down to earth

This is H (on the left) on the Mackay railway station where we stopped for 30 minutes on the way through.

The view from my window at Bowen, where I was thinking of Deborah and enjoying the wonderful variety of mangoes, tomatoes and small crops.

It was good to get out, really. I loved the train which mostly whooshed us past backyards and little towns, but also left us in the night sitting like ducks in a line ready to be picked off by any unseen fool with a grudge and a rifle. We slept fairly well on the train when you consider we were locked in a compartment with 38 other people we didn't know and the only thing we had in common was that we all bought a ticket to ride. My feet were swollen from sitting too long on the trip back. HAHA! I sound like a demented paranoid who thinks only the worst possible thing will happen. We did enjoy ourselves.

We had a lovely time with Kathleen. I loved seeing her really happy and proudly showing us her home. I loved that although K's home is new and modern, it's slap bang in the middle of a really old suburb and her next door neighbours have lived there for over 50 years. The old man neighbour sits for long periods stripping copper wire to sell, and we could hear the trains rolling by just like you can here. There are old trees there and a brilliant 50 year old Bowen mango tree in full blossom right in K's backyard. Even in all that newness, Kathleen's home sits comfortably alongside the old homes in an old suburb.

We went out a couple of times to eat, so we saw people who answer their mobile phones and use credit cards, unlike me. There were lots of tourists wandering around in the warm tropical weather with bare arms and wispy dresses and when we sat at the restaurant pictured in my previous post, we loved seeing a fat smiling baby draped in a bright red pashmina that flew out in the breeze like a happiness beacon. That baby will be remembered for a long time, not only for her jolly smile and silly giggle but also for the brightness of her shawl that seemed so unusual, yet perfect.

I had morning tea with a really special friend - Susan. Susan and I used to be neighbours in a tiny isolated town; she also used to work for me when I was editing our town paper. Over the years, and over too many glasses of wine and cups of good coffee, we've mined the depths of a profound friendship and discovered by doing that just what is was we really wanted from our own lives. Friends are the best sounding boards. About 15 years ago, Susan was the first person I discussed simple living with, and although neither of us knew it by that name then, I know those feeble first sentences ended with me being where I am now. We both talked about that too, about me saying way back then, how you could change the way you felt about taking a shower. That, my friends, was my first simple living discussion - ever. So I was very happy to see her and to know that although we live a vast distance apart, our friendship remains strong and significant. It was a pleasure to sit with her once again, overlooking her rainforest garden, drinking tea and having a truly meaningful conversation.

So now we are home and I feel right again. When I'm out there with all of you I feel a bit out of place and strange. Coming home feels right and I'm where I should be. I've cuddled the dogs, I've eaten a dozen snow peas straight from the bush and fed the chooks. I looked at the washing, but didn't do any, I've wandered around the garden and had a little sleep - IN MY OWN BED. Boy, does that feel good. I doubt you have to go away to appreciate what you have but it always accentuates the importance of my home to me. Going away was a wonderful thing and we enjoyed our friends and the travelling, but coming back home is the real joy. And to have all of you waiting for us, and all those emails, well, I am one lucky woman.

Apart from buying lunch a few months ago when we travelled away for a friend's funeral, I haven't bought tea, coffee or water to drink while I've been out for years. The reason? Well, you know the frugal word will be in there somewhere, but it's also because I realised it was a habit of convenience and now that habit is broken. The lunch we bought a few months ago also made me realise that now, many shops are serving their drinks in disposable cups, with disposable spoons, sugar and milk in single serve containers, oh, and while you're about it, take a single use napkin. What a waste!

It is so easy to get out of the habit of buying drinks while you're away from home. I must tell you I have a bit of a thing about people in shops preparing drinks (or food) for me. I watched a girl serve a milk drink at a cafe a few years ago, and when she spilt some, she licked it off her fingers! =: O Anyhow, you break the buying habit by having good flasks that will keep your drinks really hot, and you take your favourite drink from home - be that good organic coffee or tea.

When I started work at the Neighbourhood Centre I had to start packing food and drink to eat while I was there. I already had a one litre Thermos flask for the black organic tea I like to drink, but I found that over summer, it's also very good for taking lemon cordial with lots of ice. My good friend Kathleen bought me a great little lunch box a few months ago, one that has a little freezable ice block as well as some small containers that all fit together in one box. It's great for taking nuts, salad, leftovers, cut up fruit, or anything that my heart desires. I like taking a good lunch to work, because I usually share it with whoever is in the office and often the person I share with has not had home made food for a long time. Even a homemade sandwich is a real treat. You can see the post I wrote about that here.

So it probably won't surprise you to know that last week I bought another Thermos, this one holds 1.8 litres. It was bought mainly for our trip on the train, so we'll have enough tea with us for the entire trip, but it will also be used when we travel away in the car, or any time we'll be away from home for the day. Having enough tea for the two of us for a full day is great, and I wonder why I hadn't thought to buy a larger Thermos flask well before this.

In the week since I bought the flask, it's been earning its keep by keeping tea hot for us during the day. We usually drink tea at breakfast, morning tea, lunch time, occasionally for afternoon tea and sometimes for dinner. I've been filling the flask up in the morning after I make our breakfast tea and it's there hot and ready for us whenever we want another cup. It holds seven cups, so there's plenty to keep us going during the day. The great thing about this is that it saves time and it saves electricity as the hot water is only heated once.

When we go on our trip tomorrow, I'll fill the small flask with hot chocolate as we leave at 8pm and we can drink that after we've settled in on the train, and we'll have the large flask full of tea, that will keep us going the entire 17 hour trip. We'll also have a couple of bottles of water filled at our filtered tap at home. Along with our apple cinnamon muffins, Lindt chocolate and sharp cheese and home made pickles sandwiches, we'll be eating like kings as we speed our way north at 160 kms an hour. Who said you miss out when you eat frugally? pfffffffffft

After much thought, yesterday I started work on my simple living ebook. I'm pretty excited about it too as I've thought of a few things that will make it really useful and interesting. I wonder if you can help me with something, and I'd like to get as many opinions as I can on this - like everyone who reads this, including all the lurkers. : ) If you bought the ebook, do you think you'd print it out and put it in a folder, would you just print out the pages with instructions on them, would you read the entire thing on your computer? Or if you have any ideas about use, please let me know them. It makes a difference as to how I do the layout. Thanks your your help.

I've had a number of emails this past month from readers who asked about significant changes - the grand gestures of life - and how their move to a simple life will have to wait until the large change falls into place. While there is no right or wrong way to look at simplifying your life, I think that waiting for the big changes might complicate lives rather than simplify them.

You can start living simply right at this moment if you choose to. It will take no change in your circumstances, no change in location, no more money, nor less of it, no joint decision with your partner or change in employment. Small steps are the way to go. Do tiny things, little gestures that make a small difference. Small steps are easy and you will be more inclined to do a small thing rather than wait for the major ones. And when you look back on them, those small steps make all the difference.

So just what is a small step - it is anything that makes you smile, makes you feel good, makes you feel that you've done the right thing, such as ...

Put a small bunch of flowers in a cup or glass - it doesn't have to be fancy, just a little bit of nature brought inside for your pleasure.

Talk to your next door neighbour.

Phone your sister, a friend, your mum or dad and say whatever is in your heart.

Declutter your cutlery drawer.

Enjoy what's around you.

Take your old magazines to the doctors surgery.

Make your husband's favourite meal for dinner tonight and tell him it's because you appreciate him.

Take the dog for a walk.

Smile.

Start a change jar.

Make yourself a cup of your favourite tea or coffee and sit down to enjoy it.

Write a real letter to your best friend.

Make bread, soap or laundry liquid.

Look critically at your values and what you think is important to you and your family. Don't be afraid to reinvent parts of your life that need changing.

Plant some seeds.

Breathe in really deep and think to yourself: 'this feels really good'.

Write up a budget.

Change your idea of success. If you have the view that success means living in a big house, driving an expensive car and living the high life, reassess that. When you live a simple life, old symbols will be replaced by innovative ones and a shiny new car will just symbolise petrol consumption and too many dollars spent on transport.

So you can see that starting your simple journey need not be a grand statement. It's more than likely going to be small, easy to do steps. There are many things that are very difficult in this life, starting to simplify is not one of them. All it takes is your decision to start.

Nothing is better than crunching on snow peas while you work in the winter garden.

Growing your own food, or even some of it, is an important part of simple living. It gives you a good supply of fresh, organic food, it saves you money, it provides valuable exercise and it helps reconnect you with the earth. As a society we've moved away from viewing the earth as the source of our food. We've become reliant on whatever is presented for sale at the supermarket and while it's appealing to have that convenience, those supermarket vegetables do not contain the nutrients that will be ever present in your own back yard produce.

Not everyone can grow, or will want to grow, a vegetable garden but for those of you who do, you’ll find it to be a great way to unite with nature and the seasons. If you have some space that will be suitable for growing food, I encourage you to set out on a journey of discovery, abundant harvests, and fully flavoured natural food. If you live in your own home a vegetable garden and a few fruit trees is a wonderful investment in your future health and will enable you to reduce the amount you spend on fresh food. If you live in rented accommodation, growing herbs, vegetables and fruit in containers is an activity that will provide a source of cheap organic food that can be a rewarding and enlightening pastime.

Planted up yesterday - four Richmond Green Apple cucumbers. These are a delicious cucumber that used to be very popular in Australia in the 1950s, sadly it's hardly grown at all now. I think it's got a better taste than the Lebanese cucs.

Organic growing is back to basics gardening the old fashioned way. If you decide to grow organically, the food you produce will be healthy with no synthetic chemicals or poisons added, and it will be fresh. I often wonder how old those supermarket vegetables are and where they’re from, but something tells me I don’t want to know the answer. One thing is certain, the fresher the food when you eat it, freeze it or preserve it, the better it is for you.

What is better than fresh English spinach with a few new potatoes, all freshly picked and served with a little butter, salt and pepper.

I kept chickens and dabbled in vegetable production long before I worked consciously towards my simple life. We had our first chickens when our sons were very young and I don't remember a time when I wasn't growing something. I don’t know how I’d get on now without my vegetable garden and chooks. At the moment, our garden supplies about eighty percent of our fresh food. We are working towards year round food production but this is the aspect of food gardening that I've found the most difficult to work out - the continual supply of vegetables and fruit. We'll get there one day.

WHAT IS THE FIRST SIMPLE STEP TO BACKYARD VEGIES?
Work out what you are capable of growing. If you have a small backyard or a unit, you’ll be looking to smaller crops, vegetables that will grow well in containers, sprouting and mushrooms. If you have a reasonable sized backyard with a sunny area for a vegie patch, you could plant almost anything that is suited to your climate. So, work out what you like to eat and grow the vegetables that are expensive to buy or the ones that are best fresh – like corn, lettuce, celery and potatoes.

A garden is a great place to recycle many commonly discarded items like egg cartons, milk bottles and newspapers. Here you can see the recycled reinforcing steel we found which mades an idea trellis for cucumbers.

THE PATCH – STARTING A NEW GARDEN
Go out into the yard and check where the sun rises. You will need a sunny position with full sun if you live south of Brisbane, but if you’re in a sub-tropical or tropical area, you’ll need some afternoon shade. Vegetables need about eight hours of full sun to grow to maturity. The further north you live, the greater the need for shade in the afternoon.

You also need to locate the patch close to a hose or a tap so you can water the garden when it doesn’t rain. If you have a water tank, your vegetables will benefit from the rainwater, so make sure the tank hose can reach the vegetable garden. If you don't have a tank, look into what rebates you're offered in your part of the country and take advantage of them. It is quite an easy exercise to harvest the rain from your roof to be used later on your vegetables and fruit. It is the ultimate in recycling.

Instead of repeating the very good advice of a follow blogger, I'll refer you on to scarecrow's garden. Scarecrow has an excellent section on her blog on how to start your vegetable garden - Food gardening for beginners, which you'll find here.

If you have any specific questions, please email me and I'd be happy to help.

CONTAINER VEGETABLES
You can grow a wide range of vegetables in containers. Try to pick up some polystyrene boxes from the greengrocer or supermarket. You could also use plastic garbage containers or buckets, as well as conventional plant pots. Make sure whatever you use has adequate drainage holes, if they don’t, poke or drill some in. Fill the container with good quality potting mix, if you have compost, use about a third compost to two thirds potting mix. Don’t be tempted to save money by using garden soil as it won’t drain properly and your vegetables won’t grow.

I was given the seeds for these pigeon peas by Elizabeth Fekonia over at the permaculture garden at Yandina. It's a fine garden Elizabeth and her volunteers have going over there. If you have a chance, drop in for a look. I'm growing these pigeon peas for soup - they are the lentils you buy as split peas.

SEEDS

When you think about it, a seed is an amazing thing. Given the right conditions, it contains everything necessary to grow into whatever species it happens to be. It’s a dried up hard packet of potential life. How good is that! Usually, the most thrifty way to grow vegetables is to grow from seeds. The most frugal seeds are those you save from last year’s harvest or swap with someone in your neighbourhood. You could also swap seeds online. There are a couple of Australian online seed swap sites, this is one I am a member of. You have to join, but it’s free and there are many other resources on this site that will help you in your quest for simple living. http://www.aussieslivingsimply.com.au/news.php

To get yourself started, buy some organic vegetable seeds. You can buy these seeds from:
http://www.greenharvest.com.au/
http://www.edenseeds.com.au/content/default.asp
http://www.selectorganic.com.au/content/default.asp
Or, you might find some at your local hardware store or plant nursery. Make sure the seeds you buy are open pollinated varieties of vegetables or herbs, and they should be fresh (check the use by date). Here are two excellent online resources with photos and information about heirloom open pollinated tomatoes:
http://www.reimerseeds.com/heirloom-tomato_798.aspx
http://www.heirloomtomatoes.bizland.com/varieties.htm
Do some research on what tomatoes will suit you and then buy them from a place close to you.

Use some of the seeds you buy to plant in your own garden and swap the rest to get the other vegetables you need. You’ll be able to build up a big bank of seeds doing this and your new seeds will only cost you a stamp and a trip to the post office.

I believe the best seeds to choose are open pollinated types. In the old days all seeds were open pollinated but as a result of pressure to produce standardised fruit and vegetables several decades ago, some seed companies started to hybridise. In effect what they did was to breed vegetables for specific purposes and size. In the case of tomatoes, old-fashioned tomatoes were mainly the big beef steak types, these were no good for supermarkets. They had delicate skin that didn’t travel or store well and when trying to weigh a pound of tomatoes, two tomatoes where often well over a pound. So seed companies developed tomatoes with tougher skin (for transport) that were smaller and generally would weigh up as four to a pound. The problem was that when they were reinventing the tomato wheel, they forget to include the taste factor. When you taste a home grown open pollinated tomato it will taste like tomatoes used to taste like, it’s a hundred times better than a supermarket tomato. Aside from the superior taste, open pollinated vegetables are capable of passing on exactly the same characteristics to each generation. If you use seeds from hybrid vegies, sometimes the seeds will be sterile and sometimes they’ll not grow to type. You might be expecting a medium sized sweet tomato and you’ll get a small bitter one. Hybrid vegies can throw back to any of the types used to create it. So in essence, every year you will need to buy new seeds instead of being able to save the seeds from open pollinated vegies.

Another advantage to growing open pollinated seeds is that they will modify themselves to suit your growing conditions. According to the Seed Savers website: “Food plants, grown organically, that have adapted themselves to your garden over generations of seed saving, will perform noticeably better in your kitchen than generalized hybrid plants, grown by chemical methods far away from your region, and subject to transportation and storage.”

I hope this has convinced you to start off with heirloom or open pollinated seeds. Don’t worry if you go the other road but in the future, when you can afford it or when you want to eat food like your grandma had, go the open pollinated route.

When you start, don’t be over ambitious in your first few years of gardening. There will be a lot to learn and there is a lot work involved in bringing your crops to harvest. Vegetable gardening is not for wimps. Go slow to start and add a couple of new vegies every year until you’ve reach your vegetable growing goal.

If you don’t have any idea about what you want to grow but like the idea of gardening, growing your own food, or living organically, then make a list of the vegetables you enjoy eating. Don’t grow what you won’t eat.

I think the most important piece of information I can give you about gardening is that you feed the soil, not the plant. If you dig a garden plot and plant vegetable seedlings in it, without enriching the soil in any way, you'll get vegetables, but they'll be small and miserly. You must - I repeat, you must build up your soil with organic matter before you start plating. The more organic matter you have in your garden beds, the more abundant your harvests will be.

Yesterday H and I did a fair bit of work in our vegie garden. We pulled out a lot of old vegetables and fed them to the chooks. We're clearing an entire garden bed for potatoes we'll plant when we return from our trip. The next two months is our main planting time so as we plant, I'll take photos and show you what we're doing. So if you want to be ready for Spring, start planning now, start reading Scarecrow's guides, start enriching your soil, and soon we'll start our planting.

H and I ate this entire basket of silverbeet last night for dinner along with carrots, pumpkin, shallots, turnips and kipfler potatoes - all grown in our backyard.

I planted up some more capsicums (peppers) in the aquaponics garden yesterday. The fish are starting to become quite active again and the plants have responded to the current warm weather, so when we come back from our trip, I'll write more about the aquaponics system.

I thought I knew what was going on in my backyard but I didn't. I didn't really discover the microcosm out there until I stopped rushing through my day and learnt to look with kinder eyes. It's one of the things you'll be rewarded with when you simplify - you'll discover a greater depth in your immediate surroundings.

Oh I knew we had birds visiting, but I wasn't aware of the vast numbers that stop at the pond to rest and drink on their migrations from Papua New Guinea, Asia and Europe - they range from tiny finches to hefty magpie geese. I knew there were snakes but was rewarded one day with the sight of a 12 foot python with the girth of a dog sliding across the grass. Frogs are there too - tiny sedge frogs the size of my little finger nail as well as big rubbery green tree frogs that aways look like they're smiling. There are also echidnas, waters dragons, goannas and the strangest of insects, including an 18 inch long stick insect that looks a bit like a lobster and lives in the tops of local trees. We saw him when he was ill and fell from the tree tops. My kids were teenagers then and called him "the freak". But we cared for the freak until he died, I hope, a comfortable death in a box away from his natural predators.

We'd been living here a few years before we discovered all this wildlife in the backyard. It was waiting for us to slow down, to be content enough to stay home, to sit in the back yard with reading or knitting, or just to look, and then the parade started and hasn't stopped since.

Today I'll be picking some green beans and will be blanching them to freeze along with the carrots and turnips picked yesterday. We are growing a lot of snow peas at the moment but between H and I and Alice, who eat them while we're in the garden, I doubt any of them will see the inside of the house. When we come back from holidays, I'll be picking all the cabbages to make a big crock of sauerkraut. I haven't done it before but I've talked to a German chef who told me a couple of tricks so I think it will be fairly straight forward. While I'm out in the garden this morning, I'll plant up some capsicum (peppers) seedlings and a few zucchini seeds in the aquaponics garden, and there is some borage and lemon balm to plant in the vegie garden. It's been a very cold winter this year and although the vegetable garden coped well, it hasn't produced as much as our previous winter crops. I'm desperate to get some more brandywine tomatoes - they're the best I've ever eaten. I've got a few seedlings still too small to plant in the gravel but I hope to get them in as soon as we return from our trip.

This afternoon will be spent sewing. I want to make a few things to take to Kathleen when we are privileged to be the first guests in her new house. Milestones need to be celebrated and marked with gifts and celebratory meals - it's how we remember those important times and acknowledge the importance of those friends we share them with. Kathleen doesn't sew so I'm making a few things that will make her new home look like her. I have known Kathleen for about 20 years and I feel honoured to be the one who makes these little bits and pieces for her. These simple hand made gifts will express our love and respect for her and when we leave they will be reminders of H and I, and this important milestone.

I thank you all for stopping by today and hope you all have a wonderful weekend.

It's not finished yet but it's looking good enough to show. The walls that we started a few weeks ago, and stopped for visitors and when we got our colds, are finished; we still have to paint the skirting boards, trims and doors. The walls are a lovely pale lemon yellow called Milk Maiden, the doors will be a bluish grey called Smoke Rings.

We had quite a search for fabric for our curtains. I rang all over the Sunshine Coast, went to a remnant place in Brisbane and searched online, but finally my sister found exactly what I wanted at Ikea in Sydney. It's a cherry red and white check pure heavy cotton. I'm recycling the linings on the old curtains I have hanging now and I'll make the curtains when my sister comes to visit soon.

Apart from the paint and fabric I wanted to use what we already had here to change the look we had. I found a few red "things" around the place - an old red Japanese wooden box, some red China from the dinner service I bought in Germany at the end of the 1970s, red felt trims on a lampshade skirt and I'm going to make a few more red fabric decorations that I'll add to the wall with the prints. As you can see, there is a fairly big gap between the top prints and the one below, I'll add a tiny swag of check hearts there. That's the plan, anyway. I might make some red check seat cushions too.

We still have to paint this shelving unit. It will probably be an off blueish white, or if we have any Smoke Rings left over, we'll use that. That's the good thing about decorating your own home, you can do exactly what you want and have no one whispering in your ear that you should go and buy new shelves.

This is an old lamp that has a plain white shade. It was too bland for this new look so I made a little skirt to just fit over the top of the shade. I cut out some red felt flowers shapes and added them. I think it looks quite nice and just shows what you can do with a little creativity and a sewing machine. When I finish the curtains and other little red touches, I'll take another photo to show the finished room. BTW, if you click on the photos they will be bigger.

Is anyone having problems loading my blog this morning? It's very slow for me and I'm not sure if it's my computer or the blog - although other blogs seem to be opening just fine.

I live a life of contentment in a beautiful part of Australia. I grow some of my own vegetables, I keep a few hens in the backyard, I bake bread and preserve food. I live well with no debt on a low income. My goal is to continue living this way and if I can convince a few others to walk this path less travelled, I’ll be a happy woman.

There was a time when I worked as a technical writer, paid a mortgage and shopped at mainstream supermarkets and department stores. There was no method to my madness and I didn’t know where I was headed. Yet from the time I was around 25 years old I had a buried yearning to live the type of simple life my contemporaries viewed with contempt. In those quiet hours of 4.00 am contemplation, I knew that my future held a new direction where less was more and contentment would fill the sweet air I breathed; but I didn’t know almost 30 years would pass before I started to live that dream. I wish I’d been serious about simplicity long before I turned 50, because this way of life holds appeal for all age groups, and will change the way you view the world.

The most common question I hear regarding simple living is: “How do I start?” Well the answer to that seemingly simple question is not so straight forward. It depends on why you want to change. The end result will be the similar but your focus will be slightly different. Hopefully this blog will show you the steps needed to start living simply, whatever your reason.

I also want this blog to encourage people, young and older, to take charge of their lives by not buying into the materialism trap. I think there has been a major shift in thinking in Australia in the last ten years or so. As a society we are moving closer to a kind of moral and material bankruptcy because we trust self-indulgent, unsustainable promises that tell us living a good life requires the latest product in this year’s “must have” colour. We have to have the biggest and the best and it is fine to go into debt to get it. Those promises are problematic. They require that you mortgage your life, enclose yourself with debt obligations and work non-stop to pay for stress-filled fake living that doesn’t allow you enough time to enjoy what you have. Those promises don’t allow for enjoyment of the natural world, they encourage a consumerist approach to life when what is needed for long-term gratification is a prudent and simple one.

Your life should be about you, your family and the people you choose to include in your daily activities. What you see portrayed in today’s advertising is a false representation of modern Australian life. It is a glamorised lie to encourage you to spend money on products you don’t need.

Reinvent your life. Think about what is really important to you and develop a set of values that reflect your true beliefs. Respect and nurture your values. Discover what it is you really want your life to be and then make plans to live that life. Define for yourself what are needs and what are wants. Be courageous and change your attitude about what success means to you. Free yourself of the conventional idea of what you should own and want, strip yourself of pretension and in the process you’ll discover your true self.

I want this blog to take you on a journey inside yourself to discover your passions, uncover your true potential and to help you be the authentic you. Mindless consumerism masks us all. It surrounds us with junk that turns us into curators of merchandise. Free yourself of all that ties you down, be that debt, clutter, stress, envy, or wanting too much. In a world filled with overindulgence, simplicity will liberate you.

If you’re wondering why you work from dawn till dark just to pay the mortgage and put food on the table, this blog is for you. If you just bought more clothes and yet more things to put in your home and still feel a sense of emptiness, this blog is for you. If you don’t have enough money to live on, or if you have too much, this blog is for you. If you feel trapped by modern living, welcome home.

Many of us may voluntarily choose to live simply but even if it chooses you, the result is similar. You live a life that is marked by less rather than more, you organise your home to nurture and support you and your family members, you help develop a caring and supportive community, you make from scratch much of what you consume, you aim to live debt-free, you respect your environment, minimise waste and you are content with your life choices and the kind of person you are.

Living a simple life is about beating the system and not following the same road everyone else is on. Stop following what your friends and neighbours are doing. They’re probably up to their ears in debt too. Reinvent your life. Be bold, live a life you care about, simplicity can make you soar.

I hope this blog will help you discover the essence of simple living and how to apply it to your own circumstances. Please remember that we are diverse nation and have different aspirations. What is right for some is wrong for others. So cherry pick the information here and apply as much as you can to your own life while keeping an open mind about developing new strategies and ways of living that suit you. There is no one size fits all formula when simplifying your life.

To help you simplify I have included information about the practical aspects of day-to-day living. Some readers will already be familiar with some of the activities contained within these pages, others will be novices. There was a time when much of this was common knowledge but our consumer culture has conned us into relying on products to sustain and support us. We’ve forgotten old ways and instead work our entire lives to pay for merchandise that others create for us. The more we have, the more we want, and so the never-ending cycle continues. It wasn’t like that in the past and it doesn’t have to be like that now. We can relearn our collective heritage of basic skills and apply them to our modern lives.

So, what do you really want out of life? If you want more of everything, if you know that you’ll never have enough or be enough, then stop reading this blog now and go back to work. But if you want to live an authentic life, if you want to enjoy time with your family, if you want to help save dwindling resources, if you want to become more self-reliant and build your skills, if you want to discover the real you and live the kind of life you dream for yourself, then read on, the simple life is for you. When you know that buying more of everything will not make you happier and that saving resources is better than spending them, then you will really know that less is more. Welcome to your new life.

I'll make two or three posts today (depending on time) as I have some photos here I have been wanting to share with you for a while and I'll talk some more about simple living. The photos first.

H and I went into Brisbane last week to go to a remnants shop looking for our curtain material. For the international readers, Brisbane is the capital city of the state I live in. It's about a one hour drive from my home.

They didn't have what we were after but on the way home I took some photos of this incredible cloud formation. The clouds were in long tubes and although they looked like storm clouds, there was no rain. Luckily I had my camera with me. I took it in case I saw anything of interest that I could share here. It might be something I do more often now, not that I go out much.

So we drove through Brisbane and back onto the freeway and what do we find but Steve Irwin on a sign advertising Australia Zoo.

We were on the freeway for about 40 kms and then turned off onto what used to be called the Glasshouse Mountains Road but is now - Steve Irwin Way.

Driving through pine forests, past an enormous chicken farm with its 1940 long sheds - H was driving too fast to get a good picture of it. Grrrrr. We then came to Mount Tibrogargan, one of the Glasshouse Mountains. The original people who lived on these lands were the Gubbi Gubbi tribe, the Glasshouse Mountains are part of their dreaming. Each of the mountains still has its Koori name - this mountain, Tibrogargan is the father. Here is some more info about the local history of this area: http://au.geocities.com/glasshousebw/ghmtnshist.html

Another mountain is called Beerwah and that is also the name of the town that Australia Zoo is in. We live just down the road from the zoo so I guess you could say we have tigers and elephants as neighbours. Sadly, we no longer have Steve but we still see his sweet family around town every so often.

This is where the zoo is. H was still travelling too fast for me to get a good shot but he said he couldn't slow down as he'd hold up the traffic behind us. Don't they know I have a blog to take photos for! LOL Anyhow, if anyone is interested, I could go back another day and get some better pictures of the zoo.

Our lounge room, this morning, before cleaning.

In the spirit of practising what I preach, I'm having a big cleanup today. We go away next week and have family staying while we're away so I want everything nice for them. My plan is to deep clean today and spend the rest of the week sewing and knitting. This is my plan:

Put on a load of washing - floor rugs.
Put on second load of washing - dogs beds - in outdoor washing machine.
Clean the ensuite shower and sink.
Wipe mirror with vinegar and newspaper.
Scrub toilet, clean seat and lid, wipe over with tea tree.
Finish off with sweeping the floor and mopping over with hot vinegar water.

Second bathroom just needs a wipe over with a soapy cloth and dry with a terry cloth.
Finish off with sweeping the floor and mopping over with hot vinegar water.

Laundry room needs the sink scrubbed with the creamy soft scrubber.
Wipe down the benches with soapy cloth, and dry.
Finish off with sweeping the floor and mopping over with hot vinegar water.

In the kitchen I'll wipe down the benches and clean the stove with a soapy cloth, and dry.
Wipe the cupboard doors with my soapy cloth, clean glass in top cupboards with vinegar and newspapers.
Clean out the fridge.
Scrub the sink with creamy soft scrubber.
Wipe down window sill.
Check pantry and stockpile cupboards.

Help H put up wall clock and framed prints after painting.
Wipe over dresser and tidy kitchen table.
Tidy lounge room, wipe over coffee table.
Finish off with vacuuming then washing floors with hot vinegar water.

Somewhere along the way I'll make the bed, wash up a couple of times and bake bread. I hope to finish by 1pm and go to the library this afternoon. I'll make dinner when I come home and relax after that leaving me free to do my sewing tomorrow. How sweet it is. : )

“I am thankful for a lawn that needs mowing, windows that need cleaning and gutters that need fixing because it means I have a home…. I am thankful for the piles of laundry and ironing because it means my loved ones are nearby.”
~Nancie J. Carmody

Washday on the farm

Regarding the stitchery giveaway. I've posted to Shula and have received Leah's address this morning. Thanks Leah. I just need Marianna's address now. Marianna can you please email your postal address to me. Thanks.

Finally, I'd like to thank everyone who has left a comment or sent email. I have a lot of emails to reply to and will do that either when I finish this post, this afternoon or tomorrow. It's nice getting to know you all through your comments and emails. : )