down to earth

If you have had problems slowing down, I encourage you to take up the delightfully heart-warming and productive craft of knitting. Clicking away with two sticks, using long threads of cotton or wool that you can pick up and put down, take with you when you go out, and continue working on while you're talking to people and being very sociable, slows not only your heart rate but your mind too, and if you let it, your life as well.

While Tricia was here with us, I had an insight in what the old knitting circles and women's social mornings used to be like in past times. Often women used to take their knitting with them when they went out. Why not! It's portable, easy to carry and a good way to connect with others. Whenever you knit in public, often people come over to you and want to feel the texture of the yarn or the garment. Knitting breaks down the barriers, there is something about it that brings people together, and calms you when you do it alone.

Knitting can take a long time, depending on what you're working on, because it is a one stitch at a time craft - like gardening, there is no way to hurry it along. It takes it's own time, or you don't do it at all. And because it does take time and it's something you put time and effort into, it makes sense to me to use the best quality yarns you can afford. I'm lucky to have a new order of Ecoyarns here now. It arrived while Tricia was here. So I invited her to take her pick, I had plenty of knitting needles here, so she started making a simple hat and socks (above) for her first grandchild, Danny and Laura's baby, due at the end of the year. True to her nature and her fine style, she finished them off with tiny rabbits. They're very sweet, one of a kind, and can be safely worn by the newborn because the yarn used is organic.

The photo above is her second project - a newborn cardigan from a Debbie Bliss book. She's using two different types of organic cotton and again, it's unique, soft and very special.

If you've been hoping to take up the needles and learn how to knit, or if you're going from the beginner stage to a slightly more advanced level, I encourage you to choose good quality yarns for your knitting. Buy the best you can afford but check out my sponsor, Vivian at Ecoyarns because she is expanding her business and has plenty of specials at the moment. If you're in a cold climate, there is nothing better than the natural yarns like wool and alpaca to keep keep the cold out. They're natural insulators and are more efficient than fleece or acrylic yarns. In a warm climate, your can't beat knitted cotton, especially on a baby. A little cotton jacket or vest will keep a baby protected and comfortable without over-heating them.

I hope you get hooked on knitting, just like I am. It's soft, gentle and so productive - from these needles and yarn, beautiful garments and helpful household items are made. It's a craft that you get better at simply by doing it. There are plenty of excellent How to Knit videos on You Tube, so get your needles, select your yarns and dive in. It's a world that opens up an abundance of richness, satisfaction and handmade garments. Check out Ravelry for some inspiration. There, knitters from all over the world, show their work, share patterns and develop friendships through this wonderful craft.

Tomorrow I'll show you what I've been working on, as well as some of the new yarn and my very old wool winder. In the meantime, if you need me, I'll be knitting. ♥

Kathy sent me the link to this during the week. It's an excellent online magazine called Seeing the Every day. Thanks Kathy!

This plain cardigan is another fine Pickles baby pattern. I'm knitting it at the moment for one of our new end of year babies.

For anyone interested in working with wood of any kind, check this out.

I met Cath a couple of weeks ago when I was invited to talk at the Permaculture Noosa meeting. Her website, Soil to Supper has a lot of valuable information about food gardening.

If you love jam doughnuts - the ones we call Berliners - go no further. Here is your recipe.

Another excellent fact sheet about commercial insect sprays by Annette McFarlane.

OUR PEOPLE

This is Brenda's blog, Nest Bliss. Brenda shares her life along with patterns, recipes and some lovely photos of real life being lived.

This blog will charm you. It's Christina Lowry's A Little Bird Told Me. And I love Christina's Ten Things I've Learnt About Knitting. It's spot on.

Now that the weather is turning from warmish to cool, I'm taking the time to knit. It's always a wonderful time of year, my favourite. Thank you for your visits during the week. I hope you enjoy the weekend.

IN ADDITION:
I wrote today and recently that I'm knitting for new babies at the end of the year. My sister Tricia is visiting at the moment and she and I are like two chattering old birds clicking away on our needles here. It's really lovely to be knitting with my sister. Anyhow, I've had a few comments and emails asking if these babies are new grandchildren. Well, I think you know me well enough by now to know that if it were, I'd be shouting it out. But this babies are very close to me nonetheless. My much loved nephew, Daniel, and his partner Laura, are expecting their first child later in the year. And that means that Tricia is becoming a grandmother for the first time. The other baby will be the first child of my Penguin editor, Jo and her husband Eli, due in August. Luckily, I just received a large and beautiful order from Vivian at EcoYarns. I'll show you next week but it's all organic cottons and wools that will knit up nicely for these two young families and their babies. Just thinking about it makes me smile. :- )

What a wonderful collection of comments we had yesterday. If you haven't read them yet, make yourself a cuppa, sit down for an hour and read through them. Those comment clearly demonstrates what a wide and diverse group we are. I was fascinated by the variety of work we do, and how an ordinary day can be so different for all of us and yet we're still connected by our work and our lives. I loved reading about your day and I appreciate so many many of you taking the time to comment - I know from my own personal experience that taking that time sometimes seems too much but it really does give us time to slow ourselves down, to connect with others and to understand that none of us is alone.

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I love leftovers. When I can, I always add more vegetables to a meat meal so we have leftovers that can be eaten the following day or frozen for another day in the future. One recent leftover delight was this lamb curry. Originally a baked lamb shoulder, it was enjoyed with baked potatoes, pumpkin, onions and sweet potato. Way too much for one meal, we had the meat for sandwiches the next day for lunch and that night I finished off the shoulder and the roasted vegetables by making up this lamb curry. The recipe could be used for any pre-cooked meat or vegetables and you could replace the curry for chilli, or leave out the spice altogether and make a lamb stew.

One of the reasons this works so well as a leftover meal is that most of the cooking has already been done, the flavour has already developed and the meat and vegetables have areas of caramelisation on them. It really is just a matter of chopping up the leftovers, adding fresh vegetables and spices if you need to, and making a sauce.

In the photo above, I chopped up the leftover roasted vegetables and added a carrot and capsicum (pepper), onion and tomato left over from the lunch sandwiches. These were added to a pan to heat up and start cooking.

While that was happening, I cut all the meat off the bones.

See that brown colouring on the end of the bone, that is pure flavouring. It's caramelisation - it happens when the sugars in the meat (or vegetables) start cooking slowly and the water evaporates, turning the meat brown and changing the flavour.

When the vegetables have cooked, add the meat and the bones to take advantage of those caramelised bits, then add enough water to partially cover the meat and vegetables. Season with salt and pepper. You don't have to add any stock or flavourings from a tin or pouch, you'll get the flavour from the bones and pre-cooked meat.

When everything is cooked, you can either thicken the sauce by letting it evaporate, or if you're cooking for a few people and need to bulk the meal out with sauce and rice, thicken it with cornflour or arrowroot. Simply mix a tablespoon (or two in a larger meal) of cornflour with half a cup of water and mix until no lumps remain. Add that to the meat and vegetables and stir in well. Cook it for a further minute to cook out the flour taste, and your meal is ready. Serve with rice or mashed potato. It's fast, very tasty and economical.

I think we'd all agree that written words play a very important role in our lives. I blog almost every day and write every day. As well as the computer writing there is handwriting, and I still love to write by hand, and many of you, but not me, are texting. I have texted once (even the words relating to texting sound wrong to me). When I did, I felt like a monkey trying to write a Shakespearean play. One was enough, I quit and won't text again. Nevertheless, words and their meanings play a big part in my life - some sentences stay with me long after their reading. I particularly enjoy words about productive work.

The other day, Gail wrote this as part of her comment: "Today after i have finished my basic housework, I'll be sitting at my sewing machine making an apron and edging some old towels that I will cut up for cleaning cloths. I think of you and the other ladies who comment often as I go about my day and wonder what you are all doing."

I felt all warm and smily when I read those words; Gail reached out and connected to me in a real sense. Later in the day, when I was in a really boring meeting, my mind wandered back to Gail and I pictured her, cutting up old towels and working away on her sewing machine. I wondered what other regulars and newbies were doing too and decided that today, I'd write a post to find out what an average day looks like in your home or work place. I find it quite fascinating that while I'm sleeping, others are ironing or taking children to school and when I'm baking or washing up in the morning, others are piecing together a quilt in the fading light of day. Over on the forum, Rose sometimes starts a thread asking what members are doing over a 24 hour period. That is what this is about today.

Please join in if you have time, even if you don't usually comment. Let's build up a written package of our days from Norway to New Zealand, and every place in between. Add the time you're writing and what the weather is like and, of course, anything else you can - be it what you think is dull or what anyone would think is exciting. I will love all the "dull" and ordinary things. :- )

Wednesday - 5am. It's 17C and raining lightly.

Today I'll make breakfast, feed the cat and chickens, let the chooks out to roam. Then wash up and clean the kitchen, tidy up the lounge room, put some washing on, get some bread on the go and make our bed and the one in the guest room.

At 9.45am I'll drive over to the coast to pick up my sister from the airport and bringing her back home. No doubt we'll talk a leg off an iron bed, we'll drink tea and talk some more. We'll have lunch with Hanno when the bread is ready, I'll wash up and put on a pot of pea and ham soup for our tea. Later, we'll um, talk, and I'll do some knitting. She usually brings some hand work with her, often it's sewing, so I guess she'll work on that while I knit. I'm knitting baby woollies again.

Late in the afternoon, I'll start on tomorrow's blog and work out what I'll talk about at a function we're going to on the weekend. It's The Planting - part of the Woodford Folk Festival and we three have been invited along to be part of it.

So what are you doing today?

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I'll be signing books at the Collins bookshop at Sunshine Plaza, Maroochydore this Saturday from 10am - 12 md. Come along and say hello if you're close by.

I received a followup email from Joannie that said: "I have a girlfriend only 18months younger than myself (I’m 36) who has two gorgeous boys aged nearly three and 14months. She has been making the difficult decision as to whether to return to paid work after her second round of maternity leave. She was telling me she feels so torn about wanting to raise her boys herself rather than grandparents or child care but she’s struggling to deal with her feelings of “not contributing to the home financially”. We have been discussing this in great detail and I’ve been left feeling how sad that Mothers or Fathers that don’t re-enter paid work force are left feeling guilty and unworthy. As if what they do each day is not important or valued anymore.

Not contributing to the home financially! That makes my blood boil. When you leave the workforce to work at home, it is your job to manage the home with the money available to you. What is careful shopping for bargains, meal planning, stockpiling, making green cleaners, baking bread, making soap, cooking from scratch, recycling, mending, buying in bulk, caring for children? What are all these things if not contributing to the financial viability of the home? There is more than one way to contribute. Homemakers work as part of a team - there is a homemaker and a breadwinner. Both equally important. They can be a male homemaker and female breadwinner, or the other way around, they can be the same sex. One makes the money, the other uses it wisely to care for the family and pay the bills. If we don't value these partnerships of one breadwinner and one homemaker or two breadwinners who are part-time homemakers, then we lose out as a society. Our countries are populated by families with children who raise those children to take on the role of breadwinners and homemakers when it comes to be their time. We are not a solely a commercial enterprise. We are not working primarily to keep the country going, although that is a valuable side benefit, we're working to provide a good life for our families. We have a human component that is vital and without it we fail - morally and commercially.

Never forget that a dollar saved is better than a dollar earned - you do not pay tax on a saved dollar.

Opa and Jamie having breakfast on the weekend. Jamie was happy, he had his banana and his favourite gorilla toy.

I challenge all the homemakers here to record the savings they make over the course of a month. There will be savings, I have no doubt. Work out also how much it would cost to return to the work force - in work clothes, transport, lunches, haircuts, everything. When you add child care costs into that equation, often it doesn't make financial sense to go back to work. When it does, the benefits of parents rearing their own children should be considered along with whether both parents want to work. In some families, both parents want to work, in some both parents need to work. In other families, a decision is made that one will go out to work and one will stay home to work. All decisions are valid for their own reasons and no one has the right to say that the decision someone else makes to work at home or in the workforce is not right, or not enough. We can all help this along. Stop judging others on the choices they make. I support homemakers, I support women who have to work and who choose to work. I support all women. I hope you can too. If you're in work at home or in the workforce, respect the choices other women make, even if you don't agree or understand it. Everyone has their own story, and you never know how destructive your words might be. Either offer your encouragement, or say nothing.

Enough chocolate chip biscuits were baked to do us through the week and to package up a few for visitors to take home.

So, let's get back to the subject at hand. If you do decide to stay at home, make the conscious decision that your career is working in your home. Homemaking is your new job. Learn as much as you can about what you need and want to do - there is no one size fits all in this, each one of us is different. Manage your family like a little business, you'll need to have short term plans, long term plans, work to a budget and look after your assets. This is real work and often you'll develop self reliance along with all the other skills you develop at home. And that, my friends, is a wonderful thing that will help you all through your life.

When you decide to work in your home full time, often you may have to spend sometime moving things around to better suit how you will work. Modern homes and renovated home are usually set up more for entertaining than for home production and family life. At the very least you should set up your kitchen to suit how you work but if that works well, maybe you can move and rejig how the rest of the house works for you too. Forget about what others are thinking - live as you wish, develop your skills and your self confidence and become more self reliant. There is no greater gift you can give to a child than to be there, to express love and support and to show them that the life you've built makes you happy. If you can do that, you'll be a fine role model along with being a fine parent.

One of our Barnevelders perching on top of the tap!

Never let anyone demean the work you do at home. If you have small children, what better work could you have than to guide them, teach them, protect them and to show them, by example, how wonderful life can be? The home is the best place to learn life skills and to pass what you learn on to your children. As children grow, they still need you as their guiding light. Teenagers will benefit from knowing you're there when they come home from school. Giving them your time, in addition to your never ending love, is the best investment in their future.

Own your life. What you do everyday is so important. Every one of those days make up your life. Your daily work will help define the person you become so whether you're the manager of a dozen employees or the homemaking mother/father of two or ten, put your best into every day so that you get its full value. If you can find a good balance between work and the time to enjoy what you work for, you'll be in the best position.

ADDITION: My thanks to Madge who sent this newspaper clipping relating to this post. Thanks Madge.

Last week I received an email from Joannie who said: "After listening to you on the radio and checking out your blog I then bought your book and as a result my family has named me the domestic godess!. Why? I have created a stockpile of groceries, made my own soap, baked my own sourdough bread, made muffins and slices instead of buying pre-packaged snacks, I have made my own cleaners and as of this afternoon I preserved my first ever jar of capsicums in fact that was my first preserved anything! ... Another amazing positive has come out of this…..we have cut our grocery bill in half!!!!!! WOW truly something I never thought possible as I didn’t think I wasted money and always tried to buy things on sale, this demonstes the benefits of buying in bulk.

"The feeling this has given me is indescribable, I have always struggled with not being in the paid work force but being able to provide for my family and learning to live simply has given me empowerment, I can finally say, I am now so proud of what I do. My children are learning to make cleaners and preserve goods, bake from scratch and have a simple eye and ask themselves can we live without that? My daughter took it upon herself to make a lemon slice from scratch and take it to elderly neighbors and friends, my 12 year old son made his own bread and I overheard him reciting recipes to his 26 year old aunt who can’t yet cook. These small things make me proud of my job as I have two gorgeous offspring who are learning skills for life."

That is the kind of empowerment I hoped to relay through the pages of my book and I'm so pleased it reached out to at least one family.We've all heard the stories of friends and neighbours being unkind when they know a former paid worker has decided to stay at home to manage the home. That negativity can transfer to the new homemaker and be a small seed of self-doubt that can build into something destructive.

When I first started working in my home as a homemaker, after many years of being in the workforce, I felt no shame or that I was doing less than I should be doing. I'm intelligent, I have a degree, I've been successful in several areas and I knew when I came home, I'd made the right choice for me. None of my friends questioned my decision - they either understood I had decided to change for my own reasons or they realised that criticism would flow off me like water off a duck's back. For whatever reason, I heard nothing. However, I couldn't find any other women who were doing what I was doing and being satisfied by it.

During those first weeks, I wasn't sure what to expect. Either from myself, my home or from my own emotions. I knew this was where I wanted to be and I hoped I would enjoy being here. What I didn't expect was to feel powerful and more alive than I'd felt in years. To know that I could structure my day however I wanted it to be after years of fitting into a commercial environment and working to deadlines, well, that alone made me believe I could fly. I didn't have to do anything, and yet I wanted to do everything. There were so many possibilities in front of me! I felt like I'd really found my home. Over the months that followed, I taught myself as much as I could. I read about cleaning, brushes, microfibre, chemicals, preserving, nourishment, making cheese and bread, home maintenance, productive organic gardens and many other things. The more I read, the more I remembered from my upbringing when my grandma washed her dishes at a stone sink and my mother boiled sheets in a copper boiler. We are not so far from that past time; it happened in my lifetime in Sydney. Life has changed so fast.

It made me realise I had a rich heritage, not in money and possessions, but in how to build a strong family and how to look after them well. I came from a family of hard workers, prime homemaking stock, and that made me really proud. When my friends asked what I was doing, I proudly told them I'd made a new kind of bread or sewn some baby clothes or bought more chickens. I was doing important work and I wanted everyone to know it. This was not anything to feel ashamed of and I was not going to keep quiet about it. I searched for an Australian book on the subject and couldn't find any, so I wrote my own book. I felt that if others didn't know about the beauty that is lurking in every home, they should be made aware of it. I kept hearing that women who chose homemaking as a career were downtrodden and miserable but I had lived on both sides of the working track and I knew that working in my home opened up possibilities for me, it was my liberator. I wasn't disadvantaged and powerless at home, I was thriving.

What I had found was a way to bypass going to work to earn money by using the money we had available in a more sensible way. If I made my own products, not only did I have better quality, they were healthier, cheaper and more environmentally friendly. By working in my home I had the time to shop for bargains and to use everything I had to it's full value. By working at home as if it were my career, I'd opened up a different kind of future for myself - one where I felt valued and creative and where anything was possible.

When I looked around to assess after my first year at home I realised I was doing meaningful work, I was making a difference and the home where I used to rush in and out of had become a comfortable oasis in a sea of outside craziness. I read about women criticising other women for staying at home - bored housewives sitting in front of the computer or TV all day with nothing to do - none of that came close to what was actually happening in my home. I'm not sure why women criticise other women. Working life can be difficult for all of us and it's not right to attack others to make yourself feel better. That kind of behaviour is new to me. We didn't do that to each other when I was much younger. Back then, at least where I lived, other women were seen as friends, not competitors. We respected each other and the decisions we made.

This post is getting to be a long one and I still have a lot on my mind, so I'll continue this tomorrow when I talk about making that transition from work to home and self reliance. I know there are a lot of women and men out there that struggle with this. I successfully made that transition and I'm glad I did. I am happier now than I've ever been. Find out why tomorrow.

The last part of my home review this week is the vegetable garden. The garden is one of four elements that we deal with to put food on the table every day. Those four elements are the vegetable garden, food shopping, food storage and food preparation. They work together, equally important and supportive of the end goal - feeding the family. We start planting our garden in March, it grows slowly at first, always dependent on the weather and what insects are around, and reaches full production around the end of May. As we harvest, Hanno plants more in those empty spaces. What we don't eat fresh is frozen or bottled for our use later in the year, or given away - either to our family or friends.

I took all these photos yesterday afternoon.

It all starts with the seeds. We collect seeds when we can, otherwise we buy open pollinated seeds from Green Harvest. These are loofa seeds above and Easter Egg radish seeds below.

This tray of seedlings will be planted out soon. They are brussel sprouts, lettuce, mini kale and tomatoes.

Not everything we grow is in the ground. Here we have an orange tree waiting to be planted (to replace a pink grapefruit we lost in the recent rains), sweet peas, a bay tree, parsley, lemon myrtle, strawberries and nasturtiums.

And this large green leaf vine is my vanilla orchid. It's snaking its way through the bush house.

The garlic has just pushed through.

Here we have petunias, parsley, beetroot, Chinese cabbage, pineapple sage, tomatoes, chillies and garlic.

Hiding in there is the first tomato.

There must be almost a hundred cucumber flowers on these vines.

We started harvesting the cucumbers this week.

The chooks are the constant companions of the garden. They don't get into the garden, they patrol the grassed area just outside it, waiting for insects and leaves to fall near them.

This bare patch is waiting for the potatoes. We bought some potatoes in Dorrigo on the way back from the book tour and they haven't sprouted yet. They're fresh, straight from the organic farm they were grown on. It's reminds me every time I see them how old the potatoes we buy must be when they often sprout within a week of us bringing them home.

And finally, a second planting of bok choy and lettuce, just near, but out of sight, of the strawberries.

Further over, in another garden, Hanno has planted beans, peas, more beetroot, silverbeet, and green onions. There is one more garden to prepare and plant out and then the majority of the hard work is done. Then it's just harvesting and planting in empty spaces.

If you're starting your first garden this year, start small and only grow what you'll eat. Vegetable gardening is a wonderful supplement to the food you have in your kitchen but in those first years, take it slow while you learn what you need to produce vegetables without commercial fertilisers and insecticides. Vegetable gardening is one of the slow elements of simple life - it takes its own time, nothing will hasten a tomato or lettuce to maturity. You have to wait and watch, and while you do, that gentle pace slows you too.

Never expect perfection in the vegetable garden. This is nature working right in front of you. You will have perfect tomatoes and some with grubs, you'll have crisp lettuces then one full of slugs, there will be times when you do your best and it doesn't work, and other times when you don't even plant a seed but up will pop the best cucumbers. It's all part of it, all there for you to learn from. So take notes and record what you plant and harvest, so you can build on what you do this year and take it into the next season.

Gail asked for the Celery and Potato Soup recipe, it's a very simple soup and this method of making soup can be used with almost any vegetable or group of vegetables. The soup makes its own stock while it's cooking. The recipe will feed four people.

2 large potatoes - peeled and chopped
6 stalks celery - washed and chopped
1 large onion - peeled and chopped
water
salt and pepper
a splash of cream

Place the above in a one litre/quart of water, add salt and pepper to taste and cook until soft - about 30 minutes. Blend in a blender or with a stick blender, taste for seasoning, adjust if necessary. Some celery is very stringy, if yours is, strain the soup through a sieve at this point. Then add cream and a sprinkling of parsley and serve. Simple!