I'm at the Co-Op today...

See you there!

Thoughts on preparedness.

Unfortunately, we had a nasty little incident at our place last night, which has gotten me thinking about the value of being prepared whilst I dealt with the aftermath today.

We don't know how, or on what, but while our family was glued to the last 10 minutes of Masterchef, one of our dogs sliced a huge gash in the underside of his tongue. He didn't make a single noise - which is astounding - but evidently he sat (on the sand-coloured carpet) behind the lounge where we were sitting, bleeding profusely, for some time before running from one end of the house to the other, looking to get outside I suppose. Why he didn't whine I truly have no idea, but he lost a lot of blood for his size and managed to get it on everything in his path - floors, walls, curtains, cupboards, toys...

DH stood up to put the kids to bed when the show finished and as you can imagine, almost had a heart attack when he saw what was happening! It was total chaos for the next 5 minutes while he grabbed the dog and put him in the bath tub to contain the mess and calm the dog whilst I tried the calm the kids.

One late-night trip to the vet for stitches later we are seven hundred and fifty dollars poorer, yikes! The dog is sore and sorry for himself, but will be fine, thank goodness. But as you can guess I've spent the day washing every. single. cloth. in the house, scrubbing the walls, bathroom and curtains and trying to get the remainder of the enormous pools of blood out of the carpet behind the lounge (Right where you look into the lounge room as you come in the front door. Sigh). I got most of it out last night with cold water and umpteen dozen old cloth nappies, but of course in daylight it looks dreadful. Double sigh.

So what has this got to do with preparedness? I guess it was vivid reminder for me that bad things can happen very quickly and how utterly blessed we are to live with close proximity of services (like on-call veterinarians!) many of us take for granted.

I cop a fair amount of friendly stick from friends who think I'm a little over-zealous when it comes to stockpiling etc, but really, how easy would it be for both DH and I to be laid up with the 'flu or a nasty gastro bug at the same time and be unable to go grocery shopping for a week? Or for one of us to be called away to a family emergency and leave the other one without a car and kids to feed for an extended period? The money we spent on vet bills last night is more than three weeks worth of groceries for us, so if we weren't budgeting carefully we'd be in some serious strife right now.

I think sometimes there is a fine line between being thought of as a "nutter" and being admired for coping efficiently with the unexpected. I'm just glad our unexpected emergency was nothing too significant in the grand scheme of things.

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On a side note, if you haven't read it already, you should read Sharon Astyk's description of Pat Meadow's "Theory of Anyway" regarding action we should be/are taking to deal with climate change and peak oil, and then read Pat's additions to Sharon's thoughts here. It neatly sums up why I do what I do. As Sharon says:

"...95% of what is needed to resolve the coming crisis in energy depletion, or climate change, or whatever, is what we should do anyway, and when in doubt about how to change, we should change our lives to reflect what we should be doing "Anyway." Living more simply, more frugally, using less, leaving reserves for others, reconnecting with our food and our community, these are things we should be doing because they are the right thing to do on many levels. That they also have the potential to save our lives is merely a side benefit (a big one, though)."

My Winter Garden: A Photo Tour

Despite being the middle of winter, there are still signs of life in my food garden, so on a rare sunny morning today, I raced around with the camera.

The Meyer lemon is producing abundantly as usual, but snails seem to be chewing at the fruit which are then getting fungal infections and falling off the tree :-(

The potted rosemary is looking very pretty.

The galangal is ready to harvest when I get a chance. Only two rhizomes survived but it looks as though they grew on OK, so will be interested to see how much I get from them.

Something (?) is chewing at my green papayas before they can ripen. I will have to pickle this one.

The mulberry is starting to produce buds and fruit...

The blueberries are also beginning to flower and fruit...

and the strawberries are flowering.

The garlic and onions are looking pretty good, despite all the rain.

Although the red cabbage are all sulking and refusing to grow.

The Bloomsdale spinach is stunted and also refusing to grow...

Whereas the Winter Giant spinach is coming along nicely? *Shrug*

The endive isn't doing all that well either...

But the tatsoi is almost big enough to eat (if I can keep the snails away long enough).

The red kale is powering along...

As are the remaining fennel seedlings and the Tuscan kale.

Although all the lettuce are bolting, despite the cold weather - I can't seem to win with them this year.

In fact, the only greens big enough to eat in the garden at the moment are the Chinese Broad Leaf Celery (lovely in stir fries)...

And the Red Giant mustard.

The kohl rabi that weren't eaten by the snails who cunningly bypassed the snail bait, are looking good...

As is the celtuce, which looks as though it about to form it's long stem at the base.

The snow peas are producing lovely crisp pods...

And the rainbow chard is beginning to colour up, although not large enough to eat yet sadly.

I hope your gardens are also producing well for you. Happy gardening everyone!

Independence Days Challenge Update

It's Monday so it is time for another Independence Days update...


Read more about why I am participating in Sharon's Independence Days Challenge, here.

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Planted something - Borage, corn salad, spinach, celery leaf, horseradish.


Harvested something - Snow peas, lettuce, starfruit, lemons, mushrooms, thyme, parsley, cress, rocket.


Preserved something - Lemons (lemon cordial and frozen juice), ginger (grated and frozen in ice cube trays).

Bulk nuts & seeds.

Reduced waste - Received two bulk order deliveries: a hormone-free, grass-fed beef hamper from Spring Hill Beef Hampers and bulk dried fruits and seeds from Honest to Goodness (still waiting on a delivery of assorted bulk grains and flours from the bio dynamic Demeter Farm Mill); made chicken stock from roast chicken bones; made banana muffins from some mushy over ripe bananas and froze the rest.

The grass-fed beef hamper taking up a whole shelf in the fridge.

Preparation and Storage - Knitted another dishcloth (using a new-to-me soy/bamboo cotton); finally sorted out my thrifted yarn and needles and listed them in my Ravelry notebook so I actually know what I have!; bought more organic pasta on special for 99c; purchased a jar of tincture of Benzoin to add to our home first aid kit; bought three more 8.5L and two 5L storage containers on sale; started using the Butter Bell (okay so far); cleared an area of garden in our backyard for a potential future chicken pen.


Eat the Food - Bulk batch of honey toasted muesli & low-fat muesli bars; crustless quiches with lots of greens; chicken noodle soup.

Bulk toasted muesli (granola).

Building Community - Was contacted by two of the co-ordinators of Transition Towns Newcastle, and was asked if I would consider entering Sustainable House Day this year, although we can't participate as one of the qualifying criteria is having solar panels.


Learned a New Skill - Home roasting green coffee beans.

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What the?

So, it's the absolute middle of winter here - and a (normal) cold one at that. We've had overnight temperatures down to 1'C (34'F) recently and mostly cold, overcast or wet days...




So what's up with my peaches? They're throwing out heaps of new growth too and the strawberries are starting to flower!

Anyone else experiencing weird things in the garden ?