Power Off Weekend. 11th-13th December

Our friends over at the Touchwood Project are hosting a power off weekend.
Basically you turn your electric off at the mains for the weekend and see how you cope. Apart from the "blitz" spirit eating by candle light should inspire I think its a fantastic way to re-asses our living habits.
After all ANYONE can live without power for 48 hrs. But how would you manage with no power...ever?

Take a look around you and make a mental list of everything electric in your home. Cooker? Washing machine? Lights? Central heating? Even your phone, if its cordless, will be reliant on electricity. What would you do if the power went away tomorrow?

To tell you the truth I feel a little like this isn't a HUGE challenge for us at the (almost) car-less family (although its plenty thank you!). After all we have the log burner. It cooks and heats and makes hot water for us, all without a bit of electric to it. That's three more essentials we will have that a mostly electric run house won't.
Yesterday I felt bad, almost like we would be "cheating", but then I decided, no. Its not cheating, its showing others that we are already prepared, that even though it would be a bit of a pain when it came to doing the laundry we COULD do it, and in warm water too.
Our lovely log burner, not as posh as an Aga but still does the job!

We had been discussing whether to bite the bullet and get radiators in the house, the extension especially being very cold, but of course, even though we have the hot water to run through the radiators, we would need an electric pump to push the water there. Would this then complicate our so far simple heating system?

In actual fact we had already pretty much decided against this and are now looking into more passive solutions, like trombe walls, shutters and more insulation.

You can find out more about Power off weekend HERE and join their Facebook event HERE .

So I hope you join us in turning your power off at 11pm 11th December and leaving it off until the 13th December 11pm. You have 12 days to plan for it, imagine what would happen if you had no warning? Enjoy the chance to re-think your life!

Shhh..time to talk about the "X" word!

Do you know what the date is today?
Its the 24th of November which means..this time next month it will be XMAS (or Christmas/yule/whatever).

AH..tis the season to be jolly, spend loads of money, eat too much food blah blah.

By its very nature a modern Xmas can be a minefield for those of us who are trying to be green.
After all, its become an annual orgy of consumerisation, a glutton fest, a holiday that has lost any religious or seasonal meaning and is now only about how much money you can spend to keep up with the Jones's.

As you can imagine, we here at the (almost)car-less family do our best to shun the the money pit part of the holiday and as the clock is now ticking I thought now would be a good time to share a little of our green Xmas ideas and tips.

Presents
What would Xmas be without gifts!
I wouldn't DREAM of suggesting that presents should be forsaken for the sake of the planet!!
One thing we have learnt as an extended family is to ASK what people would like. After all who wants to receive ANOTHER basket of potpourri or novelty socks. Making sure everyone gets something they really want means there is less waste in the bin come new year.
Children especially can end up with huge swathes of junk.
Its easy to get carried away and try to bulk things up with lots of very cheap plastic toys.
I lost count of the amount of cheap presents the kids where given that where broken by lunch.
Now we try and work out three or four gifts they are really interested in and that are well made, then we ask Grandparents and aunts/uncles to contribute.
Also, never underestimate the impact of a homemade gift.
Anyone who can draw, write a poem, craft in wood or sew can easily make small tokens of affection for loved ones.

Tree
Oooh what a topic to divide people!
This is a toughie, there is no right or wrong answer, rather it depends on where you live.
If you live in a hot country where the traditional pine tree is not available then you need a fake tree. Although a fake tree uses carbon to make and is often made of plastic, you should theoretically never have to buy another tree again, so a couple of years down the line you should be into negative carbon!
If you love the atmosphere of a real tree in your home for Xmas then you could consider a potted tree you can either plant out or re-use.
In my opinion it is better to plant this tree out rather than try to use it again, trees are not meant to be kept in pots and you will be lucky to get 2 years out of it.
If you don't have the room to plant a tree out in your garden why not buy a cut tree and then sponsor a tree to be planted in a park or even in another country. This way you are replacing what you have cut down and also helping to grow important trees. Try somewhere like Sponsor trees to find out more.
Of course you could go all modern and forgo the tree all together, instead you could use a large fallen branch in a pot and decorated with lights to add a Xmasy atmosphere.

Food
The original Xmas dinner was a midwinter feast where the biggest and best of the food was consumed as an olden day cure for the winter blues, something to look forwards to as the wind and snow howled around the hut, it traditionally marked the shortest day of the year (21st December) and so let people look forwards towards the spring.
Although we no longer have to sleep above the animals in the byre nor save logs and potato's for the winter least we starve, we still love the marker that tells us we are are halfway there and still celebrate with a feast.
As vegan's we will not be eating the traditional meat dish but instead will have a vegetable and nut pie with all the trimnmings.
If you are a meat eater you can still enjoy ethical meat.
There are two routes you can go down.
Smallholders often sell surplus meat and this is often the most ethically farmed.
The preferable choice however, I feel, is wild shot game.
Venison or pheasant wild shot is the kindest meat.
The animal is reared in the wild as nature intended and a good marksman can shoot to kill, so the animal knows nothing of his impending death and the natural predator/prey balance is maintained.
Be warned though. The rising popularity of game means that it is readily available in supermarkets BUT this is not often wild shot, deer can be farmed and the same as cows and so you end up with the same welfare and environmental concerns.
For a change why not try some vegetarian choices for one or more of the meals over the festive season. Ideas can be found HERE and HERE to start you off.
Also, remember, where food is concerned go for quality not quantity. The average person puts on 7-10 lb of weight over the festive season, show a little restraint for your waist line and for the planet!

Waste
There will be some waste over Xmas. What is important is how you deal with it.
When presents start being opened make sure there is a bag or box set aside for paper suitable for re-cycling. Remove sellotape and avoid paper with foil and other non-paper embossing as they cannot be re-cycled. Of course you could make your own wrapping paper with colourful magazine pages and tie the parcels up with string, then you can re-clain the string to use again!
Cardboard can be re-cycled as well.
Anyone with kids will understand that most toys come with twist ties. Keep these and you can use them in your kitchen (for twist sealing bags for example) or in the garden later on.
Plastic containers that toys sometimes rest in can be kept for junk modeling or for using as paint pallets.

Food scraps can be divided into compostables and dog food (if you have a dog!). To be honest I compost nearly everything but if you have left overs like dairy and meat/bones you should dispose of these in your household waste to avoid rats showing an interest in your compost heap! Another reason to cut back on animal products!

If you plan your meals well you should have little in the way of left overs, but if you do try to use them wisely.
Roast veg makes beautiful boxing day soup, stir in a little of that left over cranberry sauce and you have all the taste of Xmas without the heavy meal in your belly!

With a little thought you can have a magical and enjoyable holiday without the guilt of consumerism sitting on your shoulders.

How about sharing some of your tips with us!

What did YOU do to save the planet today?

Like many of you in blog land, we here at the (almost)car-less family, are trying to do out bit for the planet.
Now unlike some eco-warriors (or worriers for the less go getting people out there)I don't believe the answer is to give up all our possessions and go live in a mud hut in the woods.
For a start the woods would end up awful crowded and most people would get pretty fed up pretty quickly of washing their clothes in the babbling brook, especially if there are ten other families lined up behind them waiting THEIR turn.

No. I think Pandora's box has not only been opened, but tipped upside down and shook till its hinges rattled.
Lets face it. We like our fridges and tumble driers. our stereos and computers, our washing machines and dishwashers.
They may not be essentials in a live or die way, but they DO make life a hell of a lot easier, especially for the elderly and infirm, the busy mother or the avid volunteer, people who have a desire or indeed NEED for these time saving options.

Technology is making these appliances greener all the time and new gadgets, like the Solar monkey, mean that you can charge your small goods for free.

Inroads are being made into greener energy and I personally feel that so long as scientists are funded and encouraged to come up with these carbon neutral ideas, we will have a chance of living on earth for a little longer than we have in thought in the last few years.

But none of these statements means I feel its ok to sit on your laurels and wait for the magic button to appear.
At the moment we have a duty to do all we can within our household to cut back on carbon.

Re-cycling, turning appliances off instead of leaving them on standby, using lower settings on central heating, these have been drummed into us so much that they are now almost second nature.

So how can we think outside the box?

Our own plan would ideally see us coming off grid. Providing our own energy requirements in a sustainable way.
At the moment this isn't practical.
I have my doubts as to how much energy we would get out of solar panels living here in Scotland. As we approach the shortest day it is already dark by 4pm most nights and the sun doesn't come up until nearly 8am.
Wind power seems like a good idea, we do get plenty of wind, but living at the base of a mountain with hills surrounding us means that the flow of wind over the blades of a propeller would be too erratic to work well.

Without being able to throw money at projects that are likely to yield little we have to find ways of reducing our carbon with the tools we have.

One of our long term projects is the renovation of the flimsy 1960's extension on our house. (this picture is not our house *sigh*)

It has a leaky flat roof and amazingly thin walls. The plan is to try and replace the roof with a turf one, thereby insulating to a much higher degree and encouraging more bees and other insects by scattering wild flower seeds up there.
Our solution to the cold walls is to add an external glass corridor. By using reclaimed double glazing units we can encase the outside of the extension in glass like a wrap around conservatory. This means that not only will we get heat from the sun (the extension is roughly south facing) to warm the house but that we will also have extra green house space to grow early plants in!
We shall probably add vents in the walls to use it like a trombe wall, allowing warm air to enter and then push cold air out.

But this is a long term thing. We still have a few windows to re-claim form places like freecycle, not to mention finding roofing sheets and timber.
In the meantime I am doing my best to keep electricity to a minimum.

My two main contributions today have been...

Versatile heating.
By having the log burner lit this morning I have managed to a) Heat the house (via open doors, we have no other heating) b) heat the hot water and c) Cook all our meals. My aim is to cook as many meals on the log burner as possible when it is lit so that I can save using the electric cooker. Seriously though, the log burner cooks stuff much better, although, obviously, I can't bake on it. SO for the price of one appliance running (ie stuffing the fire with wood) I have the use of three.

Bath time washing.
We have 3 kids...no, we have 3 BOYS.
Boys=mud=lots of washing.
Recently I have started saving washing for after someone has had a bath (shared water of course ;)).
After the bath has been vacated, I tip the dirty clothes into the bath water and then hoick up my trouser legs and stamp on it all for a good five minutes like a grape crusher.

Then I leave the clothes in over night to soak.
In the morning I pick out enough clothes to go in the washing machine, if they are dark or only lightly soiled I put them on a cool rinse and spin cycle rather than a wash. If they are light or dirtier I put them on the 30 minutes quick wash at 30oC. This saves a heap in time, water heated (by electricity)and laundry liquid.
The main point is its the SOAKING that gets your clothes clean, a quick rinse and spin is all most need, not even a real wash cycle. The soaking shifts the dirt and the rinse and spin get rid of it!

So that's us at the moment.
Saving the planets one wash cycle at a time.

take a moment to leave a comment and let us know what YOU did to save the planet today!

This Vegan life.

Our Veganism is mentioned a lot through this blog, but I have never really written a whole post about it.
I thought I would rectify this and also use it as a good basic introduction to what the path we follow means.

The word vegan was coined in 1944 by Donald Watson, who combined the first three and last two letters of vegetarian to form "vegan," which he saw as "the beginning and end of vegetarian."(@wikipedia)

The definition of a vegan (in simple terms) is one who lives their life as free as possible from exploitation or cruelty to animals in food, clothing and entertainment.

So a vegan is a person who will not eat meat (inc fish and poultry), dairy, eggs, animal by products (ie gelatin, lanolin, rennet, whey, casein, beeswax, isinglass, and shellac.)and honey. They will also not wear leather, fur, silk or wool.
By this list I could not call myself a card carrying vegan, but I'm working towards it!

By going through the list I can explain why an item is not acceptable and if I use it explain why.

Meat
An easy one and the first off many would be vegetarians lists. The modern meat industry has changed in all recognition in the last 50 years. Animals have been bred for factory style environments and for quickness in growth. A modern pig would have a very hard time trying to live in the wild. His bristles have been bred out to nearly nil, his skin is as pink as a humans, his immune system compromised with a diet that from birth consisted of huge amounts of anti-biotics and other medicine.
Welfare aside this is not something I would wish in my body.

Slaughter houses have also changed. Due to red tape, all the small family run abattoirs where an animal could expect a kind hand and a dignified dispatch have gone, instead they are throw in one factory door, processed as quickly as possible by unskilled, underpaid slaughter men and thrown out the other end as meat.
The hygiene in many of these places is deplorable and ecoli (which comes from animal poop)is mostly found in meat.
So in a burger you have a genetically modified, highly medicated, highly traumatised piece of meat which if your very lucky won't have shit on it.

yum.

You can find out more about factory farming HERE .

Fish also have feelings.
Fish was the last meat I gave up, about 18 months ago now. We treat fish and other sea life, as though from another planet, devoid of feelings and living only on instinct, but research has shown that many fish have maternal instincts, family bonds and have even been trained to perform simple tasks in a research environment. Fish have as highly a developed sense of pain as a kitten yet because they are not air breathers they are often over looked. There is many a fish eating "vegetarian" who thinks nothing of putting this to the back of their mind.

Also the factory style of modern fishing is destroying eco-systems, killing other marine life (including air breathers like seals, dolphins and whales). Studies have shown that if restrictions are not in place soon, fish stocks will be depleted within as little as 40 years.
Find out more about fishing HERE .

Dairy.Got milk?
Then you also got anti-biotics, pus and blood as well as clogged arteries and obesity.
You also get to kill a calf as well.
Dairy is the one thing that splits the vegetarians from the vegans. Most serious vegetarians (as in the ones who don't do it for 6 months when they're 14 because its cool to not eat bunnies and stuff) become vegan at some stage.
Once you look into the dairy production industry you see that you are supporting a just as, if not crueler, method of farming as eating meat.

Dairy 101.
To produce milk every mammal must fort produce a baby.
In the "old" days mama cow would have her calf for a couple of weeks then he would go live with the other male calves for a couple of years before becoming stewing steak. Now he is taken within hours. If he is lucky he is shot. If he is unlucky he gets to ride in a transporter truck across Europe until he ends up on a veal farm, where he will live in a a crate in a dark barn until ready to be killed and turned into that most jelly like of pale meats, veal.

Mama cow meanwhile, is left to produce milk.
No kind hands gently milk this new age bovine. Instead she is clamped to metal tubes that suck the milk out of her.

Now, as someone who has had babies and had to use various expressing (well milking!) machines, I can tell you that an electric driven suction tube stuck to your nipple bloody hurts. As a human I can say "Ow" and turn it off for a while.
Mama cow can't, she is sucked dry up to 3 times a day to get as much as possible from her. The prolonged savage suction causes bleeding and infection, this in turn can result in mastitis, a painful infection resulting in blocked milk ducts (a baby animal is designed to "milk" with tongue and lips as well as sucking, when you just have sucking, milk ducts get blocked). This means pus gets into the milk.
To read more about pus levels in milk click HERE. .
Oh and that old chestnut about milk being the best there is for strong bones? Too much milk can actually CAUSE osteoporosis, animal proteins make the body leech calcium out of your bones to regulate your body's PH.
Add to this the fact that no other animal drinks milk past the age of weaning and no animal drinks the milk of another species AND that cows milk is designed for baby cows who grow at a staggeringly faster rate than baby humans and...well..do I need to go on?

EggsThis is the one that means that the vegan society would not accept me as a member (probably).
I have rescue hens and they lay eggs and I eat them.
The eco side of me will not throw away food so we still get to eat omelets and boiled eggs and quiche. However we don't buy eggs, or products with egg in them, and here's why.
In the "old" days eggs (like lamb and chicken and apples for that matter) where a seasonal product.
In the middle of winter, unless you had stockpiled surplus in the summer, you went without eggs.

A hen has finite amount of eggs in her, rather like ovaries in human females. So a Point of lay pullet is in her prime and will lay (once going) nearly every day for a few months, tapering off in the winter as the daylight is less then stopping to moult their feathers. When they start up again she may lay very well to start and then taper off to laying 4 or 5 days out of 7, and so it goes on until she is 4 or 5 and barely laying at all.
The modern factory farmed hen has a short and brutal life.
She is contained in a cage, her beak cut to prevent pecking. She will spend her whole life in a false lit barn, never knowing natural day and night patterns. This way farmers can produce as many eggs in the depths of winter as he can in the summer.
Hens kept like this are commonly dispatched at first moult, sold for pet food or simply left to die when there is no market for their skinny carcases.
Male chicks don't even get a day of life.
Sense would say that all the boys went for meat production but the egg laying and meat breeds are totally different and so male chicks in this case are worthless. The lucky ones are dispatched by gassing, the unlucky ones are thrown alive into bin bags, dumpsters and in some cases high speed grinders, and at less than a day old.
To find out more about battery hens click HERE .

HoneyAh come on!
Honey? Whats wrong with honey? Little fluffy bee's flitting from flower to flower, how can that be cruel?
Some vegans still consume honey but it is still food produced by animals under false conditions and this had led to devastating disease among bees today that is threatening the pollination of a high proportion of our fruits and flowers.
Bee's kept domestically are not allowed to choose their own queen and are prevented from laying pupa in most of the combe. They are also prevented from swarming, the hive version of reproduction.

Swarms used to be so common that every village had a man who would come and take a swarm away, I have lived in the country for nearly 20 years and have never seen a swarm.
A swarm is prevent often by killing the queen bee and replacing her with a new queen. Bees are often killed while hives are being raided for honey and then, after working so hard for their honey, they get to eat glucose for the winter.
Now if honey is good for US I would imagine it is very good for bees, so bees fed on what is basically refined sugar will not be happy healthy bees.
Colony collapse is a disease that has hit beekeepers hard in the last few years and has spread to wild bees.
To find out more about bees click HERE .

Clothing
Now every one knows fur is a bad thing.
Most people know that leather doesn't grow on trees.
But what about silk and wool?
To obtain one gram of woven silk fifteen silkworms are boiled alive in their cocoons. Read about silk production and how it harms children HERE .
Wool is often NOT a by product of the meat industry as many think, in the UK many farmers make no money on wool. Like chickens and cows there are different breeds for different needs, so a sheep that produces good meat won't necessarily have good quality wool.
Sheep have to be sheared, they are bred in such a way as their coat does not shed in the summer like their wild cousins, but in places like Australia where wool production is high, they use a practice called mulesing, where lambs have strips of skin removed from their hind quarters to prevent the wool from growing there and leaving them susceptible to fly strike (where flies lay eggs in dung messed wool and maggots infect the animal). This is done because the sheep are kept in such vast numbers that it would be impossible for a farmer to check them properly. But if this is the case how can they be meeting the sheep's other health needs? Lameness for example, which affect huge numbers of flocks.
To read more about wool production click HERE .

All this suffering to animals, people and the health of consumers can be prevented by going vegan.

So where does this leave the (almost) car-less family?

I still consider us vegan.

We still have some leather in our house, things we brought a few years ago like tack and shoes and belts. The eco bit of me will not throw these items away in a fit of rage, but they will not be replaced and now we buy none leather shoes and synthetic saddles.
We will still eat the eggs from our hens. We don't breed from them or exploit them. They have been given a taste of a life they could never have imagined before and their eggs are only a bonus to having them.
We still have some products in our house that have been tested on animals, but again they will be replaced when used up, with kinder alternatives.
I still use my inhaler when I need to, although undoubtedly animals suffered to test it, but I am getting fitter every day and now only use it a few times a week instead of a few times a day.

Its a scary step to take, veganism.
Take one at a time and don't try to "vegan-ise" your life all at once. It will overwhelm you and you are much more likely to fall at the first hurdle.

Start looking at the back of packets, get into the mindset of understanding what goes into your food, clothes, beauty products and cleaners.
Educate yourself.

If you have the stomach try google searching for images of factory farming and Mulesing in particular.

And remember, I am here, I have done it and I feel great. Ask me anything and I will answer with honesty.

The benefits circle of hell.

As most of you know we are on benefits, the dole, welfare to our friends over the pond.
I would like, at this point, the reiterate that we do NOT feel bad about this. Kim worked very hard his whole working life and has paid over 35 years of income tax and national insurance so I don't think anyone could accuse him of not "contributing" to the economy.

Its amazing to think it has been a whole YEAR now since he was made redundant and in that year he has been invited to maybe a dozen interviews, had countless letters saying thanks but no thanks and has sent our even more CV's than he can remember. So really no one could accuse him of not TRYING to get a job.

Well it was his 12 month assessment the other week.
The job centre called him in to try and find out why he wasn't working yet, so armed with all the paperwork he had accumulated over the year he set off on the long trek to Aberdeen.

Now, we never expect to be treated like long lost friends at the job centre. Yes we realise that a good amount of their time is taken up with people who have never worked (and probably never will and don't care) but who always seem to have enough money for fags and booze and (openly) drugs, and who do it all in designer street wear.
But you should be able to expect a little civility right?

So the interview opened.
The unsmiling clerk, spends 10 minutes checking up on the computer exactly what Kim has been applying for.
Ok...
"We need you to cast your net a little wider Mr Basford."
"Ok."
"You need to stop setting your sights to high."

stop.

"Setting his sights too high!?"
So applying for work in a warehouse and being a school caretaker is "setting his sights too high?"

Not one of Kim's applications have been for CEO of Texaco or Arch Bishop of Canterbury (can supply own dress).

Ok.

"You also need to be prepared to commute further. You need to apply for more jobs in Aberdeen."
"I don't have a car, so I am limited by public transport."
*Shocked look*
"What do you mean you don't have a car?"
"Well we have a 30 year old petrol land rover but I can't commute in it. My Car blew up and I couldn't afford to fix it or buy a new one."
*Looks at Kim like he blew the car up on purpose*
"Right, public transport..."

Now Aberdeen is 30 miles away. By train and bus you are looking at a minimum of £60 a week in travel. Fine if your on £25'000 per anum, not so hot if your on say £15'000. It becomes a serious chunk of your income.
Kim explained this, he also pointed out that if he took a minimum wage job he would still have to pay full council tax which would mean that as a family we would not be a little worse off but significantly worse off.

"*sniff*, we don't take that into account Mr Basford. You need to be looking at a maximum of 1 and 1/2 hours commuting each way."
"But that would take me as far as Inverness!(80 miles, @ £135 a week..nearly half a low wage. Very ecological.)
"Yes it would."
"I think your being unreasonable. I can't commute that far."
"Well Mr Basford, you should have thought about that before moving to the country."

WHOA!

Is this what it comes down to?
Is he suggesting we sell our house and move into the city?
Does he not take into account that for 8 of the 9 years we have lived here Kim has been in gainful employment?

Wait a sec..how about we tell all the CITY people to move BACK to the city where THEIR jobs are so that their spouses can get low paid "pin money"jobs (ie , jobs they don't NEED, but do because they are bored)THERE and free up jobs in rural areas for ..oh..I dunno..PEOPLE WHO LIVE RURALLY!

I have lived in the country for over 17 years, Kim his whole life! We did not move to our house to "downsize" (ie sell 2 bed flat in city and buy 6 bed country pile) We moved here because despite us both (seperatly) trying to live urban, we both hated it so much we moved back to the country.

We are arriving in a time when only the wealthy are deemed "worthy" to live in the country, because moving to the country is what you do when you have "made it."

Would you uproot your kids from a good school, leave all your friends behind and sell all your animals, forget growing any food of your own, and live in a shitty council flat because you MIGHT get a minimum wage job stacking shelves?

I refuse to bow to that. While we have our house (paid for, so no mortgage) and our veggie garden we have a fighting chance of making our lives better. If we moved to the city we would be a million times worse off.

Our plan is to get off this moral draining merry-go-round, better to be worse off and self employed doing a bit here and there,than to be worse off and living in a crap part of a crap city in a crap job.
Its a scary thought.
Being on benefits is like being a slave.
Yes you get fed and a roof over your head, but they can whip it our from under your feet when ever they feel like it.
They can threaten you into taking the worst possible job by dangling the little money your entitled too under your nose.

Shall we finish the interview?

"You need to get more proactive Mr Basford."
"Yes."
"We think you should spend two days a week going door to door with your CV's iN inverurie."
"I can't afford the train to do that! It would be nearly £25 a week!"
"We don't take that into account Mr Basford."
"So, do have any training available for me?"
"No Mr Basford."
"But I thought you where meant to offer me training?"

"No. You can find some yourself, but you will have to declare it and it may effect your benefits if you work over so many hours."

Ok.

Fuck 'em.

Even a guy in a cardboard box has more freedom than that.

Think of us.

A path less trod.

We have made a lot of life choices in the last few years as a family.

We took the plunge and went vegan, swallowed our fear and brought bikes to cut down on car use, decided to keep our horses barefoot rather than encumber them with heavy metal shoes, threw out dog food and make Jenny homemade vegan food, our choosing to home school after primary school finishes.... And much more.

One of the things I have noticed though is the reactions of people (directly and indirectly) to our choices.

For a long time I was confused about peoples attitude.
After all I thought, this is OUR life, why do you care so much? We never pushed our views on people, never expected special treatment, never judged..and yet......

I've had someone tell me (in a very loud voice) That I couldn't possibly be a vegan because I had chickens. (For the record, the definition of a vegan is one who lives without the exploitation of animals. Seeing as my hens are rescued ex-layers and eggs come no matter what we do, I am comfortable eating their eggs, we don't however eat brought eggs or other products with egg in them.)
I was told that at a village meeting about a community even someone kindly asked if one of the soups would be vegan and was basically told that we couldn;t be expected to be catered for as a minority in the village (although there are 5 of us and my kids make up an a significant amount of the pupils at school).
People practically throw lifts at us because we can't POSSIBLY expect our children to cycle into town (a WHOLE 3 miles!).

The more we break away from what is considered the western "norm" the more I see frightened people.

By being vegan (and being friendly and un-judgmental makes no difference) they feel we are saying "Your diet is wrong. Its un-healthy and un-ethical."
Good friends still wink and nudged Kim and try to get him to eat meat. It makes them feel better to think veganism is a passing fad, a mini madness that causes people of over-sentimentality to deviate from the "correct" path.By choosing to cycle rather than run around in a car they fell we are saying "By using a car you are leading a sedentary and environmentally unsustainable life." They constantly ask when we will be buying a normal car and press lifts into our palms like alms.

By choosing to home school during the secondary years they feel we are questioning the regular pattern of school. We are saying "We care about our children's education and have no faith in the regular path of schools and exams." This is something that makes them question how we could consider taking children out of school. After all we all went there didn't we? We're alright aren't we?

The fear that other people...Other NORMAL seeming people are questioning the regular order of life, the very foundations on which modern civilization is built.... Food, Transport, Education... How can these things be deviated from?

The human animal is just that. An animal with all the instinct and safety in numbers that causes the majority to at best treat you as odd and at worst behave openly hostile to you.
Nothing is more scary than someone who seems to live happily, even thrive by dancing to the beat of a different drum.

The point is some are strong enough to follow their heart others will live their lives scared of being driven from the "herd".

So if your life choices include deciding not to vaccinate, to forgo meat, to live in a roundhouse in the woods, to medicate with herbs, to drop out and walk the earth without a care...do it.

Like the man Say's you only have one life, live it, live it well, live it happy and so long as it harm none then do it with your head held high.

Can't give up the car? Green your outlook anyway :D

Regular readers will know that although we here at the (almost) car-less family, strive for a life without the car,we also accept that in some instances people (us included) are not fully able to give their car up completely.

For example, we live in a rural area with inconsistent and highly variable public transport. We have children and animals and also like to use Freegle (ex freecycle) a lot.
Do we beat ourselves up about occasional car use?
Hell no!
We're only human, and we have lives to lead, but we do try to stick to a few golden rules that I thought I'd share with you today....

• Do you REALLY need to take the car out today?Learn to analyse your proposed trip out in the car. Is it really necessary? Can you wait until a day you can use public transport? Can you even do without making the trip at all? The majority of car trips in the UK are UNDER 5 miles!! Easy cycling distance, moderate walking distance.
• Plan ahead.It sounds so simple doesn't it. But think about how many times a week you run out of bread, cat food, loo roll etc. Work out how much you need of something for a week and then buy one extra.
• Use your car trip in an industrial way.So you really REALLY need to go out in the car, ok, its life or death right? Well make sure you have other things to do while your out. Before you go out make sure you have all the shopping you need. Is there some DIYing you were going to do? Maybe this is the time to nip to the hardware store to pick up those washers or screws or whatevers. Fill the back of your car with the re-cycling you haven't got round to taking out yet. Better yet, ask a neighbour if they need anything while you are out. That way you are potentially saving TWO car trips, and maybe next time they will ask YOU if you need anything from town.
• Make your own rules and stick to them.We never..I mean NEVER drive to the local shop. It is 3 miles away. I can cycle to the shop and back within 40 minutes. The only time the car goes near the shop is if we are on the way back from somewhere further afield. If the weather is too bad for me to think about cycling there, I can't have needed the item that badly can I.
• Re-priorities "emergencies"We tend to treat running out of olives or icing sugar as a family disaster in this current car loving society. So you didn't plan ahead? You will next time right? But in the meantime, change your dinner plan and have pasta WITHOUT olives, leave the icing off the cupcakes. Learn to adapt, learn to be flexible, learn what is really important and stop worrying about the small stuff.
• Explore other avenues of transport.You need to get some where. If you can't walk you can see if its practical to cycle. If not check out the public transport in your area. If that's no good see if you can get a lift with a friend going in the right direction (com'mon, EVERYONE is in their cars, you must know SOMEONE who is driving your way that day?). If all else fails take your car and re-read point no. 3.
• DON'T PANIC!! There are ways around everything if you use a little thought. Try and make appointments around your public transport timetables. Get as much delivered as possible. Talk to your friends and neighbours, try and organise lift shares.
• Don't beat yourself up because you can't afford the new "eco" cars. Its better for an old car to only be driven twice a week than to use an "eco" car so indiscriminately that wheels never stop turning.

Try to look at the thing as a whole.

Use your car as little as possible and its better than using it without thought or care. Before you know it you will have turned around and realised that the car you "couldn't live without" hasn't left your drive for a week.

Good luck and have fun!

PRIVATE POST

A private post to you regular readers.
This is a sensitive one that I don't want out in blog world.

Follow (if you don't already!)and then direct message me at twitter with your email and I will email the post back to you :)

(OOooOOOohh!! Secrets and intrigue!!)

A hard week.

Well apologies are due to my regular readers.

What must you think!

No Meatless Monday!

No new posts!

Even limited twitter time.

There where a lot of small and personal niggles this week but the main upset was a parents consultation I had with my youngest two boys teachers on Monday afternoon.

Usually these things follow a set pattern.
The kids are friendly, polite, work well enough when prodded with sharp sticks that sort of thing.

I LIKE their teachers, really I do. I have know the head teacher for the last 6 years and we have been through some challenging times with my eldest with allergies and dyslexia and have always come out the end on the same track and usually laughing.

The consultation was supposed to be about Alfie as this is his first full term as a Primary one pupil.
A quick 10 minutes to let us know how he has settled in.

As we say down we where told that actually they wanted to talk more about Owen (who is P2. The first 3 classes are mixed though, so they are in the same "class")

Immediately we where told that they were worried about how "immature" they both were, how unfocused when working. Owen especially they said had slipped back and wouldn't concentrate on his work and whined that he was still a "little boy" and wanted to play with the P1's.

Apart from a few extra points this was the basic summing up of the meeting.

I can tell you I was broadsided.
As I had to rush home to meet the older kids I had no time to even process what had been said , let alone ask any questions.

Me and Kim briefly talked about it ont he way home, but then kids and other jobs got in the way and I put it to the back of my mind for the evening.

By the morning we where both fuming and I decided to send the headteacher an email asking for another meeting.
Well I can tell you I was in tears as I wrote it. I sobbed as my fingers typed and I saw how unfair they had been to my boys.

Here is the email.



Hi -----,

Yesterdays consultation broadsided me a bit and as I had to get home for Ollie and --------, I didn't really have time to think of any questions to ask you and Mrs ---- .

May I start by saying we have always found you approachable and understanding and I hope this will be the case now.

Firstly, we were disappointed that a consultation for Alfie turned into a meeting about Owen. We felt we came away with very little information on how Alfie is doing apart from the fact you find him "Immature".
If you felt there was cause to talk to use about Owen before his consultation maybe we could have organised a separate meeting?

We also felt that the problems you feel Owen (and Alfie) have are down to immaturity.We fail to see exactly what you mean and found the whole thing to be a little vague, the word immaturity being bandied around rather than a specific problem being discussed.
We don't consider either of them to be immature when interacting with boys in their age group (which they do out of school) and have always considered them to be MORE mature than boys their age in some respects, that is looking after themselves personally (toileting, dressing etc) and emotionally.
The only reason we can think you consider them immature is in comparison to their peers at -------.
However in the case of Owen I feel comparing him to his peers in unfair.
His class is made up entirely of girls, which in the main (and you admitted this yesterday) do better at this age academically and socially. For Owen to be held up against them is a false comparison In our opinion.
I should also point out that all of the girls in his class attend a great deal of after school, weekend and holiday activities, so are in effect in a "school" environment for almost twice the time Owen is.
For one thing we are unable to afford to send our children to every activity available to them and on the other hand we have no wish to as this is not the way we want to bring them up.
You already know my thoughts on not allowing children to have time to themselves and, without getting personal and I trust this will go no further, we have no wish to listen to our children whining and crying and being generally unhappy because they are being bundled into the car yet again to go to yet another after school activity. This is something we hear every day by living close to people who practice this.
In this instance it feels like we are being penalised for not having the money to do these things and also having a different opinion on child raising.

On the subject of Owen falling behind slightly and wishing to be seen as a "little boy" we feel you are being unsympathetic to his feelings in this case.
If you cast your minds back to when he started P1 he was devastated when the P3 boys would not play with him. Yes he eventually played with the girls but lets face it they played with him like a doll most of the time and for most of the year he moaned to us about having to play with the girls.
Is it any surprise that he should be initially excited about --- (another boy) and Alfie starting school?
Is it any surprise that he should then feel unhappy that he isn't able to work with them in class?
You talk about your fear of Alfie catching Owen up and maybe overtaking him academically, well we don't see this as a problem.
Remember there is only 9 months between them, the same as between Oliver and ---- in P5.
Also shouldn't Owen be given the opportunity to develop self impetus by failing? Surely this is better than spending a life time coaxing him to do better?
We find it hard to get upset about something that when the boys are 10 & 11 or 20 & 21 will simply have no relevance.
This was obviously a big concern between you and Mrs ----- though.

In summing up we both felt that the whole consultation came across as very negative.
We understand that when classes are so small any child lagging behind makes a big impact on class performance statistics, but we have no wish for our children to be educated as statistics.
In this case we would like to arrange another meeting with you to discuss what the real issues of immaturity are.
In all honesty if these boys are going to be treated as though "under performing" we will be considering bringing our homeschool plans forwards.

Yours sincerely

---------------------.

I don't think I could write that out again if I tried I was so upset.

That afternoon I received an email from the headteacher apologising profusely. She agreed that immature had been vague and in retrospect really the wrong word to use.

I actually saw her that afternoon as it was open day and we snatched 20 minutes or so talking and she agreed with me that taking the pressure off Owen to "grow up" is fine by them, yes he should be allowed to develop naturally.
In her defence I am in the minority of parents who feel this way, most if the time she is fending off angry parents demanding to know why their 5 yr old children aren't getting as much homework as the kids in another school!

The trouble with these consultations is that they are so short that to try and cram everything in things get lost along the way.

Anyway another meeting is being arranged and hopefully we will get a clearer picture of their concerns and, as parents, we will be able to take the time to discuss them with the teachers.

I have very definite ideas about my children's education.
Although the plan is to let all 3 of them finish primary education I don't want to end up with broken spirited 11 year olds with no love for learning.
On the other hand the small and personal school is a safe and (mostly) nurturing place for them and gives them a chance to make village friends they will keep.

So that is why I have been off this week.

My crying jags and fits of mild depression over whelmed me and made me feel ill.

But I'm back :)

And I have LOTS to post about :D

Time for a change?

I really enjoy blogging.
I love the freedom I have to write what I think, even if I'm the only person who ever reads it. Unlike a diary I don't have to keep it a secret or writ in it every day (dear diary, had toast for breakfast...again). I can add links and write about current affairs and about all the other stuff in my head that seems to have no other place to go.

I love The (almost) car-less family blog but recently things have taken a turn in the road.

And if anyone out there is reading and has an opinion I would love to hear what you think about the evolution of my little blog world.

Personally I think the blog is getting a little crowded and am thinking of starting a second blog, one that leans more towards the vegan/ permaculture side of my life.
I worry that people who turn up wanting an alternative transport blog will be put off by Peta stickers and vegan recipes!

This may make my online life a little schizophrenic but its how I feel at the moment.

What I want to know is if you agree with any (or as many)of the following statements. Please copy and paste onto a comment with any added thoughts of your own...I really want people to get a full on experience when they come here :)

OK.

1. I think the blog is fine as it is.

2. I would prefer a bike only/ vegan only blog.

3. I like the content of both and would visit both blogs.

4. I like some of the content and might visit the other blog when a relevant link is posted.

5. I would like the bike blog to also tackle family issues (home school health etc)

6. I would like the vegan blog to also contain family issues.

7. I have no opinion on any changes to the blog.


I think that what I am leaning towards is posting as relevant in each blog, both carrying home and enviromental issues and sometimes linking to the other blog.

Really want some opinions here!!

xx