Straw bale!

I have been researching like a nutter! It's what I do when I get onto a great idea or goal. I waste spend all of my time glued to google researching the heck out of a topic that I've just recently discovered. This week that topic is building with straw bales!

Lyndon and I have recently been chatting about living in a shed on our land before we build. That way we can start prepping the veggie patch, chook pen, fruit trees, etc early on and start reaping the benefits quick smart. We would then look at building our house. This would allow us more time to save for the house while living on the property, rather than having to stay living in the city longer while we save. It would also give us the opportunity to get to know our land, the way the sun crosses it, the weather patterns, the layout, before we build so we can incorporate all of that info into the design of the house.

So.... living in a shed. Right. Well I'm no princess and think I could handle living in a shed for a few years. It would have to be insulated though at least. We were then looking at different options for sheds to have on our land and the costs involved. The shed part is easy, making it liveable is the harder part. We then thought 'why not build the shed out of straw bale!?' That would give us practise before we build our house out of straw bale, and would leave us with a great little art/craft studio/guest retreat once we've built the house. It may be a little bit more expensive but will be much more usable and blend in with surrounds a lot more.

This is the basic design we found on the web that we think would suit:

Doesn't that look sweet! So cute! We'd extend the living area bit some more enough for 2 lounges and a small 2 person dining table. We were thinking the total dimensions would be about 10x7m and a bit taller to allow for the loft bedroom.

There are some great examples of Australian strawbale homes on the web and I have been excitedly trawling through all of their websites and blogs.

A lot of people building straw bale houses offer for people to go and help out, giving them experience in the process. I thnk this is a great idea and would certainly look at doing this to learn the trade!

I'd like to know if any of you have had experiences, or know of anyone else that has, with building with strawbales. I'd love to hear your tales, the good, bad and ugly!

Visit to the country

This past weekend we spent a lovely weekend visit my fiance's parents up at Pomona, in the Sunshine Coast Hinterland. The whole weekend was overcast and slightly rainy, which was just lovely.

After the hour and a half drive from the smoggy, busy city after work, luckily only stuck in coast-bound traffic for a little while, we made it to the quiet ands serene countryside. We met up with the parents-in-law at the Cooroy RSL for dinner. It took me back to when I was growing up and we would join the locals at the local country pub for dinnner each weekend.  Surprisingly the music was really LOUD! It was a 50's band playing the ol' faves, but it was just too damn loud, very unexpected for the patronage at the RSL!

One of the best parts of visiting Lyndon's parents is the guest bed, it's the comfiest bed we've ever slept in! And we take full advantage of it, usually sleeping in until 8 or 9 in the morning!

On the Saturday we ventured out to the Eumundi Markets. These markets are so full of produce, craft, baking, furniture, buskers, hippies, you name it! and its set up in such a way that it's VERY easy to get yourself lost and walking past the same stalls over and over again! I became quite friendly with a few stallies!

I restrained myself and didn't end up buying anything from the markets, except for a yummy lentil and vegetable roll. I'm surprising myself with how well I'm going with not spending money willy-nilly!

After the markets we met up with Lyndon's godmother who he hadn't seen in over 10 years. What a breathe of fresh air she was! She's just written an autobiography and is described by her publishers as a "passionate gypsy wanderer"! Check out her bio and book here. If you get a chance grab a copy of her book and have a read, you will not regret it. It's a great story about the adventures she has had all over Australia. We were speaking to her about our plans for the future and she was so motivating in her encouragement of it all. She's convinced us to live in a shed when we get our property to get a feel for the land first! Sounds perfect to me!

We then popped into the local nursery which was very cute! It's set up like a little cottage garden. Again no purchases, just some lovely scenery.

After this very eventful day we headed back to 'The Farm' as we affectionately call it, and decided to take a walk up to the lookout. The property backs onto the Noosa Trail Network which is a bunch of hinterland trails through some great countryside. We didn't go too far to get this great view of the sunset over Pinbarren mountain:

On the Sunday, we spent the first part of the day walking around the property checking out the new work that Lyndon's parents have had done to it. A lot of new work! It's an extremely hilly 10acres so it was quite a workout. We then lit a burn pile but it didn't last long because of the rain.

Just before lunch we headed out to the famous "King of the Mountain" festival in Pomona. It's a yearly event where competitors run up the 4.5km, almost vertical Mt Cooroora, then back down again. Crazy if you ask me, but the festivities that take place in Pomona on the day where lots of fun.

Then we headed back to Brissie. Sigh.

How was your weekends?

:) Kim

THANK YOU!

I wanted to write a post to thank all of you bloggers out there!

Having just started my own blog here, I know sometimes it can be challenging writing posts that are witty, informative and interesting every few days and sometimes, everyday! So I wanted to thank each and every one of you for sharing your advice, wisdom and goings-on to everyone in the blog world.

Your efforts have given me HOURS of enjoyment and taught me tricks of the trade that have helped me on my own path to living more simply and enjoying the little things in life.

Everyone reading this please venture over to the blogs on my blogroll to the right of my page and check out the inspiring bloggers who keep me entertained daily, you won't regret it! (well you might when you realise hours have passed and you have done nothing on your to-do list!)

THANK YOU!

{this moment}

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

Inspired by soulemama

Have a fabulous weekend!

Learning to live frugally

Is quite a challenge! I'm not going to lie to you and fluff over it making frugal living out to be really easy to do. I'm very early into this journey towards living more simply and I want to be as honest as possible, so a) I can read back on this blog sometime in the future and remember what it was like in the beginning, and b) so anyone else reading this blog gets to see the journey from my perspective truthfully.

In the past few months I have been reading a lot of books and websites on living more simply and frugally. The reason a lot of them suggest we do this is to do our bit towards saving the Earth. This has lead me to be a bit more passionate about environmental issues recently. Now things like, seeing someone using disposable cups and plates or driving just down the road, really irks me! What a change that has been in me. It used to be me doing those things, not that long ago!

It goes to show that it doesn't take long to change your ways once you change your mindset. Changing your mindset is the biggest change you can make and always the first. Once I discovered the path I wanted to take with my life, I found it really easy to find out lots of websites, courses and books on the topics, I connected with people that had walked the same path and had the same ideas, I was able to decide on some goals and am able to use those resources to decide how I am going to achieve them. But it was that initial decision to not just give in to my every whim, not 'treat' myself because I was feeling a bit low or because I got paid or just because it was the end of the working week that was difficult!

Living frugally and simply is a goal of mine to lessen the impact I have on this Earth, to connect more with nature and to live a life more meaningful to me.

I have been taking small steps to live more efficiently and aware. I have chosen to use public transport to enable me to save momey, car emissions, and to reconnect with nature as I walk the 40 mins to the train station in the morning. It's such a simple act but has had so many benefits. I have also chosen to not buy any new clothes for (at least) 6 months, to learn to make my own green cleaners, to grow as much of my food as I can, to lessen my electricity use, to learn the lost arts of crocheting and sewing, which will enable me to make my own clothes and create gifts. These things I have begun to do while still living in my near-city unit, with no lawn, while still working a 9-5 job and without changing too much to be a drain on my energy. It's the little things that you make a habit that I think have the biggest impact. The things that you would normally do everyday without thinking. So once you have decided that you are willing to change, the motivation kicks in and enables you to make these small changes.

I work close to the city where the streets are lined with clothes shops, cafe's, trinket stores, supermarkets, and generally places where I would normally spend a large proportion of my money. The temptation is definitely there to just go into a shop and see what they have and usually walk out with some junk that I didn't need. But really what is the pont of that? That's just me being another mindless consumer! It's part of the culture. These shops wouldn't be there if people didn't go into them and buy STUFF.

So I have found that making the decision to be frugal is quite hard, making the initial changes aren't so hard because you have the motivation, but when you are then constantly bombarded with the consumer culture it is quite difficult to maintain those small actions. I sometimes catch myself looking at the racks of clothes from the shops lining the streets on the walk from work to the train station and thinking "oh they're only $10, I can afford that." It is a hard task to keep on track but I have found that being almost 'obsessed' with my goals, by going over them constantly and looking at more ways I can live frugally, really helps to keep those goals in the forefront of my mind and, so far, keep me on track.

Let me know what you do to keep on track. I'd love to know what methods you use.

:)

A little unnecessary.....

Hello!

So sorry I feel like I have been gone for ages! I am super busy at the moment with work, I'll tell you about that in a second.

First though I want to show you some pictures.

I walk past this house that's being built on my morning walk to the train station, and I am constantly astonished by it.

Its the house on the left. Look at the size of it! Seriously how unnecessary!
So I have a few reasons why I would never have a house built like this one

1. Imagine how many resources are needed to build that huge new house! I think we should start looking at ways to reduce our impact on the earth not look for ways to exploit it even more.
2. Look at how much space is between the house and the fence on the right, I hope they don't have kids - there's just no yard at all! I love my open spaces
3. Just think how expensive it would be! I do not want to have to work in the workforce any longer than absolutely necessary and the mortgage for this would be huge!
4. I'd get lost! It is that big that everyone in a large family could have their own bedroom AND living room! Now I don't see why it is necessary to have that much room. If you can't stand hanging out with your partner/family maybe turning off the TV and reconnecting with each other might help?

Wow aren't I on a rant today! I don't usually get so passionate about things, but that house just seems so unnecessary.

Let's look at it again

Phew ok I've got that off my chest!

So, as I said, work is getting very busy at the moment, and I feel like I'm starting to abandon my blog which I do not like at all! So I am going to have to get a bit more organised and set some time aside each day to write my post and catch up on everyone else's (actually this last part is mainly why I run out of time to write my own posts!).

So my goal form now on for this blog is to post at least every second day! Let's see how that goes.

If you want to see where I work and why I'm so busy, check us out here!

x
Kim

Garden Update

Don't let anyone tell you that you can't grow your own vegies while living in a unit. Check out how my balcony gardening is going.

Cherry tomato's about to pop! This plant has gone crazy and grown about 60cm in the past month (is that normal?!). There are so many baby tomato's coming up like these, can't wait for my first harvest!

2 lemons coming up on the dwarf lemon tree. We nearly lost this tree due to aphids and ants (!) but it's bounced back after some yumming organic pesticide and worm wee!

Hehe do you see the little fella down the bottom of the pot, that's my garden worm! A friend (who is also a keen gardener; we share our produce at work!) went to the Nambour Garden Expo last weekend and bought me a little present for my garden! So Harris (that's his name) sits in my Moreton Bay Fig pot and greets me every time I come up the stairs, very cute!

Even though I live in a unit and have no yard to myself, I have stolen a small piece of the common land that the 5 units in my block share, for a compost bin. This little patch of grass faces only our unit so if it does get a little smelly, it shouldn't annoy the neighbours too much.

In addition to the plants pictured, I have a strawberry plant and lettuce in hanging baskets, basil, bush tomato and a lime tree potted on my balconies and I'm hoping to harvest quite a bit in the coming months so keep an eye out for more pictures.

And just to keep the pictures going I have some gorgeous pictures of trees (I love trees!) that my partners mum emailed through to us recently.

Enjoy!
x
Kim

Picnic anyone?

This is what my Moreton Bay Fig tree will look like about 30 years after I plant it out of the pot on my balcony! That's why I currently call it a bonsai!