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Buy nothing day

Someone has nicked my bath!

We had saved our bath, when we decided to rip out the bathroom, for taking to the allotment ready to collect rain water in.  We reckoned it would be cheaper and less nickable than a water butt, and probably easier to collect rain water in. We hadn’t thought that someone would nick it before we had managed to get it over there! Gutted about this, and they nicked the other metal bits, which we were also saving to recycle, that is a recession for you!

Back to soil anyway, which is my pet subject at the moment, the other thing is urine therapy, but I am not sure you are ready for this yet? Comment and let me know, anyway the compost heap is about half the size it has been, and it stinks. R is putting all the crayfish bits in, and it is honking the whole length of the garden. This is good, as all this is truly organic natural matter, nothing better for making our soil really nutrient rich, although not vegan unfortunately! You have to take good care of your soil, piling on organic materials to make a strong soil for strong plants, which don’t need chemical fertilisers or pesticides. The less we kill everything in the soil, the more we are working with it, helping the bacteria and micro organisms which are the life blood. Those farmers are essentially chemical junkies, and are making our produce be the same, then remember that we consume it, are we surprised our health on a national level is reducing? Any junkies health would be bad when you think about it?

The other thing is that we are killing off in any way we can the bacteria around us, has anyone considered how important it is at times, and how we might actually need some of it? Many of these bacteria are part of a breaking down process which is needed to enable the plants to grow, farmers are killing off the fungi in the soil which could prevent disease from happening to their crops, how do they do this? They do it by using fungicide.

A lot of this doesn’t make any sense to me, why people can’t see how we are ruining the very environment we need to live in, and our best asset, our bodies on a daily basis, and choose cheap, over long healthy living is just beyond me. Oh and whoever nicked my bath can I have it back please?

Roystons finally got a shop

We have been working hard on our blogs and websites, and R recently discovered that he could sell his pieces far easier over the internet via www.etsy.com, so that is where you can go to purchase his wonderful pieces of Mokume Gane. Sorry not about living a purer or more simple life today, more about having a bit of decadence in it for a change!!

Worms!

It’s been a wet day so we didn’t end up going to the allotment in the end, a wash out, but I have instead learnt about how important worms and other bacteria are as vital organic compost for ensuring that the soil, and plants are nutrient rich. It is these bacteria that enable the plants to grow, by helping to breakdown the matter in soil for the plant to use, this then becomes nutrient rich soil supplying them with the rich nutrients which help them to become strong pest resistant plants.

So now it makes lots of sense that if the chemical pesticides are killing everything off, how on earth can the microbes and organisms survive? The onslaught of chemical farming is stopping our plants ultimately from growing into mineral rich food for ourselves, as they are weak, and have to have pesticides to stop predators from eating them. If the organisms are no longer in the soil to break down the matter, and on top of that, the fertiliser is now a chemical one which isn’t anywhere near as usable to the plant, and for us in the long run to use. Then does it surprise anyone that the soil and the plants each year become more and more dependant on chemicals to try and replace what they are losing. When the answer for me is easy, feed the soil properly with proper compost, and fertiliser and stop using chemicals which are killing off the very things that we need to be healthy.

Each day, even with the bad weather I know I am doing the best for my body, it keeps me healthy in so many ways.

Building up the nutrients for our food.

One of the key things to having nutrient rich food is ensuring that the soil in which it is grown is nutrient rich. We are very conscious of this, and the compost that we have been building up for the past year will be going down to our allotment ready to make the soil there just as rich as the soil we are currently growing our produce in.

As a nation don’t care enough about our soil, and this has really been brought home to us watching the farmers locally with how they continually grow on the same land, without resting it, or seeming to do much at all to feed it. When in comparison we are getting ready to dig over our small plot, and then dig into it as much compost as we can, then we are planning to plant on some parts of it green manure ready for when we need it.

We know that by resting the land at times, digging in the manure, and compost we will be giving our bodies the best food we can, and this is why we are doing it, because those who are in charge of growing our food produce aren’t. They are custodians, but profit has got in the way, and this is the reason we are personally taking back control of our food.

The rise of chemical farming is stripping bare the soil of minerals, the last four decades have accelerated this. Whilst traditional methods of farming are all aimed at working to mineralise the soil, they work to return the waste from animals and plants back to the soil. The agribusinesses have done all they can to make their way the only way, whilst damaging our food, and environment permanently, they no longer have the time to look after our environment, or our bodies, their processes don’t leave time for this. This is something we are really learning that cooking our own food, growing our own food, making food for the dogs, wildcrafting, even knitting our own socks, all takes time! Something we all have less and less of, corporations are making it like this for absolutely everything, and we have to take back our time, we really do.

Dogs, candles and chickpeas!

I know it’s not true that dogs will eat anything, as I have the fussiest dog in the world, not sure how long it really takes them to train us, but they master the art probably faster than we do! One of them is fussy, will not eat for days, and almost hold us to ransom becoming wafer thin by the day, the other one we have discovered is a bin, and will consume anything, fruit, vegetable or mineral, she doesn’t really care. But it is creating quite a lot of gas, if she let out all the gas we would have a dog the size of a chihuahua, we have put the candles away, as we think it could be a fire risk currently.

But we have extended our dog food recipes though, although as we can smell, we still have to refine them for the moment!  We have been experimenting far more with beans, lentils, and grains,  they like beans – a lot. Although not sure that we do!

I prefer to give them beans because they can digest them fully, (possibly) something they can’t really do with grains, so I don’t like to give them too many. But the beans that are going down a treat are chickpeas, both sprouted and cooked ones, with a single vegetable, which we are rotating. I have to say though that chickpeas have left them both drinking gallons of water, but they ate the lot, I have found the same with mung beans, and aduki which do have a meaty taste to them.

They are also liking lentils, although if we make them too watery we pay the price, lets just leave it at that! Yellow split peas, millet, which is a seed, as is quinoa, the dogs love them all. I should of done this ages ago, but I tended to keep to the same things for FD1. Both dogs look great on the food, and I know exactly what goes into it, and when R’s parents came to stay, their dog ate it as well, R’s mum was so impressed that she is going to make her own. Result!

Tetanus vaccinations for buying Pampers!

I watched the TV in the gym today in my lunch hour, something I try to avoid, but was really amazed about the Pampers nappies advert. It said that by buying a packet of nappies, they were going to contribute 1 vaccination of Tetanus to a baby in some country or other. This programme was supported by Unicef.

How many children are really dying of tetanus in those countries, or are they now killing off these babies, by lowering their immune systems even further through vaccinating them. Babies are fragile creatures, and shouldn’t be subjected to the number of vaccinations they are having to go through, each time they are vaccinated it is like putting a toxin into their body, for them to fight off.   The ingredients in these vaccines includes preservatives, carrying agents, proteins, bacterial and viral material, creating an absolute onslaught against their health, not for their benefit, but the pharmaceutical companies.

You know in all the years I have been alive, I have heard of few people having tetanus, but I have heard a lot from parents who know about children who have been damaged by vaccinations.

Crackberry

I used to have a Blackberry, I loved it, I could answer my emails anywhere, anytime, all the time, everytime, I was super productive, and I never got away from work. In the end I gave it up, and at work I deal with many of the senior managers who have them. They are easy to get hold of, why? Because they are always prepared to answer them, it’s great for business, no one really ever stops working any more, but are they really that productive?

What’s brought this on? Firstly an advert I noticed in an Ecologist magazine, in between Take all the unproductive gaps out of your day, it reads family, rest, play, friends, and life. Now I read this a few times and thought, hell I quite like my unproductive moments, they are creative, fun, social, happy, and it feeds the busy times. It’s good to have down time, but these devices are very anti that, and society doesn’t really like you having downtime anymore I really have noticed. Time to think, to be creative, to do nothing is not really encouraged, by all accounts it is now considered unproductive. When I am working both in my day job and in my business, I am very productive, but this is fed by us going out walking, eating food with friends, fishing, cooking, eating, lying around doing nothing but talking or stroking the dogs.

Corporates have deliberately made us into their working drones, which never stop, and now the technology is ensuring that they can have us working for us in our time as well as the time they pay us for. I was really upset by this advert as it shows how when you are out with your kids, or doing something else you can have your mind taken away by the job you work in, your attention is diverted continually, by something more important, the job you work in. When will those corporates be happy? When they have us all working 24 hours a day I imagine.

I always want to ask people who are walking along with their Blackberries or mobiles stuck to their ears or their fingers, have they actually noticed or paid any attention to their surroundings? Or even the people they are meant to be with, it infuriates me when I am in the midst of a conversation or meeting with someone, and they answer their phone or emails and then proceed to have a full conversation with them. The ignorance is amazing, and we are bringing up the next generation with only a focus for these devices and constantly being available, by everyone, and answering them all the time.

We have given up our addiction of these, and you know what, we don’t miss getting phone calls all the time, it’s quite nice to have some quiet time with no disruptions. We are trying to get our favourite dog walking friend to do the same, but people really are addicted to them.

Cider making

Cider making on the BBC, one for lovers, of cider that is! Click here to listen to the iplayer from the BBC