wants & living simply :: a manifesto for 2015

I've decided to start this new year with a manifesto. Not so much a resolution, but perhaps a way of living and thinking about our footprint on this planet and our daily actions in a different way. Of not guilting ourselves, but giving ourselves a way of re-thinking how we want to live. Of choosing at each moment what we want, how we want, why we want. 

I find new year's resolutions for me bring about a guilt that I never keep them, that I've let myself down by barely lasting a month or even a week in some cases. I'm hoping this manifesto can help with my ideal of how I wish we could/would live, but also be an easier way for our whole family to be part of it. Often these ideals are pushed by one member of the family (me!) and the others don't really want to go along with it.

So.... here it is. My new year manifesto ::

If we want it, we should question our want

If we do still want it, we should make it

If we can't make it, we should get it second hand

If we can't find it second hand, we should buy it ethically

If no one makes it in an ethical manner, we should re-think our want

.....

Only after this shall we consider any other options. 

I do hope that this is a good way for all the family members to live with our consumerism, want want want. To re-think how we fit within society - to re-think if our wants are based on other people's wants, or if they really are more of a need. To retrain ourselves to work out that often our wants don't fulfil what we think they will, that just as often we actually feel remorse or disappointment, after our wants are purchased. 

I also know that this is a journey we have be on for a long time. Compared to how many many others live, we do not give in to wants and whims and consumerism. My kids are always telling me 'it's not fair, everyone else has one'..... Well, my reply is we aren't everyone else. We don't go shopping for the sake of it, we don't buy new toys or books or clothes or anything just because. We do still consume, we get things that we don't necessarily need, but my hope is that we can live this year a little less and then next year a little less.

I am going to be practical in this way of being, not enforcing this in every instance of our lives. Also, I need to be aware that there will be things we need to buy that are wants. Within our business we have purchases of new items - these are necessary for our business, for our livelihood (and I may talk about this at a later stage). Our house-building will have new-purchase needs as well. 

But, hopefully this manifesto can help us all - the children and the adults - to live a happier life with less, to want less. To actively choose to want less, rather than feeling deprived on less. That's the ultimate - to stop the wants. To change the wants. To want less, to live with less, to live on less. 

I'll be sharing this journey here this year, and on my instagram feed as well. I aim / hope to be more present here on my blog. By sharing my story and ideas with you - perhaps you'll follow along. I do hope so, even just a little. 

I'm keen to hear your thoughts on new year resolutions, on manifestos, on consumerism, on wants and wants..... 

{Hi Amy - who asked when I was coming back! Hopefully now. xxx}

making from scratch || seaweed & sesame crackers {a recipe}

With back to school looming a week ago, I was trying to think of ways to ease myself back into the school morning routine. One of the things that was so lovely about homeschooling, was the not having to make school lunches and deal with half-eaten school lunches every afternoon. Or the other kids making of fun of my kids' school lunches. And such matters.

I knew I would get myself in a fluster and a flurry every morning if I wasn't prepared. I am not naturally an early riser, so dragging myself out of bed on a cold Winter's morning in the dark little shack to make school lunches isn't the top of my list!

Best way to remedy this was make a plan. A school lunch menu was talked about, and written down. A list of options to choose from, then a daily list of what the kids wanted to eat compromised with what I wanted them to eat, and what I knew they really would based on experience. 

Added to this is my ban on buying packaged sweet or savoury biscuits / crackers, or any fast lunch-box packaged items.  For more reasons than one; the sugar / salt content is so much more than I like in either sweet biscuits or savoury crackers, the plastic packaging is crazy and thoughtless (Ryvita's are one of the few that have minimal non-plastic packaging, and aren't really kid-enjoyed!), the cost and the speed at which a packet of biscuits is consumed in my house. I haven't been buying any biscuits, bare the occasional few, for all year. 

Some time ago, Ari declared he wanted some crackers, so set about making some. Yep - my 8year old boy came up with this recipe! With a few tweaks from me, and a continual change of additions and tastings, here's our recipe for:

Go Crackers for Ari's Crackers!  Seaweed & Sesame Crackers

2 cups of flour (of your choice, can be gluten free flour or nut 'flour')

1 cup LSA (or almond meal or similar)

1/2 cup each of white + black sesame seeds (or mix up with whatever seeds you like, sunflower, pumpkin seeds, flaked almonds, etc etc)

1 TPS each ground cumin, coriander, rock/sea salt

1/2 cup olive oil (or whatever oil you like using)

A few sheets of nori roll seaweed or wakame

Mix together with enough water to just make a workable dough, not too soft. Wrap in a cloth (I use these beautiful beeswax wraps) and leave in fridge for 1/2 hour. Roll out in batches between two sheets of baking paper until very thin, chop seaweed sheets into sliver using scissors, and roll/press into crackers. Add more seeds and press in too, if you want. Score into shapes and place on baking tray (leave it on one sheet of baking paper and transfer whole lot to tray). Bake 180-200C until looks cooked; 8-15 mins. Once cool they will be crispy. 

Enjoy with homemade dips, cheeses or on their own; I've been loving beetroot/yoghurt & a homemade cheese dip lately. Nibble nibble yum yum.

I'd love to know if you make some, and any variations you work with.

things about living in the country

We're not necessarily getting better at this country living thing, but it is getting easier. Bit by bit. 

All the times I think of complaining, of the living in this tiny little shack with no bedrooms, and no bathroom, and no sewing room, and not spare.space.for.ourselves.whatsoever. Every time I want to complain, I go outside and look around. Up and down and out and in. All around. 

Those are the wonderful and good and ever so amazing parts of living in the country. {We do not live in the 'country-side', instead we live in the forest or bush}.

Looking up I see the trees stretching for years and years into the sky. This tree that lives and grows right near where we have chosen to also plant ourselves is more than 80 years old. It looks like a dinosaur tree, covered in moss and ferns and orchids. With little birds building their own lives within the spiky leaves. And also a giant goanna that climbs up the rough bark and slips into the massive basket ferns that live there. 

Looking down I see tiny ferns and moss and fungi. Ants and beetles. Leaves and buds and twigs fallen. The earth beneath my feet is the same earth that my mother walked upon. And I walked upon with my siblings when I was young. 

Looking all around I see this circle of trees that we live in. Like a fairy circle with trees around us in a ring of life. And the birds that call this valley home. I am trying to encourage the kids to draw each bird they see on our daily adventures. There's lots of birds, and I do think it would make a beautiful journal seen through the kids' hand drawings.

Right now, as I type this, there is a carpet snake in our kitchen. Yes. Yes. You read correctly. A snake curled up in the corner behind a cupboard in our actual kitchen. Remember, we live in a shack with lots of easy-to-access broken windows and chinks in the wall (our kitchen has stone wall in some parts). A carpet python isn't poisonous or dangerous. She has sat there quietly all day, and simply wants to go outside. I think she came in last night during the storm. Our cat will not venture into the kitchen; we had to feed him in the loungeroom! It's good having a snake in the kitchen as it keeps the native mice and rats away. 

Driving to the creek, the kids sit in the boot of the car. No seatbelts. Or perhaps sit on my lap while I drive, turning the steeringwheel as I drive. These things are ok in the country. We don't have traffic jams on our way to town; we have cows across the road, or geese honking at you. One day a turtle was sitting on the road and I had to help it back to the creek. You must slow down for birds. And laugh at the brush turkeys racing across the road. 

Looking up I see the stars. Every star in the sky shines brightly at night. Twinkling and shimmering on us. At night when you go outside you need a torch. We go outside every night - we have no inside toilet. Sometimes cold in Winter, but always so much more beautiful than a regular indoor bathroom. {And not as cold as here!!!}

There are other, oh so many other, good and wonderful things about living in the country. I am counting my blessings to live here, and enjoy all the good and wonderful things about it.

*these sunflowers are from my neighbours garden. She threw handfuls of seeds into a well dug patch - the flower head seeds are intended for chicken feed once they are spent. We did have sunflowers last Summer, and I *intend* to have a flowering garden again this year. Last year was busy with being away from home, and my whole garden suffered badly. 

{living simply} some things I don't talk about

 {before any of you get excited; this isn't our house - it's my dad's house - the beautiful upstairs verandah with bamboo ceiling. And the downstairs entryway with those well worn bricks and the mud-brick style walls}

I've been thinking a bit lately about how we live, and how it probably differs quite a bit to how other people live.
I don't talk about it much, as really for me, it's part of who I am, and almost how I grew up - so it doesn't feel unusual or difficult or different for me. But I am very conscious of how it is for Sam and for my children, and for family and friends who come to visit us and have never experienced this way of living before.
So, I've decided that I might start sharing it here a bit more too.

The way we live on this little parcel of land isn't how we planned, or how we will always live here. But it's how we are living here right now, and have been for the past 16 months, and will continue to for some more time while our house building continues. But much of how we live is how we want to live - and will be a continual journey of slow and simple living.

Firstly - the no electricity thing. Yep, it's hard. It was romantic for the first few months, during Summer and the long evenings. But after some time, and then in Winter when the sun sets at 4.30pm. Well, it's a bit of a drag.
We live by torch light, and candles and little solar garden lights that we take outside to charge every morning, and bring inside every evening (they are more for ambient lighting, and act as little glow-bug / night lights for the children in these dark dark nights). We buy candles, and have also been making our own from the melted wax (I'll blog about that another time). We read our bedtime stories by torch, and in Winter time we cook dinner by candle or torch or good eyesight!

We have a battery powered radio - it doesn't last long if we play cds on it, so mainly we listen to whatever radiostation isn't fuzzy at the time.

We don't have tv, or a little dvd player. We have my one laptop computer (we did have two, but Sam's died a while ago). This means at night time we can sometimes either watch a (borrowed from the local library) movie or I have time for my blogging addiction, or doing online work. I charge my computer at my dad's house on most days - but not all days; those nights we have no computer at all.

We charge our mobile phones in our cars when we're driving to school or town. I take my charger and plug it in whenever and wherever I'm out and about, and I feel I'm not pushing the friendship too far...

We have a small gas fridge, it doesn't fit much, and freezes any vegetables we put in it. Luckily for Sam it keeps beer nice and icy! When we first moved here we used an esky and ice for at least 9 months - this was horrible and tedious. But it has taught us to only buy what we will eat and need for a few days, and not keep unnessecary food at the back of the fridge going bad and wasting electricity. (Go and look in your fridge - do you need everything in there? Do you really need a fridge that big?).

Prior to living here, we were never a high-energy consuming household. This is just a step further, and makes us realise we don't need as much as we ever use when it's at our finger tips to switch something on.

Perhaps you could try using your computer for as long as only a fully charged battery lasts. When it runs out, you have to turn it off - you can't plug it in and spend more hours blog-hopping, or pinning, or all those other things I used to do all hours of the night when I lived in Brisbane.

We spend more time reading or sitting and enjoying the quiet. We go to bed earlier, which means we have a better sleep and wake up earlier as well.

You could set yourself a little challenge to live in the dark for a few hours this week. Dinner by candle light is romantic, crochet by candle light is poetic. Get the kids involved too - reading bedtime stories by torch light is really fun; an adventure. I'd love to hear how you went - go on, it's not hard, just a challenge.
(and before you go to bed, go outside even in the rain the cold the snow to say goodnight to the moon, the stars, the sky, the night, the world).