In with a lot of other emails I had one from Ceri through the week.  I asked her if it was okay to answer in a post because I think this is something many people struggle with.  To summarise, Ceri wrote that she and her husband have just moved from Dubai to Cyprus in the hope of living a simpler life.  She writes:  "What I would like to have some ideas on are  how to adjust and not feel guilty about being a stay at home wife.  We have no children and I have worked long and hard most of my adult life. My husband’s salary covers the bills and we can put aside a little for the future and the life insurance but there is very little spare outside of that.  ( I used to be a 3 overseas  holidays a year Radley handbag girl,)  Now  I have chosen to stay at home as this was part of the plan to drastically change our way of living, but I feel really guilty about not bringing in the bread even though I am learning to bake it.  I feel ashamed to tell friends that we cannot afford things and don’t want to make new friends for fear of them laughing at my simple ideas.   How do I overcome this?

 Also  how do I go about starting my own veggie garden in rented accommodation.  How would you suggest I do this so that I don’t upset the garden but still begin my dream of growing my own produce and know I can take it with me when the time comes to move on."

Dear Ceri, all changes take time to feel right and natural and this is a very big change so it doesn't surprise me that you feel uneasy.  One thing you should do is to think of what you're doing at home now as your real job.  It will be as time consuming as any paid job, maybe even more so, and thinking of it as your job might help you with your adjustment.  That is what I did when I left work. I wasn't earning money but I felt it was my job to save money in the home to make up for what I wasn't earning.  That lead me to everything I currently do in my home.  It is my job to shop for bargains and get value for every cent we spend; I must grow or buy good quality food for our table; it's my responsibility to look after our assets so they last as long as possible - that covers everything from bed sheets and clothing, to everything in our house and the house itself.  If I do my job properly, we'll spend less, conserve more and live well in the process.

With your husband going out to earn money and you saving your money at home, you'll make an excellent team.  Remember, you'll be leading the way here.  This is new territory for both of you.  Check through blogs you can relate to and see how others are living, then cherry pick what you think will work for you. Your job then is to customise that to really suit your lives, and add more of your own original ideas.  When I first left work, I wanted to live a simpler life, I wanted to built a life that would suit both Hanno and myself, I wanted to work hard but to really enjoy every minute of the day.  I knew there would be days of toilet cleaning and vacuuming carpets, but I also knew there would be many times I'd be out in the sunshine talking to the chickens and gardening, and times spent cozying up inside in the winter with my knitting.  I wanted all of it.

When you live like this you feel you're really in control and if that's the first time your own life has made you feel like that, it's very liberating.  You feel like you can take on the world!  Everyone's life is a series of stages - you've been through your three annual holidays and Radley handbags stage, now you've progressed to something beyond that.  (BTW, I have no idea what a Radley handbag looks like.)  What this stage is like is all up to you and your husband.  There should be no shame in what you're doing now and being open and honest with your friends is one of the greatest gifts you can give them.  Anyone who shuns you for not being able to buy what they buy is not worthy of being your friend.  But you'll have to develop pride  and satisfaction in the way you live before others will see it in that light too.  I hope you can just forget about what others are thinking - just live as you wish, develop your skills, become more self reliant, and I think that will bring you self confidence too.

There are a number of things you can do in rented accommodation.  

There is a lot to take pride in when you build a life that makes you happy.  Money alone cannot buy that, it takes time, effort, skill and the ability to let go of what we've been programmed to believe.  Turning your back on conspicuous consumption, giving yourself time to hand-make a life and living with less is the opposite of what we are brought up to believe will make us happy.  When you live that way, it may be uncomfortable for some people but soldier on nonetheless; they'll get used to it or move on.  As you are settling into your new lives you should be focused on each other and your home, other things and people can wait.  But I believe that when you build the life you want; when you develop a rhythm to your days that helps you accomplish all you want and need to do; when you slow down and concentrate on building your new life, the people who mean something will be there.  And they will be people who will not make you feel shame in the way you live or how much you can afford to do.  It's a brand new way of life for you, Ceri, many things will seem strange and unusual, but you should also feel excited and optimistic.  You are on the verge or reinventing your lives and yourselves and you are very fortunate to be able to do that.  I wish you well in your new lives.

We went to the shops yesterday - a trip to the big mall down on the coast. Gulp.  Hanno jumped at the chance to come with me, he's been at home alone while I've been at work these past two days and there was a big electrical repair job being done in our area so the electricity was to be off from 8 am till 3pm. I needed to buy provisions for some of our homeless clients. Now that winter is here, they need sleeping bags, blankets and tents, so along with those thing we also bought saucepans, frying pans, and a couple of nifty little gas stoves and propane gas to keep the stoves going for a while.  It was good to have him with me to help with the bulky items we would buy.  In the end we fully loaded two big trolleys.

It's interesting going into a place like that if you're not used to it.  People rush.  I'm sure they don't know they rush, but they do.  And, they apologise if they can't rush and if they hold you up so you can't rush.  The total of our bill was $955, and I had to pay with a cheque from the Centre I work at.  The girl put the items through but the register refused to take the cheque.  She called a supervisor and they both apologised that we couldn't be on our way quickly.  Hanno and I were just fine, we went and sat just off from the checkouts and waited.  We did some people watching as we both find that very interesting. Finally the supervisor asked me to go with her while she checked my details on the phone.  Everything was cleared and she apologised (again) for holding me up.  I told her it was fine and that I wasn't in a hurry.  She looked at me like I'd just landed from another planet.

We went back to the till and she had to re-enter everything back into the computer because the first girl had wiped the sale from the system.  The supervisor apologised again because I had to wait.  "It's fine, dear"  I said.  "It's not your fault, and besides, I'm not in a hurry."  Her eyebrows turned into little pointy arrows and she peered at me above her glasses.  While I stood there waiting, customers walked into the queue behind me but glared when they realised I was holding everything up.

WARNING ... SLOW CUSTOMER IN AISLE 7!

I live in a slow world and nothing will make me hurry when I don't have to.  I realise it's a completely luxurious and indulgent way to live but it's one of the many benefits of growing older and I enjoy it immensely.  Not only is it an ideal way to be at home, but it gives you the chance to see what's going on when you're out and about; you can observe other people and you can see that they rush.

I guess it took about 30 minutes to get through the checkout.  We didn't rush through like most others and we received several apologies because we could not rush.  Had the checkout staff been able to see what Hanno and I got up to after we left the store, I'm sure they would have shook their heads and mumbled something about pensioners or old people.  LOL  We ambled out with our two fully laden trolleys and went straight to the first coffee shop.  We both had a big mug of steaming hot coffee with weird squiggle art on the top and a dusting of chocolate powder, then loaded the car and returned to the store to look around, slowly.  Then we drove to the beach, bought some fish and chips in a paper parcel and sat, surrounded by seven hungry, begging herons, gazing out to the perfectly blue Pacific Ocean.  We didn't talk much, we didn't have to.  We fed the birds, enjoyed our lunch, then drove back home.

I don't know what I would have thought of two old codgers slowly dawdling in front of me in a shopping mall when I was younger and much faster.   I'm sure they wouldn't have annoyed me but I probably would have felt sorry for them, because they weren't getting through their shopping faster.  Let me say this loud and clear: life is fine in the slow lane.  The 15 minutes you might save by rushing isn't worth it. There is a time to rush, we've done that many times, but not rushing is much better.  You get to see what's really happening around you.  You really experience your time.  You are stress-free.  It's wonderful in the slow lane, join us, there aren't many of us here.

After today's kitchen, I have only two remaining in this series.  I'll start another series as soon as I've featured all the kitchen photos, so stay tuned for some more interesting peeks into the lives of readers all over the world.

Today we peek into Amy's American kitchen.  There is a lot going on in that kitchen with children and guests to feed.  If you visit Amy's blog you'll see some of her turkeys.

We renovated the very outdated kitchen and dining room when we bought this house.  We had very little money so we did the most with what we had.  For the entire kitchen and dining room (they started as two separate rooms) we spent less than $2500 and over a year.   Being a stay at home mom I spend most of my life within the walls of my home.  So I find it very important that my home make me happy and that is what my kitchen does, it makes me smile.  Countless meals have been cooked and eaten in here.  We LOVE to get together with friends and we often have house guests so where people are you must have good food.  And where there is good food there is usually a good mess too ;).  Needless to say many many hours are spent in this room.  It is very functional and very practical.  I like design with a practical use and try to use that throughout my whole house.

 

One of the most enjoyable things I have discovered over the past year is cooking with friends.  So almost on a weekly basis hours are spent in this kitchen with good friends cooking up some great food.  Laughing and even crying on occasion.  Everyone is welcome!  It is a gathering place.  The door is usually entered with a short knock before walking right in.  If you come through my kitchen door then you are more than likely a good friend and good friends in this kitchen can walk right in and sit right down.  Have yourself a glass of tea and chat for a bit.

On any given day you may find me in here making pasta, cheese, butter, bread, salsa, spaghetti sauce.  Doing Once a Month Cooking, canning, freezing or preserving.  We even have baby turkeys in it at that moment. 

I am always on the lookout for delicious thrifty meals that are fairly easy to make but in winter I keep coming back to this old standby that ticks all those boxes - split pea soup.  I think it's a favourite in many families but I thought I'd write about how I make it for anyone who hasn't discovered how to cook it entirely from scratch.

The key to most good food is good ingredients and this is no exception.  I start with a ham bone, this one bought on special after Christmas for $2, then I add two small packs (500g/1lb each) of split peas (one green and one yellow) $1.40 each and whatever vegetables from the garden or fridge I fancy.  I always use onions and carrots, for this soup I also used a celeriac root.  For additional flavouring, I added bay leaves and parsley from the garden.  So altogether, this soup cost me $3.40 for the ham bone and peas, and about three dollars for the onions, carrots and celeriac.  Add the cost of water, salt and pepper and gas to cook with, say 60 cents, and I'm up to $7.  This made up about 7 litres/quarts of soup, enough for Hanno and I for many days.

Assemble your ingredients.  If you don't have celeriac, use celery, which is more traditional.  The celeriac almost disintegrates in the soup and gives it a mild celery flavour.

This soup doesn't need pre-made stock, it makes its own stock as it cooks.  Add your seasoning right at the end.  Pork tends to need a fair bit of salt and pepper and although I add pepper, I don't add salt to the soup pot.  Hanno has high blood pressure so salt is a no no for him.  I add my own salt to my dish.  I do add croutons that I make just before serving by brushing two slices of bread with virgin olive oil .  I then cut the slices into small cubes and dry fry in a frying pan.  Another useful addition to bulk the soup out is to add smoked sausage/frankfurts cut into disks.  When served with a dessert of fruit and yoghurt or custard, we find this is a satisfying and warming dish that we both enjoy.

This is one of those soups that tastes better each day when you reheat it, but it also freezesd very well.

It seems like I've been gardening most of my life.  My mother was a keen gardener and my sister has a magnificent garden in the Blue Mountains so maybe the love of it is in my bones.  I know people who have been healed by gardening.  A couple of people I know who were suffering depression, took up gardening, got their hands dirty, created wonderful gardens and remade themselves in the process of doing it.  There is something about putting your hands into the soil that heals.  It brings you back to earth - literally- and puts many things in perspective.

Gardening not only helps you produce organic food for the table, it also helps you slow down.  Gardening is about time, the slowness of it and how using that time in a meaningful and productive way can make you healthier, both physically and mentally.  Your garden will not allow you to rush - there is a time for planning and a natural requirement for preparation and attention to detail.  Becoming a steward in your garden helps you become a providore in your own kitchen.  With careful planning you can provide food you often cannot buy in the supermarket and even if it's  the same, your garden produce will be much fresher that anything you can buy.  You have never really tasted a potato until you taste a new potato, dug that afternoon and steamed with butter and parsley.  Certain foods taste better when they're grown out the back.

But gardening isn't just about slowing down, freshness and taste, it's also a life skill - one of those skills our ancestors took seriously because it helped them survive.  And now here we are with the luxurious option of choosing whether to produce food in our backyard or whether to buy it. Of course, some of us don't have that luxurious option - it's been taken away by illness, lack of time or no land, but those of us who have that choice should grab it with both hands and teach our children as well.

I took a stroll through our garden early yesterday morning and although there are still a few empty spaces, it's lush and plentiful and is starting to fill with ripe vegetables and fruit just waiting to be picked.  I took these photos for you to see what is growing now.

I hope your gardening, or your planning is coming along well.  Take your time to make sure you're planting the right things for your climate, and when you know what to plant, make sure you have the right varities.  This is especially necessary if you have a short growing season because you only have one chance at a crop.  If this is your first year in the garden, take it slow, don't over do it and be patient.  Take the time to discover your soil and backyard.  Listen to the birds, look at the insects and come to know them - they are not all bad and can be your enemy or your friend.  When you're in the garden, be there, both physically and mentally.  Don't think of other things or what you'll be doing later.  There is a lot to learn in any garden.  I have been gardening for about 40 years and I'm still learning, discovering and being amazed at how complex, yet simple, our natural systems are.  If you're lucky, you'll harvest not only healthy vegetables and fruits, you'll grow in confidence, increase your skills and blossom in spirit.

There is something in every one of you that waits and listens for the sound of the genuine in yourself.  It is the only true guide you will ever have.  And if you cannot hear it, you will all of your life spend your days on the ends of strings that someone else pulls.....Howard Thurman.

Good morning everyone.  It's another beautifully cold morning here, the temperature is 10*C/50F right now and not 6C/42F like it was yesterday.  Our home is insulated so it's quite warm inside but I know when I go outside to feed the animals, I'll need a cardigan or jumper.

Oh, I just wanted to mention that my sister Tricia (Patricia Margaret) sometimes comments on my blog and did so yesterday.  It was really lovely for me to read her recollections of those times.   It seems to make it better when memories are shared.

I wanted to answer a few questions that have come my way recently.  The first is from Larissa:

"My question is does the oven proof dish rest on the bottom of the water dish or does it rest on the edges so that the bottom doesn't touch??? I hope that makes sense. A bainmarie as I know it (from industrial kitchens) had the dishes suspended over the water with the bottoms in the water. I'm not sure what size or type of pan to buy otherwise to fit my pyrex glass oven dishes."

Larissa, I used my stainless steel baking dish - the sides are maybe 6 inches high - and placed an oven proof bowl into the boiling water, directly on the base of the baking dish.  The bottom touches the bottom of the baking dish, but if you were to put a few smaller dishes in, instead of one larger one, the sides of the smaller dishes shouldn't touch each other.  The temperature in the oven is quite mild so it won't boil and bubble to de-stable the dish and move it around.

The second question is from Rachael:

"From your pictures and from conversations at the local home improvement store, I decided to use cinder blocks to raise my veggy beds. The yard tends to flood in the spring, and I think the raised beds will help with that. I put in my first raised bed, with cinder blocks, a few weeks ago... and those cinder blocks are not straight from any angle. What did you do to get your cinder blocks so straight and level? Did you use a base of gravel or sand? Or perhaps did lots of work to level the ground first? What have you let grow between the raised beds? (my yard is currently lots of drought/flood resistance native green things, which  many might call weeds, so figuring what to pull and what to leave)."

Rachael, the blocks are set in the ground about 2 inches.  Get yourself four short sturdy sticks and tie string to each of them.  The string should be a little longer and  wider than the dimensions of the garden bed.  So, for instance, if your garden will be 15 feet x 5 feet, have two strings of 17' and two of 7'.  That will give you your length and width with enough left over to tie the string around the sticks.  Go to where your bed will be and hammer in the sticks on each appropriate corner, then tie the strings so that you have a little string fence surrounding the garden bed.  You should now have a rectangle with straight sides that you can use as a guide to lay the blocks.  Take your spade and dig out a trench the width of the blocks you have bought, to a depth of about 2 or 3 inches.  Make the bottom of the trench as level as possible and place the blocks into the trench.  They will be touching end to end so that will support them lengthwise, and when you back fill with the soil you removed from the trench, that will support them on both sides.  You should end up with a block border with a straight and level top.

Now, the problem with the flooding.  If your vegetable garden is flooded regularly, it will kill your plants.  You may need to build up the beds quite a bit - I have seen high raised beds where people have used corrugated iron sides.  But if the flooding is minor you'll be fine with the blocks.  You'll have to add quite a bit of compost or manure to your garden soil for good results, when you do that, add some sand to the mix as well.  That will help with drainage.  To give you a rough guide, I'd use a bucket of sand for each bucket of manure or compost  you use.  Then dig it all in.  You will get much better results when you dig.  You'll open up the earth for the tiny roots to penetrate.  This is something you'll have to do every year.   Over time, your soil will improve and give you really wonderful crops.

I thought there was another question but I can't find it now.  If I've missed you, please let me know and I'll slot it in later this morning.

Added later:  I remembered it was for the chocolate cake recipe. Here 'tis.

200g soft butter

1 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 eggs 

100g chopped and melted dark chocolate

1 ½ cups self raising flour
2 tablespoons cocoa powder 

¼ cup milk

¼ cup boiling water  (boiling water at the end makes a moist cake)

Cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.  Add vanilla and eggs, one egg at a time and mix well.  Add melted chocolate.
Sift flour and cocoa together and add it to the butter mix.  Add milk to help mix it.
When everything is mixed well, add the boiling water last and mix in.  Place in a 22cm deep cake tin and bake at 170C for about 50 minutes.  Check with a toothpick to see if it comes out clean, if not, bake another 5 minutes.

When the cake is completely cold, slice in two horizontally so you have two layers and add the icing of your choice.  I used this:
200g soft cream cheese
1 cup icing sugar
2 tablespoons cocoa
2 tablespoons milk
Mix all the above together until smooth.  I put some of this in the centre and topped the cake with the rest, plus some fresh ripe raspberries.
Happy baking!

Sandra asked about growing passionfruit.  Sandra, they need lots of manure and water in a free draining soil.  And FULL sun, never attempt passionfruits if you can't give them full sun.  In that photo of my passions,  that is the end of the row that gets the most sun.  They love it.  So sun, manure (cow, horse, chook or goat), water and well draining soil.  Oh, and they like to be mulched but ours aren't because the chooks walk there and they pick it off.  BTW, we have wire over the top of the soil so the chooks can't scratch the roots.  Good luck, love.  Let me know if it works for you.

I hope you have a beautiful weekend doing a few things you love.

I think snow is falling on the mountains.  Not the rainforest covered mountains I live at the base of but the cold and frosty mountains a thousand miles south of here.  When it snows there, it's cold here.  Nothing brings out the earth mother in me more than a cold afternoon.  It catapults me back to my childhood when my mother, in the days well before central heating and electric blankets, would lay thick pink and green woollen blankets out on the warm floor in front of our blazing open fire and wrap me and my sister each in a cosy woollen cigar shape.  Then dad was called in to carry us both to bed.  I can still see Tricia being carried, giggling, enclosed in her pink and green woolliness from neck to feet, into bed, and  remember waiting for my turn while I watched the fire and listened to its crackling.  When it's cold, like my mother, I want to wrap everyone I love in pink wool and put them to bed. Many things have changed for me since those days of my youth and the way we live now is not much like what it was then, but when I feel the chill of an afternoon come up from those southern mountains, I know the snow is falling and it never fails to take me back home again.

When I feel those cold winds and know there will be a cold (for us) night ahead, I think of warm flannel sheets, extra quilts and fleece blankets.  Much to Hanno's horror, I am still luxuriating in having the windows open when we sleep.  I love feeling the cold air on my face while I snuggle deeper into the warm embrace of our bed.  It won't be long though before I have to close the windows to keep out the icy air.  I started writing this blog yesterday afternoon.  It's morning now and yes, the night was cold, and I had to close the last remaining open window halfway through the night.

Almost every type of homemaking task is better for me when the weather is cold.  Not only does the colder weather make me want to fluff up my nest more, but working is more pleasurable when I feel that nip in the air.  And there is that intensity that comes with the coldness  of winter - a primal instinct from deep within tells me it's more important now to bake bread, keep warm, and to cook nourishing traditional foods for those I love.  It seems that work takes on a new significance now; that if I don't do it right, all will be lost.  I suppose many think of winter as a harsh season, but I never do as there are so many opportunities to soften the coldness with woollen cardigans, lambs wool slippers and hot chocolate.

I have had a lovely couple of days floating through my house work and I spent a morning with my good friend Bernadette who is in hospital at the moment.  We talked about some very personal and confronting things and when I left her, I felt truly grateful to be healthy and have the freedom to live as we do.  But the truth is that while I enjoyed the past few days I missed laying my thoughts down in this blog.  I didn't miss the computer or the internet, only the blog and the capacity to connect to you.  It was like missing a friend who used to drop by for a cup of tea, and then stopped coming.  I'm pleased to be back.  

I have a few questions to answer that I promised a few days ago, so I'll do that tomorrow.