If you're wondering if I'm out gardening or baking or knitting. The answer to all is "no". This is what I'm doing and I think I'll be doing it until I pack it all up to go to a meeting this afternoon.  Signing books is not hard work, but it's repetitive.

Don't get me wrong, I am really grateful to have the opportunity to sign books, but at the moment there are a lot of books to be signed, packed and posted. If you have ordered and paid for a book, I'll probably be in touch sometime today. We hope to do the mail out tomorrow.

Backyard chickens will remain in good health if you give them a variety of good food but it's also worthwhile to see if you can reduce the cost of chicken feed while providing healthy food for your flock. To get a good supply of eggs, chickens need to eat high protein food. Most people feed commercial poultry food, either pellets or mash, but if you can add green leaves, table scraps, grains, stale bread or toast, and give them access to insects and worms you'll keep them happy and healthy while reducing the cost of keeping them fed. A good way to provide insects is to leave a couple of logs or tree branches around - untreated and unpainted. Keep them moist just by spraying them with the hose and over the months, as they start to decompose, they'll attract all sorts of bugs. Turn the logs over for the chooks every so often and watch them search for tasty morsels.


One of the easiest things to do is to have your chickens free ranging on grass that has not been sprayed or fertilised. The chicken droppings over the course of the day, and rain fall, will add to the fertility of the soil and the richness of the grass. Grass contains Omega 3 oils and if your chickens eat grass, there will be Omega 3 in the eggs you eat. Omega enriched eggs are very expensive at the supermarket so creating them in this natural way will save you money and give you healthier food. It will also reduce your feed bill.

I've had several emails from people saying that Fishpond have told them the book will be released later in the year. Some say April, some say July. I spoke with Penguin this afternoon and I want to assure you that the book will be published on Wednesday 22 February. Nothing has changed.

I would advise everyone who has received an email like this from Fishpond to email back asking what the problem is. And please let me know the outcome. Thanks.

Hanno and I have been unusually social these past couple of days. Last Thursday we went out to lunch at a newly renovated and reopened local restaurant, Daisy's Place. Not very frugal, but Jens and Cathy gave us a gift voucher for lunch there for looking after Koda while they were away. The restaurant has an interesting history behind it and is now a beautiful place to dine while being surrounded by rainforest. Both Hanno and I were really impressed by the service and the food. The wait staff were very friendly and they knew their menu - that's aways a good sign. And the food! We both had fish and salad and it was fresh, delicious and beautifully presented. We went over to the dessert cabinet and while we were making our selection I heard: "Hello Rhonda". I turned around to find Vanessa Rumble - it turned out that she is the manager there. I introduced you to her blog a while back. Vanessa's husband Nathan was best man at Shane and Sarndra's wedding. Vanessa and Nathan are such lovely people. Vanessa told us that Nathan will be head chef there starting next week, so we'll have to go back at some point. We also met the owner, Sue Joseph. It turned out that she had a reservation to dine at Shane's restaurant, Absynthe, on Saturday night! What's that thing about six degrees of separation? It's been such a long time since I've been to a restaurant where everything was good, but that was the case at Daisy's Place. If you live here or visit the Sunshine Coast, you have to go there.

On this past Saturday we had the pleasure of being at the Bunya Festival. If you've been reading here for a while, you'll probably remember my good friend Aunty Beverly Hand. Aunty Bev is an elder of the Kabi Kabi people; the Sunshine Coast is their traditional land.  For thousands of years, Aboriginal people have met when the bunya nuts are abundant to feast on them, for sporting competitions, to talk about justice and politics and to socialise. Aunty Bev started the Bunya Festival in 2007 and the Maleny Neighbourhood Centre, funded by the festival, prepares and serves the food. It's simple fare - roasted bunya nuts, sausages on bread, scones and jam, fruit, tea, coffee and water and it's all provided freely to everyone who comes along. It's an invitation only event - and invitations for family groups arrive by message stick. Hundreds of people come along and enjoy a wonderful alcohol-free family day in the sunshine, on the banks of the Baroon Pocket Dam.

Kangaroo and emu being erected beside a screen and stage.

Hanno with some of the workers at the festival who enthusiastically took up the offer of cold watermelon for morning tea on a hot day.

Aunty Beverly is one of the most interesting people I've ever met and I feel honoured to call her my friend. She is a kind and generous soul and when it comes to native flora and fauna, and the sensible management of our land, she's like a walking encyclopaedia. The festival started with Aunty Bev talking about the history of the Kabi Kabi people, the land and her own family history. Sadly, last year, Aunty Bev's mother died. She was a shining light for everyone who knew her. Like Aunty Bev, she was a gentle activist, a teacher and a good family woman. There was a tribute to her at this year's festival and that gave everyone there a chance to honour and remember a great woman who made an enduring mark on her people, her family and her land.

It was a delightful day full of art, competitions, challenges, feasting and socialising. I have never been to another event that warmly accepts and embraces people in such a wonderful way. It was a pleasure for Hanno and I to be there.

FYI: It is a mark of respect in Aboriginal culture for an elder to be called either Aunty or Uncle. It is a title given to those who work with their people to help strengthen families and communities. It is also a sign of respect for the name of a person who has died not to be spoken or written. It is out of respect and love for my friend Aunty Bev and her family that I uphold and honour these customs.

Thank you for your generous and beautiful comments yesterday. We both loved them. I'll be posting our itinerary as soon as it's ready. I know for sure we'll be in Melbourne for The Circle, Ballarat, Canberra, Wollongong and the Blue Mountains. The rest of it is not quite ready yet but when I have it, I'll post it.


I have written quite a bit about change in the past six months but those changes have been more about a move towards simplicity and sustainability by many people, right here in Australia, and all around the world. I think that's a wonderful change, and when I was slogging away on my blog in 2007 and 2008, I never believed that we would be at this point just a few years later. All of it was pushed along by the GFC and while that was a disaster for many, and continues to be now, it is also the pendulum swinging back towards thrift and prudence after years of rampant consumerism.

Today my topic is change, but it's about a change of attitude. When we were starting out, I found that adjusting my attitude made the difficult changes that were to follow, much easier. We all change in different ways, but many of us have to come to terms with our debt and to become more frugal in our habits. That often means giving up things you're used to having and sometimes doing that is painful. We gave up pay TV, our second car, buying books, magazines and newspapers, eating out and other things along the way. When I look back on that time I remember wondering if we were doing the right thing or if it was pointless. Now I know that for us, those first small steps not only gave us the strength to dive into bigger changes but they also made money available for things we needed, not wanted.

Okay everyone. Stand up, face the wall and don't move.

I was over-ripe. I was ready for change and nothing could have stopped me. But I think our changes seemed (now) to be easy because I was absolutely convinced that sacrifices were necessary. I had thought about how I wanted my life to be and when I visualised the future with nothing changing, I was saddened to see much of the same - waste and joyless shopping. I was disappointed in myself. For me, a change of attitude was vital and it helped all the difficult adjustments that followed. 

If you haven't had that change of attitude yet and you're occasionally slipping back into old habits, take some time to think carefully about why you want to live sustainably and simply. You want to move from "I deserve/want this." to "It would be great to have it but maybe I shouldn't." to "No, I want a better life. Let's get on with it." When you identify what you and your family will gain from the changes, something will click, you'll see different possibilities and you'll be in a different frame of mind. There is no doubt that being at peace with your reasons for change will make it easier for you. If you're not quite there yet, do some more reading, stop going to the shops and watching advertising, think about what your life could be and go ahead again. There is no one way to do this. We're all different, we want different things and we all come from different circumstances. A change of attitude is common to us all though, so if you can get there, it will be easier.

I know now, with certainty, that our simple way of life will never come unstuck. This is us now and forever. We grow vegetables, bake bread, work hard, connect with our community, live easily with thrift and do as much for ourselves as we can. It's not a burden. We do it with open and generous hearts and all these things, have become our normal. It can be your normal too. It can all start with a change of attitude.

We have had a solar hot water unit for about 30 years. We had one on our old house and installed a new one when we moved to our home here. Solar hot water units still attract a government rebate in Australia and as hot water is one of the highest components of the electricity most of us use, it's a worthwhile exercise to save up and install one. Information about solar hot water for Australians is here. I would love you to add comments about rebates in other countries. Half way through last year we went a step further; we had some money, and with the assistance of the government rebate, we had a small solar unit - 1.5 kW, installed. We got excited about it and had visions of working our way towards saving money on our electricity bills. Here in Australia, and probably all around the world, the cost of electricity, gas and water have been rising a lot. We thought that with prudent use of our appliances and by keeping a careful eye on what we were producing with the solar panels, we'd slowly work our way towards a credit balance on our electricity bills.

That didn't happen. We were in credit on the first bill. Yes, $55 credit! I can still see it now. Hanno and I don't use a lot of electricity but we were not always like that. We slowly learned how to conserve this precious resource and we cut our electricity bill back to about $130- $150 per quarter, before our solar panels. In Australia most of our electricity comes from coal-fired plants so not only were we saving money if we cut back, we were saving carbon emissions too.

Some of our strategies might help you and if you contribute to this conversation in the comments, we might come up with a pool of great ideas that will help people all around the world. I am aware that many of these things are common place, but it's worthwhile repeating them because a lot of this about about developing habits - and that comes from repetition.

1. Get into the habit of turning off appliances at the wall. Standby power drains about 10 percent of your power over the course of a year. See if you can rig up your TV, DVD etc, to one power board and turn that one board off every night. Yesterday I read that these are the yearly stand by costs for:

• Printer/ Broadband Modem / Telephone all on standby but not used - $61.
• Home computer with printer on standby - $20.
• LCD TV, with DVD and PVR in average use and always left on standby - $45.

• 4 standby eliminators and remote control
• Household power assessment by qualified electrician
• A wireless power monitor - you set this up in your home and it will show you how much electricity you're using at any time. This alone will help you save energy - you can see how much your washing machine is costing you and how much it goes up when you dry clothes in the dryer.
• 5 power saving light globes
• A hot water system adjustment, if yours needs it.
• Water and power saving shower head.
• A customised power and water-saving plan.

Concentrate on your big energy appliances first - dryers, heating, cooling etc. Moves towards reducing your electricity consumption are usually slow and it's one of those things that takes time to see improvements. But if you can make a plan to cut your usage, it will pay off because it looks like these charges will continue to rise in the future. Yesterday many of you shared your wonderful ideas by commenting. Please do so again and see if we can help others save both money and carbon emissions.

If you were to cook your own meals from scratch, I doubt you'd add sulphites, nitrates, artificial colourings or flavours, gums or MSG, and yet they're common ingredients in foods on supermarket shelves. Some preservatives, like calcium propionate (282) in bread have been removed recently because of their effects on health, but there are many other additives remaining in the food we eat. These things are added to keep food fresh, to add colour, flavour and to replace certain food properties that are removed during processing. Some additives are harmless, some cause problems, some haven't been tested. If you buy processed foods or pre-prepared meals, it's a good habit to get into to read the labels and have some understanding of what you're reading.

One of the ways we can get around this is to buy unprocessed ingredients instead of food that has be modified in some way, or already prepared and cooked. If you can make meals using ingredients you know, such as vegetables, fruits, meat, chicken, fish, dairy products, pulses and legumes, you'll be as close as you can get to eating and serving food you can be sure of. Instead of relying on packets of powdered spice mixes and cans of soup to add flavour to your food, get to know the herbs and spices you have available and use them instead.

1. Chop, slice, shred your food yourself.
2. Caramelise meat, chicken, onions and vegetables - that alone will add a lot to the flavour of your food.
3. Make your own seasoning mixes. Find recipes here.
4. Be careful with fruit juice as well. It's much better to grow your own or buy oranges and squeeze your own juice, but if that is not possible, read the label carefully and buy cautiously. There have been news reports last week about insecticides in orange juice imported into the USA from Brazil another country and processed in America.
5. Buy in season; fruit and vegetables in season are usually cheaper and fresher.
6. Buy cheaper cuts of meat, like shoulder of lamb or pork instead of the leg, and chuck steak, skirt steak, gravy beef, shin beef. All these cuts contain cartilage that break down with long slow cooking to give you natural gelatine in your food. That is very good for you. There's more to be read about this is the excellent book Nourishing Traditions. Use your slow cooker or a casserole dish in the oven to slow cook a double batch. Freeze the second portion. We buy our meat in bulk from a local family butcher.  We usually buy a hind quarter of beef which will see us through several months. It costs $7.95 a kilo (2.2lbs) and is local meat from the butcher's own farm. Obviously that is the ideal and not everyone has that luxury but you can ask about the meat you buy. If you ask questions you'll learn more and will be less likely to buy inferior meat.
7. Stockpile - this will support you cooking from scratch. A cupboard full of ingredients will see you through not only your daily meals and snacks, it will be an insurance policy for those times when you don't have the time or energy to shop, when you have increased expenses one week and run short of cash or if there is a community emergency such as a storm, flood or fire.
8. Use your leftovers. Learning how to deal with leftover food can stretch one meal into two or at the very least will provide a lunch the following day.
9. Take your lunch and drinks to work or school.
10. “Don't eat anything your great grandmother wouldn't recognize as food. "When you pick up that box of portable yogurt tubes, or eat something with 15 ingredients you can't pronounce, ask yourself, "What are those things doing there?" Michael Pollan says. So if you eat grains for breakfast, forget the Corn Flakes, Coco Pops and Cherrios and go for oatmeal or semolina instead. Don't buy instant oats (or instant anything), buy rolled or cut oats or barley, soak them in water overnight and cook them in the morning.

Cooking food isn't one simple task. It's a series of steps that will see you buying, possibly growing, cleaning, preparing and cooking the food you eat. How do you go about it?  Can we turn this list of ten into 100 essential tips?

The top five regrets of dying - a must-read

A Green Journey to inspiration  - here you'll find news, videos, info about courses and many inspiring stories about people who are living sustainably.

Irish corned beef recipes

Woollen soaker longies pattern

For Australian jar lovers and cooks - check out the solar powered light jars

Podcast of the radio interview I did yesterday

Thank you for your visits this week and for taking the time to comment and add your ideas to the mix. I hope you have a beautiful weekend.

I received an email from Madeline last week asking me to write about replacing household linens, crockery and odds and ends like umbrellas, as well as how to plan in the costs of maintaining a home. She wrote:

I've just had to replace my hot water system and computer printer. I also noticed the exterior of my house is suddenly looking really shabby,with exposed lining boards in places.I'm considering painting some of it myself to save money, but aware that I'm just one person trying to manage home, garden, major renovations, a business, and two kids!

And then there are all of the little replacements that add up - the umbrellas for school, crockery that's broken, towels ready for the rag bag etc….

When my very old sewing machine gave up a few years ago, I replaced it with a Janome Quilters Companion I bought on eBay for a fraction of the new price. It's still going strong and has worked perfectly since I bought it.

I've written in the past about the common sense option of building an emergency fund for unusual and unexpected expenses. Everyone has these expenses as some point - the dog will have to go to the vet, someone is sick and needs special treatment, the fridge breaks down or some other appliance you need has to be replaced in a hurry. Those expenses are best covered with an emergency fund. The fund is kept in a bank - we use the ING online bank because their interest rates are better than the local banks. You may not need to dip into this for a couple of years and when it reaches a certain level - say $1000 - $2000 - you stop paying into it. It can sit there earning interest until you need it. Don't be tempted to keep your emergency fund at home in cash. You'll be tempted to dip into it and many of us would give in to that temptation.

We put aside a certain amount every month for home maintenace. That covers house painting - we have a brick house so it's only interior painting, guttering, roof repairs, fencing etc. We are lucky in that Hanno can do most of our maintenance and repairs and when he does he often uses recycled materials. Hanno never throws away nails, screws, washers, paint, timber, wire, roofing iron, steel reinforcement or anything that he thinks will be useful in the future. Luckily we have a large shed to store these thing in and having that stash of recyclables saves us a lot of money. One of the many things that impresses me about Hanno is that he is always checking things to see if they're working and in a good state of repair. If he finds anything broken or damaged, he will fix it immediately. He never lets it get worse. Get into the habit of checking around your home and do your maintenance promptly so it doesn't turn into a repair job. If you need to replace or repair anything, look at buying from renovation yards and compare prices between buying new materials from the hardware store and recycled pieces from the dump shop or renovator's store. Make sure you not only compare price, compare quality too so you get the best value for money. Madeline, if you have to pay to have your repairs done, if you source the materials, that will save on those repairs.

We put money aside every month for car registration, maintenance and repairs too.

Inside the house, we only replace things like sheets and towels when they're absolutely beyond repair. I keep a lookout for frayed or ripped sheets, and repair them to keep them going another season, generally I get another two seasons from them and then the sheet or towel will be used for cleaning rags or patchwork, it won't be "thrown away". I only ever buy sheets and towels when I see them at a good price, usually at the post Christmas sales. If I don't see the quality I want at the price I'm prepared to pay, I don't buy it and we make do until I see something I'm prepared to replace it with. I don't want to waste money and I don't want inferior quality. If I can buy best quality as a reduced sale price, I know that it will last many years, it will be a pleasure to use and I haven't spent too much on the replacement. I am prepared to wait for that. If I were to replace crockery, glasses, pyrex or cutlery, I'd do it at a good sale too, and make sure I got the best quality I could afford. Second hand shops are also a great place to look for kitchen replacements. Naturally everything will be pre-used but they'll be clean and in good repair and usually the older items haven't been made in China or India and will be good quality. Taking a regular stroll through your local second hand shop is a good habit to get into because you never know what you'll find there.

Hanno with his son Jens in his workshop/shed. In there he keeps all the bits and pieces he saves that he thinks might be needed for future repairs.

For odds and ends like umbrellas, sports equipment, camping gear and bags, the obvious place to look is the closest lost property sale. Here is a link with a catalogue showing what is available here in Australia but I'm sure most countries would have similar lost property sales. These auctions happen all over the country, you may find one near you. Go well before the auction starts because you should inspect what you intend to buy. You won't get your money back if you're not satisfied. Goods bought at an auction are generally bought "as is".

When you're doing this kind of shopping, don't go overboard and load yourself up with too much. Keep your simple life values in mind and remember what your level of "enough" is. All you're looking for is good value and good quality and if you can get that you've done a good job.

So to recap, if you can, and I know not everyone can do this, save an amount for emergencies. Put aside a certain amount each month for ongoing house repairs and maintenance and car repairs and maintenance. To work out what that amount is, go back and look at what you've paid in previous years and if you think that is a typical yearly amount, divide it by 12 to get a monthly amount, or by 52 to get a weekly amount, and that is what you'll have to put aside. If you get to the end of the year and you haven't spent the money you set aside, use it on building up a stockpile of a small number of sheets, towels, glasses, crockery, underwear, socks, work clothes, children's clothes in sizes they'll grow in to. Once you have enough of these things in your stockpile, any excess money can go to your emergency fund or straight to savings. Take advantage of sales, second hand and auctions - either local or online and be prepared to step back and wait if what you need is not at the right price or is an inferior quality. It's okay to wait for exactly what you want. That is wise economy.

Please add your thoughts here so this pool of ideas can help Madeline and others who are changing how they live.

ADDITION: I forgot to tell you that I'll be interviewed live on Radio National's Life Matters today at 8.45 am Queensland time and 9.45 am AEDT. The program will be available later in the day as a podcast.

I've noticed quite a few new soap makers at the forum lately, and have had emails from some of you with soap questions, so I thought it would be timely to give a few thoughts, not so much about how to make soap but about those things that are associated with it. Please remember I'm not an expert soaper. I make my own soap - one that is plain, unscented and not coloured. So I don't know much about essential oils or colourings but I know about what I do and am happy to share what works for me.

You don't need the best oil for soap making, in fact courser oils are better.

If you can't find coconut oil and you live in Australia, use copha instead. You'll find it in the dairy aisle at the supermarket. It's solidified coconut oil.

You have to be careful with palm oil. That's often found in the dairy aisle too but many palm trees are being cut down to supply palm oil and that is not sustainable. Palm oil itself is not a problem but it becomes a problem depending on where it is harvested and how it is processed. Go here to download a very good file (and click on the Panda) that shows what various countries and companies are doing. If you don't know the source of your palm oil, buy a different oil, like coconut or sunflower.

Don't make too much soap. The oils can go rancid and additives like oatmeal can go mouldy, so if you make about three months supply at a time, you'll be able to get through your batch and have a new one waiting while only making soap once every 10 weeks or so.

I usually make about 20 bars in one batch. I let them dry out for a month or so and then I usually store them soap in an open tray in the bathroom. If this humidity goes on too much longer, I will store these in a paper lined box.

I hope you're having fun with your soap making. When you "get it" soap making could take you on to many wonderful types of soap or even a little business you could run from home.