down to earth

I was contacted by "Jenna" last week asking for help with a major life change. Jenna is a nurse, five months pregnant with her first child, who is in the process of simplifying. She wants to take maternity leave and reduce her family's cost of living by 30 - 40 percent. I'd like to help her if I can. Just as a side issue, when I was on my last book tour, this topic came up more than any other. Some of the people I met wanted to tell me about their mostly successful changes to single income simple living, and others were about to do it and wanted reassurance. I was very happy to give it because I think this way of living is a bold liberation from a life of continuing consumption.

This is part of what Jenna wrote:

"My husband and I are focused on debt reduction, we are very conscious about our purchases and I have swapped to home made cleaning products. In the last week there has been some significant political change with regards to maternity leave, which if passed will affect me. As I am the main income earner for our family I need to balance the (income) needs of our family, with the personal desire to stay at home for the first nine-months of my babes' life. The only solution is to be very brave and look to reduce our cost of living by about 30-40% and more if possible.

This means that I am jumping from a few small steps (good household budget, extra mortgage repayments) to adopting more of the amazing things that you have recommended over the years (for example - better management of food, reduce wastage, stockpiling). And the truth is that I am really scared. I am scared to go from dual income no kids, to maternity leave where a proportion of income that was previously available is no longer available. (Please don't mistake my tone - I have always been exceptionally grateful to live in a era where maternity leave is paid, available, and generous to Nurses - I never took for granted the opportunities, and I understood that the Government wished to change things - but this has happened rather suddenly, and I was unprepared).

The reason that I wanted to write to you is because I don't think making this change would have been at all possible before I read your blog, I don't have anyone in my life who has committed to this way of life. My friends and family live purposefully and with much joy - but they are not in the same place or situation and don't quite understand. I also wanted to thank you for making me feel (even though I am truly scared) that change is possible."

And yes change is possible, for all of us, so let's get to it. Jenna, I won't comment on debt reduction, mortgage payments or budgeting because it sounds like you've got all that under control. You will need an emergency fund and that is something you should start straight away. I'll just say this, and I'm sure you already know it, keeping your money on track, staying within your budget and paying down debt is vitally important. So is working well with your partner. You both need to work towards common goals but acknowledge that you might do the same job in different ways. As long as things get done well and on time, that should not be a problem. Respect your differences as much as you celebrate what brings you together.

Please note: clicking on the linked words will take you to another post in this blog on the subject.

There are a number of smaller measures you can look into that will help you keep to your budget and that's what we'll focus on here. I don't know what expenses you have but I presume you use electricity, maybe gas, you have at least one phone, the internet, you have insurance of some kind. What ever it is, go over all your accounts and see if you really need what you're paying for. If you have more than one phone, you may be able to get rid of one. There was a time not too long ago when most families had only one phone and that was a land line. Unless you have a medical condition, people don't need to be able to reach you 24/7 on the phone. If you can retire a phone while you're working in your home, that will be just one small saving you can make

ALL savings are worth your time and effort. They might be small savings but they add up to create large savings over time. And that's how you should look at it. Don't think that not buying a bottle of water today will save you $3. Instead, think about not buying water for a year, which would save you over $300 a year if you bought two bottles of water a week. All of us think that $3 isn't much, but you should look at the cost of the continuing behaviour instead of the cost of the individual product. Remember, ALL savings help you live the life you want for yourself and your growing family.

Cook from scratch, make as much as you can for yourself and recycle. Be an active shopper, find your best supermarket but buy as much as possible from farmers markets, local butchers and green grocers. Menu planning, either the popular way many people do it, or your own version of it, will help you avoid wasting food as well as save money on groceries. There are many threads on the forum that will help you plan your menus. Stockpiling is another way of saving money and making sure you have food in the house during times of financial hardship or community disaster. Like menu planning, there are different ways of stockpiling, but you build it up slowly as you see specials and sales. If you don't have a large freezer, it may be a very worthwhile investment especially when stockpiling meat specials, leftovers and cook-ahead meals when you return to work.

Always check your fridge and vegetable bins before you shop. Store your food properly when you return. If you waste any of this food it's the same as throwing the money it cost to buy it, out the window. Run your home like a small business - you want to get value for money for everything you buy and you don't want to waste anything you've already bought. That not only includes groceries and food, it also includes water, electricity, phone and internet usage.

Organise yourself with routines before the baby arrives. If you've got the washing done and a decent stash of meals in the freezer, it will make you feel more relaxed and you'll enjoy your baby and this new stage of your life much more. If you can't manage to organise yourself every day, that's okay too. You and your family will survive even if housework is left undone.

When you leave paid work it will be your job to save money and organise your home to be the safe and comfortable haven you'll need it to be. Use the time you have now to start on that process. Start living on one income now so you can ease into it and work out how to make the most of what you've got and get the best value for money. I'm sure you'll have family and friends offer you furniture and clothes. Take everything you're offered. There is a strong tradition of older mothers passing on baby paraphernalia that is no longer needed. Take advantage of that and don't buy anything new for the baby until you know you need it. Most new mums are offered a lot of pre-loved clothes and nappies. If you're asked what the baby needs, ask for cloth nappies. They'll save a fortune and you won't be contributing to the mountain of nappies already in land fill.

Rediscover your library. If it's been a while, you'll find a nice variety of media available like books, DVDs, comics, magazines, talking books, the internet, games and music CDs. This will provide you with some cheap entertainment. You'll be kept busy with your baby in the first year but keep up your contact with family and friends. Instead of going out, invite them over for a meal or coffee. You'll probably find that other parents prefer this kind of outing rather than going to a pub, concert or party.

No matter what you do, retain your own identity because it's easy to become lost in motherhood. If you raise your child with a strong sense of who you are while being tender, gentle and loving, you'll make a fine role model. This is going to be a big change but it's entirely possible if you're strong enough to walk your own path and be who you want to be.

You'll have to be self-reliant, go against what your friends and family are doing, be self assured, take risks, learn a lot, develop your skills, change in more ways than you expect to, build your confidence and self respect and in the end, you'll find yourself living the life you want to live. Not everything will go according to plan but I'm sure that won't put you off. Learn from the lows as much as you learn from the highs and keep your growing family close. Good luck with your changes, Jenna, and be kind to yourself.

I'm sure other readers will offer their take on this too. There is a thread on the forum for this topic now, please click here to go there.

This time of year is about gardening for us, even with our smaller garden. We start our gardening year in March and all through the cold months we grow winter crops. But when spring arrives we add more manure and compost to the soil and start on our tomatoes, chillies, herbs, capsicums, lettuce, cucumbers and green leaves. These crops are the exciting ones because they all have a big flavour punch and they look good in the garden. If we get it right, instead of paying high prices for watery tomatoes, cucumbers and chillies, we have our own organic heirloom varieties that with one taste yell: "This is why we grow our own food."

Hanno added a shade tunnel over the green leafy vegetables a couple of weeks ago. It's a simple structure made with four short star pegs, flexible black plastic pipe, shade cloth, a timber brace and hooks to attach the shade cloth to the pipe. The tunnel takes about 30 minutes to erect and depending on how long your star pegs are, you can bend over or stand straight to weed or harvest in the tunnel. We've found it particularly handy during the early hot days when the plants haven't yet developed their tolerance to the hotter sun which burns tender salad leaves, tomatoes and capsicums. It's also a good defence against summer storms and wind. It won't prevent vegetables going to seed in the hot weather but with mulching and prudent watering, it will get you through a harsh summer better than you would without it.

You can unhook the shade cloth if you need the height to weed or harvest. The timber brace just stops the centre of the shade cloth from sagging.

Photos above and below are of the same plants. The top photo was taken 2 October, the bottom one 24 October.

We're growing a French tomato, Rouge de Marmande, and an Oxheart. Both are heirloom varieties and both have few seeds. The French girl is great in salads and sandwiches and the Oxheart is for relish, cooking and sandwiches. I sowed tomato seeds a few weeks ago and planted out the seedlings this week. I like to pot the seedlings on from the small cells they start in and allow them to grow so by the time I plant them, they've almost outgrown their pot and have started to flower. We always grow an organic garden and use the minimal amount of additions. Instead of using commercial fertiliser, I make comfrey tea which is full of the nutrients most vegetables and fruit need. When we planted the tomatoes, I picked some comfrey, chopped it up and we placed a large hand-full of chopped leaves in each planting hole. As the days go by, those leaves will decompose and release their nutrients to the plants. I also gave each plant a drink of seeweed concentrate and liquid comfrey after they were planted.

A bunch of comfrey was cut into small pieces and bruised so it would decompose faster, and then added to the tomato growing holes.

It's important to run a frugal garden just as it is to run a frugal home. When you plan out your garden, take into account all the water you'll use, the fertilisers you'll add as well as the cost of mulch and anything else you'll buy for your garden. When you do up your garden budget, you may find it's just not cost effective. So, what do you do if that happens? Decide whether the joy of gardening out-weighs the cost of the harvest and proceed accordingly. We have tanks here that hold 15,000 litres of rainwater and we never use tap water on the garden. We make our own compost and most of our fertilisers. We buy organic sugar cane mulch, sulphate of potash, seaweed concentrate and Dipel (a biological stomach poison for caterpillars that is organic and non-toxic). We buy some seedlings and seeds when we need them but if we can save seeds, we do that instead. Our shade structure was made using recycled materials we already had here. It's quite easy to save money in the garden so look around and work out what you can give a second life to, learn how to save and sow seeds and how to propagate. Those small things will save you money.

It's been a productive time in the garden but I still take my time out there watching, sniffing, touching and enjoying what's around me. It gives me a good feeling to produce some of the food we eat, knowing it is as healthy and fresh as it can be. A garden will give you much more than vegetables, herbs and fruit if you let it. It gives a sense of peace and of connecting with the natural world, a place to think and a quiet haven from a noisy world. And when you create your garden make sure you have a few seats there to encourage lingering.

A few readers asked about yoghurt starter cultures after yesterday's post so I thought I'd add to the information here. It really is a very good way of making yoghurt. I buy my culture from Green Living in Brisbane. They charge $16.95 for enough culture to make 100 litres. The culture is highly concentrated so even though you have the capacity to make that amount, it's a tiny parcel. I bought sour cream culture too and measuring spoons so I wouldn't over-measure and waste the culture. Every batch I've made has been perfect. I don't have any affiliation with this company but I have been impressed with their fast and efficient service.

When you have your starter culture, you make yoghurt in the usual way but you use the culture instead of adding live, fresh yoghurt to your mix. If you haven't made yoghurt before, here is an old post on the process, although now I use the Easiyo in the final stage to ferment the milk and I use starter culture instead of adding fresh yoghurt. For those unfamiliar with the Easiyo process, it's plastic one litre jar that fits inside an insulated container. Just before you place the filled jar into the container, you fill the base of it with boiling water. Sealing the jar inside the container with the hot water overnight gives you a simple and easy way to make yoghurt.

When the yoghurt is made, you can use it to make a simple fresh cheese called Labneh. All you need to do is to sit the yoghurt in a strainer with a loose weave cloth over it and allow it to drain for a few hours while it sits in the fridge. If you want to hurry the process, put a plate on top of the covered cheese with a large tin of fruit on top. That will press the cheese down while the whey is draining off. When most of the whey is gone what remains will be a much thicker yoghurt that, when shaped, makes a delicious cheese.

At this point, it's over to you to add the flavourings you prefer. I always add ½ teaspoon of salt to the savoury Labnah, plus chilli, pepper, herbs, finely diced cucumbers or capsicum. Other flavour choices are dill, green onions, mint, honey, figs, candied fruit, jam etc. Hanno loves it on bread and crackers and it's a great replacement for store-bought cream or cottage cheese. Don't throw out that whey. You can use it in your baking. Cakes, scones and bread made with whey are excellent and nutritious.

Labnah will last up to three weeks in the fridge.

I have a dairy chapter in my last book, The Simple Home, which contains several other dairy concoctions that are easy to make and delicious.

We've had so many visitors lately my head is spinning. Add to that my adorable grandkids and a new puppy and I'm starting to feel as if I need a few days with nothing to do. Those "nothing" days are valuable to all of us but from my experience, few of us get them. I make sure I have them now and have discovered that all the work I should have done during that time is always waiting for my return when I'm ready to get back into the swing of things. It's much more difficult to do that when you have a young family but even then you can give yourself a mini break, leave the beds unmade for a couple of days, forget about the laundry and serve your family eggs on toast for dinner. The world won't collapse while you take care of your own mental health.

You probably won't be surprised at this but when I have my mini breaks, I still work, but I only do what I love to do. Being creative and working on projects that make our lives better gives me a feeling of self-reliance that builds my confidence and helps me feel in control and on track.

I've had soap making on my to do list for a while now but still haven't made it; I hope today is soap day. I'm going to make my normal four ingredients soap using calendula-infused olive oil as my main oil. We suffer from eczema in my family. I have it and some of the others do too. I've found this soap to be nourishing on my skin and soothing on my eczema. I hope that if I tackle it with homemade soap before the hot weather starts, I should be able to get through summer with minimal itching and no cortisone cream.

Rosella cordial.

Making a blanket for Grace.

I made yoghurt the other day. I buy culture online now. It makes a great thick yoghurt and it's cheaper than buying a live yoghurt starter from the supermarket. I used to freeze yoghurt to use as a starter but now I always forget to do it. The frozen culture works well for me. Instead of using a warm oven or yoghurt jars wrapped in towels to ferment the yoghurt, which is how I used to make it, I now use an Easijo insulated jar. I bought the insulated container when they were on special at the supermarket a few months ago, and it's working well. I don't use their powdered product. Fresh milk from the local dairy and frozen culture gives us good quality, delicious yoghurt for a really good price. Yesterday, after the yoghurt was made, I divided the batch in two, flavoured half with honey and the other half with good raspberry and blueberry jam. I'll make another batch in the next day or so and use it to make a savory fresh cheese for bread and crackers. Hanno loves it and I haven't made it for a long time. It's good to get back to these things and to enjoy the time I spend making them.

I discovered many years ago that when I make cakes, soap, gifts or another set of dishcloths, when I repair and recycle, when I budget and organise, along with all that, I make the life I want to live too. Each small creation, all the meals and bread and cordials, all the knitting, sewing, mending and gardening, bit by bit, it all adds to this wonderful life we've built here. I wonder if you feel the same way.

It was a dream day here yesterday. I didn't have much work to do so I took some time on the computer to research various things and I caught up with my friend Morag on Skype. Lunch was leftovers, so no cooking, in the afternoon I made a batch of yoghurt.

Yes, that is mud on her nose.

She's watching Hanno here. He was digging in the garden. As soon as he left, she dug there too. ;- )

Inspecting the Italian thyme.

She could hear the kids playing next door so she sat and listened to them for a while.

Gracie and I spent time in the garden so she can become accustomed to the sights and smells there. She such a scallywag! She started digging in the garden bed Hanno weeded and prepared for planting today. She sat at the chicken run gate and watched the chooks. She was scared by cockatoos screeching in the trees overhead and when the kids next door came home from school, she sat and listened intently to them play. She was born into a family with six children so I'm guessing she's missing them.

Inside she runs off with our shoes and shakes the living daylights out of her pink and while sponge ball. She's constantly with us. She loves sitting next to either of us with her body touching our feet. I'm pleased to tell you she's been an absolute delight and hasn't cried at night at all. Toilet training is going slowly but she's only two months old so I'm not worried about it. Overall she continues to be a dream puppy.

Today will be busier because I'll cook lunch and I have plans to make lemon cordial and a batch of calendula soap. Two litres of lemon juice is defrosting on the sink and soon I'll strain calendula-infused olive oil for the soap. I haven't made soap for a while and I'm looking forward to it. I'll let you know how it turns out. Life is slowly returning to how it was before I started writing books. There is time for friends, reading, research, crafts and wandering around the garden with nothing much to do. There is a lot to be said for dawdling. It might not look like much is going on but often it's exactly what's need to keep going.

Here she is! Meet Grace/Gracie, our two month old Scottish Terrier.

We picked her up from the airport yesterday and she's currently settling into our home and making us smile - a lot. She's eating and drinking well and pulling Hanno's shoes around by the laces. She slept well last night, only waking once for a little cry. She's in a box she can't escape from right next to our bed and she looks pretty comfy in there with her warm fleeces.

At the moment we're feeding her Black Hawk puppy biscuits, a chicken, rice and vegetables meal I make myself, water and lactose-free milk. If we run out of home cooked food and can't make one up that day, we'll give her a small tin of salmon, tuna or sardines. So far she likes all the food I've given her. I did some research on puppy and dog food while we were waiting for Grace to arrive, and in opinion, much of the commercial biscuits and tinned food isn't fit for a dog. They contain by-products, corn and wheat which aren't good for dogs or puppies. We're taking Gracie to our vet tomorrow for a check up and I'll discuss her diet with him. I definitely don't want her to eat those vet endorsed meals or biscuits, I don't want her to eat the science meals, I want her to eat good fresh food cooked here in my kitchen so I know what's in her food.

Here is a review of the current dog and puppy foods on sale in Australia. It's very interesting reading. If you have a dog, check what you're feeding your pet, it might surprise you. I'm surprised that well known vets recommend what they do. Of course you need to keep your pet foods within your family budget but buying commercial foods that contain non-specified ingredients or "meat by-products" isn't the best way to do that. I'll do a post the next time I make Gracie's food and price it up for you. I think home cooked food gives the best value for money and will keep your pet healthy for a long time. You can put it all in a crockpot and cook it overnight, so it doesn't take a long time to produce good pet food.

In the meantime though, we'll be enjoying this joyful little character we have living with us now. I think Gracie will keep us on our toes, and that's not such a bad thing. ;- )

One of the things I love about gardens is how different they all are. Even those that look the same have different elements that make them unique. Our garden used to be different to what it is now. We used to have a fairly large productive garden but as we aged, the garden got smaller. Now we grow all our herbs and some of our fruit and vegetables. Doing that we still keep our hand in, what we grow is organic, we save a bit of money and we enjoy it.

Many birds visit our garden every day. This fellow is a native miner, below he is on top of the tank trying to relieve our friendly magpie of a worm she just caught.

I confess I'm a creature of habit. This is one of the flowers I always grow in spring - columbine (granny's bonnet). That, along with roses, alyssum, cosmos and violas are always there in the cooler months. This year I added a swag of Dutch iris after Tricia "found" some seeds in spent flowers on her walk last year.

When you sink your hands into the soil, you could be a million miles away from the cult of consumption we've established on the planet in recent years. Most of what you touch in a garden is natural and most of what you're doing is hoping to create beauty, produce food and live true to your understanding of self-reliance. If you spend time in a garden and experience what it is and how it feels, you'll usually come away feeling an inner peace you didn't have earlier in the day. Over the past 50 years I think we've tended to trade our peace for more time at work, or out in the world doing whatever it is we do. I'm not pointing the finger, I did it too. But now I think it's important to make time for the small quiet times because they have the potential to restore balance and help us develop the strength to keep going. There is a very thin line between making time to be in your garden and putting it off for another day. It's easy to put it off and think that other things are more important. But I encourage you to think carefully about giving yourself those brief periods of solitude because you'll gain so much by being in the garden - walking and thinking, or just sitting, looking and breathing deeply.

This is the interior of my bush house. It's where I pot plants, plant seeds, tend ailing plants and keep tender plants over summer. Lucky I took this photo because I just saw a polystyrene box under the bench that I use for rubbish. I'll have to move that before we bring our puppy home tomorrow.

These flowering cactus are on the outside of the bush house.

Mint growing in an antique enamel baby bath and a pot of oregano. Both these herbs grow better in partial shade here.

Tomato seedlings above with borage, common thyme and more oregano. Below are trays of radishes, lettuce, bok choi and nasturtiums. I'll keep growing these tomatoes in pots for another three weeks and when they start flowering, I'll plant them out in the garden.

The slowness of gardens might help slow you down, and for me, that's one of the many benefits of gardening. I used to be extremely impatient. I wanted everything NOW. I've grown out of that and I'm much more accepting of a natural pace for most things. I think I was helped in that acceptance because I was watching plants grow and nothing, nothing at all, made them grow faster. The reverse has happened to seasons. When I was young, the seasons I experienced moved at snail pace, now it's all much faster. Years go faster, weeks seem like days, days fly by.

Gardens aren't only for growing food or flowers, they're also a bustling ecosystem contained within a quiet haven where you can sit or walk and enjoy the plants and the sense of peace they bring. When you garden, you, the gardener, make exactly the garden you want. So be bold, throw caution to the wind, make your wildest dreams germinate in your soil. Your garden may fill an acre or be contained in a few pots but whatever it is, tend it, observe, breathe it in, appreciate it, look around and then slow down and experience the experience.