Hello, Will here.

Sorry for not writing sooner, and thanks Jess for making all the previous posts.

In my absence I have been mainly at work, but occasionally buying less and living slow by making things for the house. Work has been great, it provides us with all we have materially and will hopefully one day allow us to move somewhere more rural (Wales) when we have saved up enough. After work and at weekends I have built a few things for the house. First I made a shelf to give us more space in a cubby hole:

I used some wood from my Grandad and screws Jess' mum gave us.

Not long after that or perhaps before that I got another bit of wood that Grandad gave me which had been in use for a while under our the length of our bed as a support. It snapped one day so I put it to one side. The slats didn't break and are strong enough on their own. I fixed this broken piece with 2 screws and some glue, then rounded off one end with a chisel and put it in a pole holder that was at the end of the garden. I drilled a hole in it and we threaded through a line we got in a corner shop for £3 maybe. Jess treated the wood with preserver so it will last. It had two heavy wetsuits on it and they touched the ground so I used a bit of wood as a prop. Jess had a better idea and put them closer to either end of the line. I think there is a photo of it on the blog elsewhere.

I also made this shelving unit out of more old wood from Grandad, and a few bits from dad's vulgar kitchen extension. It took me quite a while as I got one side the wrong way round and had to unscrew it and make new holes but I got there eventually, and now we have a gleaming example of function over form, giving more space than the two floating ikea shelves that have been banished to the loft until we leave.

Here's one I made earlier, maybe 2010 or 2011. It is a pew from St. Martin's church in Dorking that grandad rescued from a skip when they took out the first couple of rows of pews to put chairs in. It may be a hundred or so years old. It was a wonderful experience to renovate it and learn the old ways. There are only 6 screws holding the frame together, all hidden quite cleverly. You can see how the holes were drilled and then chiselled out to fit the back of the pew into its sides. It sits together like this with no screws. I will get a cover for winter at some point. Hopefully the car boot will have one.
I can sit on the pew and evangelise about buying less. In these cases although I have been lucky to have things given to me, a lot of the wood I used for the shed was second hand stuff I bought. The bed was built entirely from new pine, but it gave me pleasure to make it, I made it how I wanted it, and it wasn't reliant on as many people working in factories. From now on I will ideally get all the wood I use second hand as I don't trust any of the big timber companies since they were caught selling Amazonian timber. I want to contribute to deforestation as little as possible.


 Lastly, here are some small cabinets I made, the bathroom one for Jess, which she painted, made from wood my friend Arron was throwing out, and the bedside table is from chipboard that started out as kitchen cupboards, then almost became a bathroom cabinet, but in the end I made it into a bedside table as the cabinet project went wrong and it was too heavy and would have swelled when wet.
 The new cabinet is held together with little dowels I carved out of some scraps of wood I had. Faggots?
And the bedside table I just bashed it together with nails, quite a crude job but it is functional.

Challenging climate change

Just a quick one as I've lots to do today. As I'm sure many of you know there is a March against climate change happening all over the world on Sunday. Will and I will be going, and I hope that anyone who is near a city that has one and who physically can will also be going. As probably anyone reading this has a Blogger, and therefore possibly a blog, you probably have a message to get across and you want your voice to be heard. Well this is the way to do it. Make your interests known.
It comes at an appropriate time where Scotland had the opportunity to vote for the independence of their own country, and sadly lost it 55%-45% (certainly I believe as a direct result of shameful scaremongering by the English press and politicians). How gutting it must have been for those 45%, and how regretful those who chose to stay home, or who were too scared by England's threats but believed in the independence of their country must feel. The only way for change to happen is to make it happen. Other people won't do it. Other people won't stop eating meat or driving their cars or buying iPhones while you watch, YOU have to be the change. See you there.

Food for thought? Foody thoughts

Well well, it's been a while. We've just been a bimbling along in much the same way as ever. Admittedly I've felt that we've rather been falling off the edge a bit - I'm becoming tired and disillusioned with... well... everything, and Will's still plugging along with his work, nothing changing. But I feel a second wind now, like things will slot back into place and the wheels are starting to turn again. We know our direction and we're still headed in it.

The garden is still going and growing. Beans are coming thick and fast now, and we're also about to pick our first runner beans which is exciting. I'm spending less time out there now that it's all just getting on with its business, but it's really nice being able to regularly use vegetables and plants that have grown out there.

 The runner beans have finally stopped dropping their flowers without fruiting, which is a relief. I'd not encountered this before, but it looks as though it was because of the hot weather. As it's difficult to predict a hot summer in this country, it seems a bit risky to plant the beans later in the year next yeaar, so I don't know if there is a solution to this problem.

We, or perhaps just I, have been mourning the loss of a couple of tomato plants that we had to remove because they had a fungus. I'm not really sure what it was as so many of them looked the same when I looked it up, but the stems were going white and hairy, then dying and going brown, and some of the fruits also shrivelled and went brown. We removed the plants and a lot of the soil, but I'm a bit nervous about putting anything else in their place as I'm not sure if whatever it was can affect other plants? Fortunately the tomato plants on the opposite side haven't been affected, but I think next year I will grown in pots.

RIP

This aside everything in the garden is doing well. Between the beans and the new flowers the garden is filled with the bees, and either the tug of the season of the marigolds and gypsophila have worked because there are a lot less butterflies now as well, though I noticed a few eggs on the nasturtiums.

A few weeks ago we collected some ripe plums from a tree in Will's Dad's garden which is pretty good luck. We picked about three kilos, and I'm hoping to get some more soon. The majority of them I stoned and froze for later in the year when there are apples and I can use them for pies and jams. I discovered a worm in only one of them, so fortunately queazing was minimal this time.

I used the plums that I didn't freeze + a handful of our July blackberries to make a pie, and also made a tarte tatin of sorts, but didn't use any sugar. It was fine! You don't need it, and actually for a while, and still I'm really trying to make sure sugar sneaks into our diet as little as possible. Regardless of any recent health studies or government warnings, sugar just makes you feel crap. It's pretty instant - you're tired, slow, crabby, headachey. Anything that makes you feel so bad can't be good, and it's added into so many food products that it can be pretty much constantly topped up, so you forget how it feels to be without it. Much better, is how you feel. I also made a 'quick jam' last week with a couple of handfuls of blackberries and a spoonful of jaggery just cooked down. It set, and was sweet and purple, but not sickly - perfect!

 Will also recently learned from his stepmother how to make noodles (+ pasta) which is invaluable. It's something I couldn't have imagined would be so easy, and it now means that there's another food product that we don't have to buy - excellent as I don't think I've ever seen British Pasta in a shop.  Will bought a 20kg bag of Organic British wholemeal flour, so we're sorted.
It's simple enough that I think it's worth me just writing out the steps:

Make a soft dough from just water and plain or bread flour. I'm not sure what the proportions are, but I use my hand to mix as I add the water, and  you just want a dough that's soft + easy to work with, but not sticky, similar to pastry.
Coat the counter + your dough with flour. There is a LOT of flour added throughout the process, so keep it out + just keep adding it. Every time I roll the dough I flour it + flip it over + flour it again. Flour flour flour.
Roll your dough out into a rectangle. Roll dough quite thin, probably 2-3mm-ish, but it doesn't matter that much. Really jut as thick as you want your noodles to be - obviously the thicker they are the less fragile they'll be, though I've also found that they are a lot less delicate when you use wholemeal flour as well.
When you're done coat your rolled sheet of dough in flour so there is no chance it will stick to itself.

Fold the dough in half from top + bottom (so both end meet in the middle of the sheet). Fold again in the same way, and again if your sheet was quite big. This is just to make it into a smaller sausage-shape so it's easier to cut in a straight line. Chop the sausage the width that you would like your noodle to be - again, the wider they are the less likely they are to break. As you can see, we've used a meat cleaver as it's quite heavy + sharp. Any big knife will do.

Slide a chopstick underneath the middle of your sliced sausage and lift it up - as you do this the noodles should unravel. If they don't separate very easily give it a bit of a tap or a shake. (this is why it's important to have so much flour!!)

I usually have to roll the dough out in more than one batch because I'm making a lot of noodles + it's easier to work with smaller amounts. Just make sure the finished noodles are coated in flour so they don't stick to each other + put them in a bowl or on a greaseproof sheet while you do the rest.

Boil or fry the noodles for a few minutes, and voila!

 I have also made ravioli - slightly more time consuming, but very nice + no need to go to the shop! I filled mine with spinach + garlic and made a tomato + red wine sauce to go with.

One exciting day this week I also made a salad from the garden using our nasturtiums as well as radishes, perpetual spinach and spring onions. I've known for a while that you can eat nasturtiums, but haven't really tried it yet, just the odd leaf here or there, as I've been told it's like rocket which isn't my best favourite. I used about equal nasturtium leaves to spinach and found it much milder than rocket, and very green tasting.
We had the salad with homemade wholewheat pasta + garden beans + a couple of vegbox carrots.

And finally, in a happy turn of events we went for a walk in the local cemetery yesterday + found an apple tree teaming with dessert apples! We only had our pockets with us sadly, but still managed to grab a fair few, and I'm sure will go back soon with a more appropriate vessel. We are also planning to go for a run tonight (which will be our first since June!) and take bowls with us to collect some more blackberries for the freezer, so jam will soon be on its way.

Now, that's everything we've eaten for the last month or so! But what else? Well, as we're finally living in a place that actually feels like one, I've been having a lot of thoughts about community. Northfleet North, where we live, is a pretty deprived area and was chosen as one of the first 50 for the Big Local scheme - a ten year programme providing funding and support to improve communities.
At the moment I don't know that much about it, but I've been learning by talking to people at the food bank where I volunteer, and now hopefully through the No Walls Garden where I began helping out at yesterday, which is funded by the scheme. The Garden brings people who are out of work, out of prison, or recovering addicts together, and provides a space to be creative, get back into the mindset of work, and enjoy the fruits of their labour. The garden is open to all, as is its produce.

Although this is an area that apparently has so many problems, I've not yet lived in a place that has had such a strong flavour of 'it doesn't have to be this way' as Northfleet does. As I get more involved with local schemes, as I hope I will, I'm sure I'll be able to talk about it more, but even now I am completely struck by how involved so many people are, and how they don't feel that they have to take the marginalisation that this area seems to be experiencing lying down. It's equally disappointing, and horrifying however, how evident it is that once an area is 'poor' it's apparently a downward spiral as they are abandoned by authorities. It's not a surprise that so many people are feeling let down and disillusioned, and if this is how you are feeling it's very difficult to want or believe there can be change for the better. I believe that communities really are the most important thing - a strong community can be a great foundation for so many good things. The idea of community is certainly something that I will be coming back to, as it seems to dominate the way so many of us are living now - either community or a lack of.

I have also been thinking further about coffee. In my recent post about it I pretty much concluded that it is bad. However I left it at that, hoping that I would find a loophole that would alleviate my conscience and allow me to continue drinking it. As I said, I have one cup a day, and I really enjoy it. I still haven't really made much of a development on this, coffee is still bad, and I'm still drinking it. However I really do believe you should be the change you want to see, and I certainly don't continue drinking milk knowing that I=that's bad, so why coffee? So I'm going to make a concerted effort to cut down. A lot. Coffee, like bananas or anything else that's delicious and from far away should be an exotic treat, if that. I will continue my research and if anything satisfactory comes up then I'll be sure to update.

Finally, I will share the 'Live Slow Manifesto', a set of life-guidelines written by me and Will one drunken wurbly night a couple of years ago down the pub in Plymouth:

Make love, not money
Do nothing
Gather ye condiments while ye may
Don't eat Anyone
Never forget that people are human - even if it's hard to admit
Be gentle even when you're not treated gently
Trust yourself
Listen to the quieter voices
Be content with simplicity
Marmite
(Chris Isaak)
Mind your manners
Be careful, your words and actions may mean more than you think
Better be last and right than first and wrong.

Goodnight

Plants plants planh plah blah blah blah

Well we're back, we're married, and it' been a hectic (and very sunny & rainy apparently) couple of weeks culminating in a lot of work to be done in the garden.

Our wedding was wonderful - very very hot and sunny, lots of friends, and lot of homemade vegan food, and our honeymoon was double wonderful - a week in a cottage in Llandeilo.

Unfortunately when we got home our first discovery was that a couple of our cacti have been struck down by mealy bug, very upsetting as our plants have never had any diseases before, and this meant that after a quick bout of the Queasies we had to quarantine and spray the plants, and are now just waiting to see if that's enough. Luckily the new garden table is perfect as a temporary plant treatment zone.

Our second discovery was that in all this beautiful weather our garden had gone MAD. The beans are creeping off the end of their poles, weeds have taken over, the peas have disappeared off somewhere, and unfortunately my lack of foresight in firstly not thinning the cabbages before the honeymoon, and secondly not putting netting up, meant that we had to face a major invasion of caterpillars. After a second quick Quease I finally thinned out the, now fairly large, holey, and caterpillary, cabbages and Will and I put up some netting, so now we'll just have to see what happens.
Does anyone have a pesticide-free butterfly deterrent they can recommend? And has anyone found companion planting completely successful? We now have gypsophila and marigolds (talk about locking the stable door) and with future crops that's certainly something I think we'll make sure we do as a priority.

We harvested our first crop, or some of our first crop, which was our radishes and found them very  hot! I'm planning to plant another load in a pot this week as they were such a quick + easy to grow veg.

I've finally put some flowers in the garden to encourage bees and also just to make it a bit nicer thanks to very generous friends and family giving us gifts of money for the wedding, and already our garden is filled with buzzing. I also planted a bird bath that was from my Mum's garden as it's quite a catty area and I'm a little worried about putting water in it and encouraging birds into the garden (I know we have a bird house, but the only thing using that is a big spider).

 I also planted out a few leeks, kale and beetroot so with any luck we'll have a few more vegetables this winter. We're not even approaching producing enough to be self-sufficient in vegetables, and won't be able to in this space, but any step closer is pretty exciting at the moment. We were also able this week to go blackberrying after Will got home from work, and collected a Kilo and a half of berries with a lot more to pick  next week. We also found a couple of plum tress to go back to in a month or so, so we're planning to freeze a lot and have jam and pies for the rest of the year!

Finally, a surprise gift for the house from the husband arrived today - very exciting if you are me, which I am.

Now, I'd better go and find a job. Morrissey Sympathises.

Chamomile, construction, car boots & coffee concerns

A very picture-heavy post today, as what I’ve mainly been doing this weekend is taking photos!

After a fairly uneventful week of Will working and me frantically writing lists and trying to control every little thing for the wedding (11 days!), we finally got to spend our first weekend together in our new house. The weather’s only been so-so, so unfortunately the line-up of boot sales we’d planned to visit had to be postponed until a better weekend so on Friday we worked in the garden, finally getting a washing line up. Will also built a couple of storage units with wood leftover from other projects, while I mostly squatted by the seedlings whispering encouraging words.  I also made something of an effort to organise the study (ha!) in the hope that I might be able to start working again one day, as after all something is better than nothing.

Sunday was the really busy day, and we managed to make it to one car boot (in the rain) where we dug up several things we needed for the house, and several thing we didn’t (Whimsies, cherries, jewellery, ahem.) Afterwards we went for a walk through a nature reserve we passed on the way, which was not at all unfruitful either as we managed to collect some chamomile that was growing wild, and brought it back home for the garden.  I also caught Will chewing on some cow parsley (or at least it was evident by the flowery crumbs in his beard) so we have plans to go back with Food For Free and see what we can see.

For the rest of the weekend, Will mostly worked on fixing up old scissors he's collected over time, making them smart enough for gifts, and I repaired my almost favourite pair of shoes after over a year of staring at them in dismay. Will also made me a little table for the garden with a nice bit of wood we found in the loft.

 Now, if Will and I are going to look at our daily lives and find the cracks in our routine compared to our ideals, then my hot drink habit has got to be high up on the list of things to examine. I don’t drink a LOT of tea or coffee, and certainly less than I once did, but it is a daily – 2 or 3 times daily, I can’t speak before my morning coffee – event, and that’s got to add up. What I really need to know, is what is the cost of drinking a cup of tea or coffee?

Well, for a start it’s definitely bad to have milk in your cup, although that’s something I was pretty sure of anyway without reading about the ill-effects this has on our environment. But anyone who knows me will know that I’m thrilled at any opportunity to boast the benefits of not consuming animal products, so this is good news as far as I can see!  However, smug as I am, I couldn’t have predicted the shocking fact that having a drop of milk in your tea or coffee is more harmful to the environment than both boiling the water needed for that, cup, and indeed cultivating the tea or coffee itself and shipping it over here, combined. But, as the milk issue doesn’t really apply to me, I still want to know where my tea or coffee comes from, what it does along the way, and how I can make this better.

I stopped drinking coffee for quite a while last year because it had gotten a little out of hand, and I certainly know that caffeine is bad for you – you just have to see how you feel an hour after a coffee to know that. Instead I replaced my coffee with a barley & chicory drink, produced in Italy; bingo – caffeine free and much closer than coffee certainly, however I have since slid back to drinking just one cup of coffee a day, and that's starting to weigh on my conscience a little.

So what are your options when it comes to hot drinks?

Well, the easiest thing you can do to make your tea or coffee ‘greener’ before we even look at the product is to simply boil the amount of water you need. If by chance you do boil too much (although a good way of making sure you don't is to use your cup to fill the kettle), use it anyway. Put it in the washing up, cook with it, fill your hot water bottle, or just make a pot instead of a cup, but do not let it go to waste. I’ve also read a couple of articles which indicate that it is greener to use a gas stove-top kettle rather than an electric kettle because of the amount of waste that goes into transforming fuels into electricity, however I would wonder about the benefit of this if you are sourcing your electricity from sustainable companies/sources, so that’s one to look into before rushing out to buy a stove-top  kettle.

A simple and not unpleasing way to cut down on processing before your coffee reaches the cup is to buy beans over instant. Although the product is heavier to ship, there is less processing involved, and therefore fewer steps between growing the coffee and drinking it.

A fairly major issue with drinking coffee in England, is that coffee definitely does not grow in England. So what can you do about that? If you do a Google search for that all you get is a long, long list of your local Costas. So resigning yourself to the fact that England is cold, can you at least, and if not why not, get a coffee that is fair-trade, organic, shade grown, bird friendly, and grown not too far away (relatively speaking)? There’s the earth friendly coffee company but as they’re based in the U.S. ordering from them might be counter-productive. The Ethical superstore boasts a wide range of ‘eco-friendly’ coffees, but none of these say that they are shade grown/bird friendly, and having emailed them they  have confirmed for me that while the companies' products they stock are equal exchange and organic, they are apparently aware of bird friendly coffee but are not currently producing it, and I'm starting to wonder if bird friendly is only a myth. So at the moment I'm buying CaféDirect Machu Picchu which is organic and equal exchange.

I don't really have any answers at the moment (apart from quit the habit) and there's a lot of research still to be done.  This is obviously something that’s going to take more than a few Google searches. Expect updates soon (though not too soon).