Blog Action Day

Blogger has nominated October 15th for a mass environmental awareness campaign. Bloggers are invited to register their blog and post an environmental-issue-related post on that day.

I have made a list of actions I have explicitly taken during October in order to reduce carbon emissions and engage in ecologically sensitive issues. We are all told that little actions taken close to home can have a large effect on reducing emissions. Here are my actions:

1. I have not used my car for 3 weeks. I have felt a little bit claustrophobic, but only because I have not yet got to grips with the local buses.
2. By shopping locally, and using our independent butcher and organic veg box scheme I have further reduced our household waste (which only consists of non-recycleable waste packaging thanks to our council recycling scheme, home composting and Bokashi system).
3. We had a no electricity day where we turned off all electrical appliances, and told stories and played games by candle light - little chap though this was great.
4. Replaced 5 more light bulbs with environmentally friendly ones - all our lights on the ground floor are now eco except the kitchen spotlights.
5. I washed all our woollens by hand and only used the washer for the spin cycle (drip dry is not an option in winter when things have to be dried inside!).
6. I freecycled a large pile of our old and unwanted items (mostly baby stuff and old office equipment).
7. We turned an unused area of hardstanding in our garden into a new flower bed, thus improving rainwater drainaway, and improving the wildlife environment. We are planting it with a range of wildlife-friendly shrubs.
8. I signed us up for milk delivery from our milkman - I have opted for locally produced organic milk which is not available in the supermarkets. This will support local organic farming and reduce waste (as the milk will come in reusable bottles not plastic containers).

We have not found this tasks to be be difficult, and have enjoyed the feeling that we are deliberately and conscientiously doing our bit. It will be interesting to see what other posts are published by participating blogsites today.

Blogger has also suggested that another way to support Blog Action day is to donate one day's earnings to an environmental charity. I am donating today's earnings to Green Peace.

Blogger will be producing statistics relating the the "reach" of Blog Action Day. I shall report these back when I see them.

Threads and Beads

This is the ongoing saga of the layered machine embroidery piece I started a while ago. Various threads were trapped between some sheer gold fabric and stitched over. I was never too happy with it as a large piece, but it has now made its way onto a set of Christmas cards. I cut it into small squares, bound the edges and added a bead as embellishment. I think they work a lot better this size, although I am determined to work on a large piece again. There are six cards in total, all slightly different.

This brings my total of Christmas cards made so far this year to 48! Only 52 more to go! So far I have never met my target of making all 100 cards... but this year is looking the closest yet. This 100 does not include the 30 homemade ones we also make for little chap to give to his school chums!

I have also finished the first skein of silk boucle that I am using to knot a scarf for a blogging friend... just tying on the second skein now...

We are rotters!

We are very keen composters... we have 4 composting bins in our garden which we fill on a rotational basis with a mixture of kitchen waste, garden clippings and paper/card. We also have a large water tank which we use as our final stage maturation unit (wow that sounds impressive!). Basically every autumn, I fill this with the most mature compost from the bottom of our four bins, layer it with extra paper and card, and also add the old soil and compost from our patio tubs and hanging baskets. The advantage of this is that it turns all of our compost heaps, aerates them, and checks the balance of green to brown matter. The newly filled water tank is then covered with some hardboard and left for another six months. Then each spring I "harvest" our homemade compost. This involves digging out everything from the water tank, then riddling it to remove any large pieces of less composted matter. The result is a big pile of beautiful, homemade brown stuff which improves the nutrients in the soil and also aids water retention. I then top up the water tank with some of the partially composted stuff from the four main bins, and leave it to mature further and settle until the autumn. I also combine the contents of some of the other compost bins to make more space, and add more paper as necessary. Here is some detailed advice on composting from the RHS.

To this we have added a Bokashi system. This means we can now also compost cooked waste, including meat and fish scraps. Bokashi is a kind of fermentation process. Each time waste is added to the Bokashi bin, a layer of bran is added. The bran is enriched with "effective micro-organisms" which perform the necessary digesting of the waste. After the bin has been filled, it must be left for 2 weeks, and then can be added to a conventional compost bin or dug into a hole in the ground where it fully breaks down very quickly. This week our first bin load will have matured, and we can add it to our garden compost bins. Silly as it sounds, I am very excited about this.

We got our Bokashi system from Wiggly Wigglers who offer a great range of products including wild flowers and native shrubs and British flowers (yes, flower miles count towards global warming too!).

We have also been busy decluttering, and I have taken the gut wrenching step of passing on all my little chap's baby clothes through freecycle, so that someone else can get the benefit of them. I kept a few items back for sentimental reasons. I have also been recycling his old bedroom curtains into toy sacks for use at the toy library. I hung onto everything for a long time, but it is good to let it go.

Tagged - 10 questions

Many weeks ago I was tagged by Dancin' Fool to take part in a meme she had compiled which posed the following questions of participants. I apologise for the delay in completing this... but can I also add what fun it has been to identify and articulate the answers...

1. If you could have super powers what would they be and what would you do with them? (Please feel free to be selfish, you do not have to save the world!)

• I would eradicate the inertia caused by pointless regret and enable the world to move on positively by learning from their mistakes and experiences.

2. Were you to find your self stranded on an island with a CD player...it could happen...what would your top 10 bloggers island discs be?

At first it seemed like an impossible task, but then it just got easier and easier.

1. Sade - Stronger than Pride
2. David Bowie - Diamond Dogs
3. Miles Davis - Sketches of Spain
4. Dave Brubreck - Time Out
5. Bob Dylan Desire
6. Bruce Spingsteen - Born in the USA
7. Eric Clapton - Slowhand
8. Winton Marsalis - Marsalis Standard Time
9. Talking Heads - Little Creatures
10. Jimi Hendrix - Are You Experienced

3. you were a smell what would it be?

• Crushed geranium leaves - sharp, surprising and from an unpromising exterior!

4. What bird would you most like to be?

• A Puffin.

5. If you were a bird who's head would you poo on?

• Margaret Thatcher. She changed the direction of this country forever, and to my mind not in a good way. We are still feeling the pain of the changes she made, and some we are only now understanding the full ramifications of.

6. Are there any foods that your body craves?

• Ginger and chillies.

7. What's your favourite time of year?

• Spring.

8. What's your favourite time of day?

• 6:00am - I am still warm and in bed, my dreams are still with me, an none of the day's demands have yet landed at my feet.

9. If a rest is as good as a change which would you choose?

• A rest please, I have had too much change - both my own and other people's.

10. If you could have a dinner party and invite any 5 people from the past or present who would they be? (Living or deceased.)

1. Shami Chakrabarti
2. Germaine Greer
3. Sheila Hancock
4. Tony Benn
5. Louis Theroux

If anyone else would like to complete this meme, please leave me a comment and I will link to your answers.

Silk Fibre Paper

A while ago I made a felted bag which incorporated shibori pleating as a thankyou for a cousin in Ireland. Last week, I received a lovely card saying how pleased she was with the bag. The card itself is a work of art, and features hand made paper which incorporates silk fibres. The card is called "Burren Hills 1". The card was made by Leueen Hill.

The Burren is a fabulous place, and has been designated a place of "special scientific interest" because of the micro-climate and rare flora found on its limestone pavement, and is also an archaeologists dream with its megalithic tombs and monuments. My husband and I visited it on our first trip to Ireland. I think the card captures the colours and contours of the place very well. Thank you, Veronica, for sending me such a lovely card.

Shamed into action

Today I went to see Alice's Mum to say hello and see how she was. We had a lovely chat. She said that at all sorts of unexpected moments things happen, or occur to her, or are said that evoke sadness, but it is clear that she is forging on with life in a most admirable way. She asked me what craft things I was up to, and I was ashamed to have to say that I had not been doing any. Overall, I have had very little inclination to do any of my art or craft pursuits. I suppose this is not entirely the case... there have been some small dabblings, and also we have had a very busy time socially, visiting or having people to stay here. Anyway, this post is an attempt to follow the admirable example of people around me and get back into gear.

Some tome ago I tried my hand at a bit of machine embroidery. I trapped various threads between layers of light chiffon materials. I was not too pleased with the effect, and received advice to keep stitching and building up the layers and textures. However, I also came across an article in "Fibre and Stitch" magazine about making fabric charms, and so I have been reducing the piece into small squares with close zig-zagged edges. This has much improved the effect, and I am looking forward to continuing with other sections of the larger piece which have denser collections of fibres. My guess is these will make their way onto Christmas cards.

I have also been working with some hand dyed silk boucle from The Yarn Gallery, and using a multi-wrap stitch to make a textured scarf. I am pleased with the results so far, although have found to my great cost how easily silk yarn slips off the needles!

We have a new wool shop in our area (The Wool Cabin), and I had an interesting time there last week browsing. The shop is slightly old fashioned in that its main focus is the traditional brands (e.g. Sirdar, Wendy, Patons) and the proprietress is rather dismissive of the luxury brands (e.g. Rowan, Debbie Bliss, Louisa Harding) or the novelty yarns (e.g. Lanartus, Adriafil). However, I bought some self-patterning sock yarn, and also some lovely hand made beads.

I've still not picked up my paints, but there is always next week. Here is a picture of the various bits and pieces... We got a new scanner recently, and it is not as easy to use as the last one, so apologies for the faded edges.