in the begining....

It has been just over 6 months since my husband Kyle and I made the move from living in a city suburban duplex with small yard to our ¼ of an acre block in the country town of Cootamundra. We are slowly (money and time permitting) renovating our 1930s house and getting stuck into the ground work of making our yard work for us. We have the chickens pottering around, we have had them do the work of clearing out designated yards which will be used for vegetable patches and we will continue to rotate them around through the seasons as new seeds are planted. We recently planted a plum, apricot, peach and apple tree, there has to be some benefits to having the temperatures go below zero.

I am writing this so I can document what changes work for us and what don’t. I have recently read the book Down To Earth by Rhonda Hetzel and am currently reading Living The Good Life by Linda Cockburn, I highly recommend both. Both books have got me thinking more and more about how I can try to live more simply and save money at the same time. I may not be able to change my life as drastic as Linda Cockburn but it is certainly a start.

Apart from the hens producing eggs and planting as much fruit and veggie as we can its little things I have been trying to change. We have always tried to recycle but now I seem more aware and are trying to reuse paper and containers etc before they even hit the recycling bin, a simple concept I know but I think most of us have been guilty or just thinking we have done our bit by making the effort of putting things in the recycling bin, when in reality though helpful really isn’t enough. I have a couple of buckets kept in the shower to catch any clean water so it can be re-used in the yard. We are lucky enough to have a few water tanks already on site but the more water saved the better. I have learnt through my husband’s persistence that I really do not need to flush the toilet every time, we are now adopting the old motto “if it’s yellow let it mellow, if it’s brown flush it down”.

Our electricity provider recently sent us a letter informing us that due to the carbon tax our electricity prices are going to increase. The increase is really enough to make us take notice. We already try to turn things off at the power point but we are really going to try and make that extra bit of effort now. Must make a note to look into the price of getting solar panels installed.

Things to do;

·         Get quotes of solar panels

·         Look into composting doo poo

·         Find recipe for  laundry powder and other homemade cleaning products