Hoorah! I’ve finally become the kind of person who can do something crafty and then blog about it! (And shout hoorah! a lot apparently. I’ve just read Swallows and Amazons which may explain that one).
Anyway, I’ve come across freezer paper stenciling on a few sites now and wanted to try for a while but because I’m broke I haven’t been able to shell out for fabric paint nor this fancy freezer paper stuff (available in craft shops in NZ). But my mum has let me in on a sneaky secret: the wrapping paper from a ream of photocopy paper will do the trick just as well*. Free! Free and environmentally responsible! Hoorah!
And she also told me I could use ordinary school acrylic paint instead of fabric paint: just paint, alllow to dry and heat set with the iron. I wish I could share photos of my son’s new stag beetle shirt. It looks very cool, and actually very professional. And, can I just say again, free!
I love free craft. I’m planning on doing a lot more - not just “freezer paper” stenciling but anything where I don’t have to spend any money to create something. If you’d like to have a go at the stenciling, these are the best instructions I’ve seen: The Artful Parent.
Photos will come again, I promise.
*it has to be the stuff which has a shiny side. The shiny side will adhear to the fabric when ironed on at cotton setting.
My garden is a bit of a mess at the moment. Plumbing problems. Scary and potentially expensive problems which are most likely the result of tree roots breaking up the sewer pipe. The lesson, of course, is don’t plant big trees where your sewer pipes are! I wish I could go back in time and tell someone that…I’ve been having a lot of wistful thoughts about a composting toilet and a grey-water filtering system of reed beds and the like alternating with the fear that the plum trees will have to be chopped down. On the plus side, we have now obtained plans of our property which show the sewer lines so I can plant my new fruit trees in wise locations.
Assuming that we’ll have any money left over after paying plumbers to buy any.
In other news, my elder son started school. It’s thrown us into chaos as we (actually, meaning mostly I) deal with the change in routines, most specifically the dreaded School Pick-Up (an event which bisects the afternoon in a most annoying way). Coupled with the fact that I have mixed feelings about this school in particular and about School in general, has made the last month interesting as well as busy. Consequently, I missed the Te Aro Community Gardener’s Solidarity Tour but I’m going to keep an eye out for another.
It was a perfect day, begun in chaos, finished in chaos, but in the middle was much lying around on the lawn in the sunshine, climbing trees, eating party food (homemade too!), reading books, playing with friends, digging in the sandpit, tallking and laughing.
I wasn’t as organised as I could have been. I left stuff to the last minute again. Important stuff like doing the dishes so I could bake bread and ice cup cakes in a clean kitchen. I cleaned the rest of the house the day before but then got sidetracked (story of my life) by this weird urge to make something. Not that it’s weird to make stuff, just that it’s weird for me to want to make stuff. I used to, before the children turned up and disrupted my sleeping patterns. So instead of cleaning up my kitchen and organising the party food the night before like any sensible mother would have, I made bunting from scraps of fabric I’ve had in a box since before my five year old son was born. It gave me such a thrill to make something that cost nothing and can be used again and again and, although my son will probably be sick of these little flags by his twenty-first, he appreciated it too.
I’ve decided that one of my main goals this year is to make more stuff. I think that is the key to everything.
BTW don’t miss Live Earth this weekend. It did lift my heart a little to see the saturation advertising on C4 this evening - both for the event itself and for lots of little carbon reducing actions like switching off the lights and recycling your paper.
On the other hand, I haven’t seen a single one of these little ads exhorting people to stop driving so bloody much!
The end of my own post last night was a such cop-out. I knew it when I wrote it. I shouted at myself in my head: “you lazy cow. You don’t have time to sit on your arse! Get out there into the rain!”.
It’s not just about laziness. It’s about despair too. It’s just so bloody hard to keep working when it just seems hopeless.
And then, while I was sitting on my arse reading about other people’s efforts I read the following which reminded me of why it’s so very, very important to change my way of living (and then my family’s way of living, and my community’s way of living…):
“The only hope we have is the notion that the assumptions we make are merely assumptions - that we don’t actually have to live as we do right now. That we don’t have to extract food from the third world, while burning our own dinners in our cars. That we don’t have keep growing - in fact, we can’t. That we can’t reduce our usage by not 50%, but 90 or 95%.
As far as I can tell, there is no better plan than this. Build soil. Plant trees. Grow food. Make Do. Do Without. Give what you can to others. Fix your mistakes. Cut your emissions to the bone, and then cut them some more. And every time it hurts (and it will sometimes), close your eyes and imagine your nieces and nephews or your children or grandchildren or your friend’s beloved children grown to womanhood and manhood in a world where there is food and peace and water. And then imagine them without. And ask yourself “What else don’t I need so I can bring about a decent future.”
Otherwise, when we say we can’t do it, we’re choosing the next generation’s future. The places we love underwater. Wild creatures that live only in zoos. The deaths of more than a billion people from drought and famine - some of them people we love personally, and all of them people we should be capable of caring about.”
Quoted from Sharon at Casaubon’s book.
Nikki suggested to me that I needed to find something to focus on and this might be it.
If you read the same sites I link to, then you are probably already aware of the Riot for Austerity 90% Emissions Reduction Project (is it too soon to call it a movement?).
I think to make it relevant to me, all the targets would have to be translated into New Zealand averages. It’s a lot to think about.
If you’re intrigued, have a look at the rules.
Then if you’re still keen, maybe we can do it together?
This is my third Car-Free Tuesday. I’m trying to decide if they are a good idea.
The first Tuesday was great. I had always wondered if I had it in me to walk the children to the library in the adjacent suburb and it turns out that I do! Usually it takes 5 minutes to drive down a fairly punishing hill (also known as the Incline of Doom) and along a road which is flat by Wellington standards. Our entire excursion, including walk to and from, library visit, cafe visit and playground visit took about 6 hours. It was a struggle dragging the children and their many, many library books back up the hill at the end of the outing but I actually felt really pleased that we did it. We’d talked more, thought more and noticed more on our walk than we would have if we’d driven and as a bonus we didn’t get back home until late afternoon which was fantastic because not only did the children have less DVD time, they had an early bed time too. Hooray!
It took two days to recover from the second Tuesday. A friend came by with her little boy and we went for a bush walk and picnic which involved about the same amount of walking as the previous week but also an awful lot of stairs. Stairs which a tired two year old needed to be carried up at the end of the walk. Happily for the planet this had the flow-on effect of making Wednesday car-free aswell because I was too stuffed to leave the house.
Today the struggle of dragging two spirited and strong-willed children up the Incline of Doom after four hours of solid sand-pit time at our Playcentre almost undid me. During the battle with my children (my two year-old son who didn’t want to walk, but didn’t want to ride in the pram either and my four year-old son who swung wildly between running away from us out of sight and lying on the ground refusing to move) I started thinking about the usefulness of a self-imposed rule such as ‘Car-Free Tuesdays’. When I decided to do this I hoped it would save a couple of car trips thus reducing our carbon footprint and stretching out the petrol money a little further. Do I really need a rule though? Couldn’t I just not drive the car so often?
My thinking hasn’t got very far because I’m stuffed. I might stay home tomorrow.
The problem (well maybe it’s just my problem) with being “green” is that as soon as you start thinking about things - whether it’s your personal contribution to the carbon in the atmosphere or the oil running out - it quickly gets too depressing to bother getting out of bed in the morning.
There’s just too much to do and often it’s hard work pushing against the cultural norms which we live with. Sharon has some interesting insights and I agree with her conclusion that the struggle is “worth undertaking, if for no other reason than the health of myself and my family, and for the little drop in the ocean (or atmosphere) that I can save for the future.”
Anyway, while I was wallowing in “what’s the point” thoughts, Rag Grrl posted a list of things she’s doing to green her life and world. And so, in the interests of my mental health, I’ve shamelessly stolen the idea:
Things I’m doing to green up my life and world
1. Cloth nappies. They’re just nicer in so many ways.
2. Reusable menstrual products (Mooncup and washable panty liners. Cloth feels nicer for me too ;>).
3. Minimise my use of commercial chemical-laden cleaners. Not difficult – I’m a bit of a slattern anyway. I use the more eco-friendly types of commercial cleaners but as they run out I’m finding you can often do the same job with hot water, baking soda, vinegar and lemon juice (not all together at the same time of course).
4. 1/2 flush toilet (easy because the tank is broken and the tap has to be turned on to fill it for each flush. With screaming children in the next room I don’t often bother unless I have to!)
5. Front-loader washing machine with cold water washes.
6. Short showers – often shared with one or more child!
7. Turned off the heated towel rail and all appliances in ’stand-by’ mode.
8. I use energy efficient light bulbs in all the sockets which will take them. In the 2 light fittings with dimmer switches I use normal lightbulbs but only 40W.
9. Resist the purchase of unnecessary appliances (easy when you have no money for such frivolous things anyway)
10. I try not to use my dryer too much. It gets a lot harder in winter with a small and sunless house.
11. I use cloth shopping bags.
12. Angst over packaging. I try to buy stuff with less of course! I try to make things like hummus and bread which bring unrecyclable packaging with them.
13. We compost our kitchen scraps and farm worms. More on my sad little worm farm later!
14. I’m trying to make more things from scratch and grow my own vegetables. Well, you know I’m trying.
15. I try to buy New Zealand made/grown.
16. I don’t eat meat.
17. I try to recycle everything I can.
18. I try to buy recycled stuff-clothes, furniture, books etc. Again, this is easy when you have no money for new stuff anyway…
19. I try really hard not to want new stuff.
20. I have a “No Circulars” sign on the letterbox which helps with the trying not to want new stuff.
21. I use the car minimally. It helps that we have a tight petrol budget and I always have an eye on the tank. Right now I’m pushing myself a little further – with Car-Free Tuesdays and walking to Playcentre more often.
Rag Grrl’s follow up post is a list of things she’d like to do next. I started one, but it quickly got too depressing.
I just want to bask in the feel-good glow of the “I’m doing” before I bog myself down with with the “I should be doing” list.
