some of the tomatoes he didn't get to. This is one of the larger tomatoes being grown near the chook house. I've forgotten what type they are but they are heirlooms and possibly a beefsteak variety by the look of these.

Of course nothing stops the eggplants once the hot weather starts. These are purple heirlooms that I like to pick quite small to cook with tomatoes, onions and garlic. Next to them are some green capsicums (peppers). They've been a good crop this year and I'll be saving their seeds to continue them on. That's the beauty of growing heirloom vegetables. As well as helping maintain the genetic diversity of backyard crops, growing vegetables from the seeds you harvest from your own crops, builds up resistance and produces better vegetables than those from seeds purchased new each year. Hybrid seeds do not grow true to type.

Further along in the garden is this Washington Navel orange tree. It's still small but we got four juicy, sweet oranges from it last year. This is the third year of growth so I've let all the flowers develop naturally, instead of taking most off to help the tree establish. There are about 30 oranges of this size on the tree.

I get a lot of satisfaction knowing we can grow a lot of our own food. I'm still learning after being a backyard gardener for about 30 years. But that's the beauty of gardening in that it constantly teaches as well as offering its sweet rewards. I think my simple life is pieced together through my garden. It gives us vegetables and herbs for our evening meals and for preserving, fruit for juice and jam, eggs for general consumption, cakes and lemon butter, luffas for cleaning and a place where we can slow down, reconnect with the earth and experience our place in the natural world.

I took this photo of Kerry and Hanno just before I drove Kerry to the bus the other day. He'd just woken up, and he's not a morning person. ; ) I love having our sons visit us. When we were sitting around the table the other night, talking and telling each other of our plans, I felt that deep and genuine contentment that often visits me nowadays. Shane and Kerry have become all I ever wanted them to be, and as a mother, that makes me very proud. I love how they still feel a strong connection with us as a family and they return home for most of our important days so we celebrate together. No doubt there will be a time when our family expands to include wives and babies, and while I look forward to that, I do treasure these times when it's just us.

When you think about it, you only form a really close and intimate relationship with a few people during the course of a lifetime. Usually that closeness is with your immediate family and a few friends. They are the people who know you in good times and bad, and yet love you no matter what. I like to think I (and Hanno) made our sons what they are today but the real truth is that they made me what I am. They made me a better person than I was because I had to be a role model for them. My wish to raise decent and caring boys made me model that behaviour; they forced me to be genuine, hard working, loving and tender because that is what I wanted them to be. And while I don't like to speak for Hanno, I'm pretty sure he would feel the same way.

There were times when I wondered if I was doing the right thing, as well as times when I didn't have a clue and just kept going on hope and trust. That was when I operated on motherly instinct. I have lived the ups and downs of all those years, I know my own imperfections and see some of them in my children too, but I've always had the belief that we were doing okay. So sitting at the dinner table on Monday night and seeing three decent men - my husband and my sons, with a strong sense of themselves and a true depth of character, well, that just made me smile and be thankful that we were all there together and looking forward to another year.

I hope you hold your family close at Christmas.

Lyn asked an important question yesterday: "This year I strived very much to simplify Christmas in what gifts I am giving & did fairly well, but I still didn't go as simple as I wanted to. There is still that "guilt" factor or is it compulsion that affects me when I should not let it (especially when I know a loved one is giving me generous gifts). Have you ever struggled with that?"

Lyn, thank you for your comment and for bringing up this subject, I think many people struggle with it. Australia is a very materialistic country. We are a small country of 21 million people and in the lead up to Christmas, Australians will spend $34 billion!

I did struggle with this in the past but I don’t feel any guilt now. As the years progressed and I became more confident with my lifestyle, that guilt faded away. I don’t ask that any of my friends or family live as I do, or even agree with how I live, but I require that they respect my choices. Everyone of my friends and all my family know how Hanno and I have chosen to live. This is nothing new, they’ve all had time to think about it and to accept it or not. If they don’t accept it, that’s their problem and they will deal with it as best they can. I accept the life choices of all my family and friends. I respect their wishes and admire any of them who step outside their comfort zone and do things their own way. I expect the same from them. If they don’t agree with our philosophy, that’s fine, but they need to respect our wishes not to be caught up in the commercialism of Christmas nor in the ongoing push to have more than everyone else.

Our choice is to give from the heart, we give to those we love, choosing our gifts carefully. We stopped giving because it’s the done thing or because it’s become part of an annual expensive ritual. We don’t expect anyone to give us anything. If they do, we want it to be a small gift that we can use, not the latest gadget or anything expensive. Now that everyone knows our thoughts on this, and they know how we live, I haven’t received any extravagant gifts. But if I did, and it was from someone who knew about my life choices, I would thank them for the gift but tell them I couldn’t accept it. When you make lifestyle choices that differ a lot from the mainstream you have to expect hiccoughs along the way. Some people will want to see how strong you are in your resolve, or you might have some friends or relatives who will test you, so be prepared to graciously refuse an expensive gift. Make sure you give gifts people will use or find beauty in. You’ll defeat your purpose if you make up 12 soap and luffa sets and expect everyone to like them. Be mindful when you give gifts and tailor each one to the person who will receive it.

When you make a commitment to this lifestyle, live it to the best of your ability and be content with your decision. Explain what you’re doing to your family and friends. Tell them that part of your philosophy now is to cut down on purchases and to be more environmentally aware (or whatever your particular interpretation of simple living is). Explain that at Christmas and on birthdays you’ll not be doing what you did in the past but will simplify your gift giving in line with how you live now. From now on your gifts will be more personal and less extravagant. Ask them to respect your wishes as this is important to you and you don’t want them to give you expensive gifts. You cannot give simple gifts but be okay receiving extravagant ones. Explain that well in advance and be prepare to live it. It might take them a couple of years to get used to it and they could ask you what you’d like, so have some good answers ready. You could say you would like some heirloom vegetable seeds, wax for making candles, a new broom or an invitation to their home for afternoon tea. A couple of years of these sorts of suggestions will get them on the right track.

Overall, if you know the way you’re living is right for you and your family, and you’ve explain it to your extended family and friends, then they should respect your wishes and you should remain steadfast in your convictions. I know some of this may seem a bit harsh, but you can't say one thing but do another. If you take time and care with the gifts you give and let others know you don't want to be part of the commercial excesses of Christmas and birthdays, then show them you mean what you say, you will be on the right track. Don't feel guilt for something you believe to be right. You never know, you just might set a simple example that others will follow.

While the shops get busier with the excesses of Christmas shopping, my simple life continues at a gentle pace. It was cooking and odds and ends day yesterday. I baked two fruit cakes, one for my family and one for a gift, and then made butter with local Guernsey cream for a batch of shortbread, also a gift. Hanno had a garage sale happening outside with the results of our decluttering over the past couple of months. Luckily we sold our old stove and oven and some other bits and pieces, and ended up making around $400. There was a constant stream of people and also tea being made and taken out to him, then, later, cold drinks with ice.

I wanted to get all my gifts organised yesterday. I don't give much now and I don't send cards at all, but those I do give to, are very special people. The gifts must be exactly right. I've been storing the last of the luffas from a crop earlier this year and yesterday afternoon I peeled and cleaned them. They've been soaking overnight with a little bleach added to the water as a couple of them were slightly mouldy. A luffa and homemade olive oil soap is a lovely combination and every time I give them as a gift, they're always appreciated.

Homemade soap is a real luxury. It's creamy and leaves my skin feeling clean and cared for. Most commercial soap doesn't contain glycerin, and that is what nourishes the skin. Usually, the commercial makers extract the glycerin and sell that as a separate product because it's more valuable than the soap it comes from. That's why those soaps often make your skin dry and itchy. When you make your own soap, the glycerin stays in it and when you use the soap every day it gently cares for and nourishes your skin. Homemade soap, used with a luffa, is the perfect simple indulgence. Skin is the largest organ of the body and you should be careful with those products that touch your skin every day. Using an organically grown luffa from your garden, with homemade soap, is the most gentle and wholesome type of daily skincare.

This photo was taken in February of this year. Luffas are a hot weather crop and are harvested in this area in late February. We grew these next to our poly tank. When they're small and green you can eat luffas as a vegetable. They're pretty bland but, like eggplant, they take on the flavour of what they're cooked with.

This is what they looked like yesterday. I think I harvested about 30 luffas and these are the last of them. That hole at the end is where the seeds fall from.

Seeds and the peeled luffas. They look pretty ordinary at this stage.

They sat in a bucket of water with a small amount of bleach overnight. That was to kill the mould that was on some of them, but it also lightens the luffas.

And here they are this morning drying on the back verandah.

The addition of a good homemade olive oil soap makes this a wonderful gift for either a woman or a man.

I'll finish preparing my gifts this morning. I'm also baking bread, washing the floors and ironing. Things not sold in the garage sale will be boxed up and given to our local St Vinnies. This afternoon I'm writing letters and a couple of reports for work that have to be ready tomorrow afternoon. I doubt I'll have time to do them tomorrow.

Thank you for stopping by today. I hope you're enjoying the weekend and your Christmas preparations.

There are times in our lives that are natural turning points. At these times we stop, evaluate and make a deliberate choice about whether to stay on the same path or turn another way. When you simplify you are forced to make some changes, but most of your choices will be intentional. You stop blindly following what everyone else does and decide for yourself what your life will be. You live deliberately.Year's end is one of those natural turning points. It's a time for self-evaluation, for decluttering the excess collected during the year, for getting rid of bad influences and for thinking about what you want your life to be. This is a basic and fundamental part of simple living. If you do this thoroughly and well, you'll throw out what isn't working for you so you have room for progress. I'm going to tell you how I do my evaluation. I hope you will get something from what I do and modify it to how it will best work for you. In two weeks time, the new year will start. You have two weeks to prepare.

In a notebook, I mark two pages. One is 2007, the other is 2008. On those pages I write tasks for myself. Some will be to finish off things I want to be rid of - these are written on my 2007 page, the others will be on the endless possibilities of 2008 page. You won't come up with a list straight away, that's why it's important to do this over a couple of weeks. I generally think about this when I'm going to sleep at night and just as I wake up. When I get up, I write any decisions on either of my pages. You may write down something that is later crossed off. That's fine. What your lists do is give you a number of areas to think about. Right at the end of the year, you go through your list and decide what will go and stay.

Some of the things on your 2007 page might be activities you were interested in in the past but now don't suit your simple lifestyle. These could be anything - groups you belong to, hobbies, services you pay for, or acquaintances or neighbours that take up too much of your time. Think about what you did during the year. What worked for you? What didn't? What areas do you want to develop? If you identify something that doesn't fit in your life now, it's important to get rid of it. Don't take it with you into the new year. It will drag you down.

On your 2008 page - your page of new beginnings, write down a few things you'd like to modify. They could be as simple as changing your hairdo or as difficult as stopping spending on wants so you can increase your mortgage payments, plus a lot in between. If you've been thinking about cutting down on your meat consumption, now is a great time to do something about it. Want to grow your own vegetables? What's stopping you? Want to spend more time with your family? Do it! Now is the time to make those plans.

So when I have a full list and after thinking about the lists for a couple of weeks. I sit down in the new year and decide just how serious I am about what I've written down. I have to tell you that I generally do most of what is written but there are times when I'm not quite ready for something. The important thing is to start. If you want to move towards a more simple way of living, this will help you.

No one will see your lists, so be honest with yourself, both in what you want to do and what you're capable of. Often the most difficult part of anything is starting it. When you see what happens on your lists you might be surprised at how many things you want to change. Or you could be determined to change only one very important and significant thing. Whatever it is, be brave enough to start.