Bloggers for Postive Global Change

Ages ago now Nikki tagged me with this Bloggers for Postive Global Change award thingy. It was really very sweet of her and it’s taken an embarassingly long time for me to pass it on.

My own efforts for postive global change, I feel, are rather haphazard and very small scale. I’d like to pass the meme on to Simple Living: Simplify + Reduce. Miranda and Sharon started the Riot for Austerity 90% Emissions Reduction Project which has bloggers participating from all over the world. That truly is blogging for Postive Global Change!

Meme Rules

It’s easy to participate in this meme. At minimum, you can proudly display the BPGC badge (it’s available in two varieties: Transparent GIF and JPEG with white background) on your blog and bask in the glow of our collective good will. If you are sharing the kudos, however, please make sure you pass this list of rules to the blogs you are tagging.

The participation rules are simple:

1. When you get tagged, write a post with links to up to 5 blogs that you think are trying to change the world in a positive way.
2. In your post, make sure you link back to this post so that people can easily find the exact origin of the meme.
3. Leave a comment or message for the bloggers you’re tagging, so they know they’re now part of the meme.
4. Optional: Proudly display the “Bloggers For Positive Global Change” award badge with a link to the post that you write up.

Archaeology 102

The dig continues…

Black pantyhose
A wrought iron candle holder
Tubing and random pieces from the irrigation system
A castor from an office chair
A broken mirror
A blue sweatshirt
A cricket ball
Several lighters
Ornamental gravel from a fish tank

I have stopped counting the plastic supermarket bags (the ground underneath them is always slimy. Ick!) and I suppose I should have mentioned the shopping trolley! I am currently contemplating banning plastic completely from my life.

Garden Helper

I went outside yesterday to re-pot the flowers I’d been given as a housewarming present. Elder son followed closely behind. I found him grandad’s rake and directed him to the pile of debris I wanted cleared from where I plan to plonk an experimental square-foot garden bed. He came over to help me with the potting mix and somehow persuaded me to let him do this:

“Oh, well”, I thought. “I can always move my garden over a couple of feet.”

It sure kept him busy! Nearly an hour later he’d transformed his little patch into this:

I’m starting to think I might have to start my garden in a completely different place now…

Beans, Beans…

“

What am I going to do? Pick them out one by one? Dig out all the topsoil and dump it? Sieve it? Hmmm. Whatever I do they sure aren’t going to melt away.

Hate plastic yet? You can either come and help me dig it out of my garden, or, you could read this: Our oceans are turning into plastic…are we?

And then you could read Envirowoman’s fantastic blog. (It’s where I found that article ;&gt

Archaeology 101

We have been clearing rubbish out of the garden. Finds so far include:

Many plastic bags in various stages of disintegration (today I tried to explain to my children the difference between degrade and decay).
Many chippie/lollie/muesli bar packets also in various stages of disintegration.
A pile of pipi shells.
The bristles from a house painting brush.
The brush from a brush and pan set.
Clothes pegs.
A once-white sports sock.
A sports shoe (why just one? Maybe the other is still out there…).
Wine bottle corks.
Empty wine bottles.
Empty beer cans (both crushed and whole).
One still full beer can.
One spotting knife.
An inflatable toy dog (uninflated).
A tarpaulin, buried under leaves.
Three tennis balls.
A t-shirt buried under about half an inch of soil.
About a million polystyrene beans from inside a bean bag (I’m wondering when I’m going to find the bean bag cover).
A glass votive candle holder.

It must have been a good party…

Into the Vege Patch

Strawberries
Peas (and sugar snap peas)
Broad beans
Scarlet runner beans
Cannellini beans
Carrots
Onions
Garlic
Spring onions
Tomatoes
Potatoes
Pumpkins
Courgettes
Capsicums
Silverbeet
NZ Spinach

I only write this list here because I’ve already lost and found the bit of paper with it written on three times already this week.

Happiness is…

four loads of washing drying in the sun! I couldn’t have done this at my old flat.

The move was fast and chaotic. I can’t believe how much stuff we had managed to squeeze into a 2 bedroom unit. Maybe that’s why the place was always a mess. On Saturday night the new house looked pleasingly spartan, with just a few treasured items scattered around the rooms (yes, rooms! A separate lounge! Oh, the luxury…to be able to ignore the kitchen mess from another room), but then my parents arrived on Sunday with the second wave. Now I can’t move for boxes and I’m starting to wonder if I should just shove them out on the front lawn with a sign saying “take me”. Really, the thing to do would be to unpack them methodically, discarding and decluttering as I went. But all I want to do is be outside in the sunshine, digging out the weeds in the retaining walls and watching where the sunlight falls on the garden through the day.

The boys and I spend quite a lot of time outside this afternoon poking holes in the ground and watching the sun. I’ve learned already that the place where I thought I’d put in a quick vege garden is shaded by the clothesline and the hedge. I’m thinking I might either have to move the clothesline and cut the hedge or to start in another spot. I just have to pick a spot and start planting though, or it will still look like this next year.

Or worse, my husband will have turned it all into lawn!

The New Garden

It’s still pretty sad even if it isn’t quite so little. It has the “middle of winter” blues. I’m certain that spring foliage will improve things. The best thing about it? We’re moving in this weekend!